Critics Got These 5 Movies Dead Wrong The First Time — And History Absolutely Corrected Them

Blade Runner Wasn't A 'Masterpiece' In 1982 — It Was A Confusing Flop

Ridley Scott's neo-noir opened to a genuinely lukewarm response, with Variety's original review warning that its "unrelenting grimness and vacuum at the story's center will make it tough to recoup" its budget. Janet Maslin's New York Times review called it "muddled yet mesmerizing" and flat-out said the plot "has great lapses," and audiences agreed enough that it barely cracked the year's top 30 at the box office. Four decades, multiple director's cuts, and one Rotten Tomatoes flip later, it's a certified 89% sci-fi landmark that spawned an entire genre's visual language — the critics who called it all style, no substance were simply wrong.

Vertigo Was Dismissed As 'Far-Fetched Nonsense' — Then It Became The Greatest Film Ever Made

When Vertigo hit theaters in 1958, The New Yorker's John McCarten lambasted it as "far-fetched nonsense," while Variety dismissed it as "too long and slow" for what was basically just a murder mystery. Even Sight and Sound's own editor Penelope Houston was unimpressed at the time, writing that Hitchcock was "repeating himself in slow motion." Fast forward to 2012, and that same magazine's international critics' poll crowned Vertigo the single greatest film ever made, dethroning Citizen Kane's 50-year reign — proof that the critics who called it Hitchcock coasting were about a half-century behind the joke.

The Shawshank Redemption Bombed So Hard It Barely Broke Even — Now It's IMDb's Literal #1

This is the ultimate glow-up: Frank Darabont's prison drama opened on just 33 screens, and even after a wide release it limped to a $16 million domestic total against a $25 million budget, getting steamrolled by Pulp Fiction and Forrest Gump. Producer Liz Glotzer even believed a lackluster Los Angeles Times review actively scared crowds away from theaters. Word-of-mouth, VHS rentals, and endless TNT reruns rewrote history completely — today it sits at the very top of IMDb's Top 250 with a jaw-dropping 9.3 rating, ahead of The Godfather and every other so-called classic.

Critics Called The Big Lebowski 'Mediocre' — Now There's An Entire Festival Devoted To It

The Coen Brothers followed up their Oscar-winning Fargo with a stoner noir that left plenty of critics cold: The New Yorker's David Denby wrote that "it's only amusing the first time the Dude gets lost in his own story," and The GW Hatchet flatly declared it ranked "mediocre among Coen brother movies." Nobody was ready for what happened next — the annual Lebowski Fest launched in 2002 and is still traveling to major cities, complete with White Russians and Dudeist ministers officiating actual weddings. The same "incoherent" plot critics complained about is now exactly why people can't stop quoting it.

Fight Club Was Called Fascist Propaganda On Release — Now It's A Defining Film Of Its Decade

David Fincher's adaptation didn't just get mixed reviews, it got savaged: The New Yorker's David Denby branded it "a fascist rhapsody," and The Hollywood Reporter's own review warned it was "bound to polarize critics and audiences" while calling its violence "increasingly sadistic and cruel." It flopped hard too, earning roughly $37 million domestically against a $63 million budget. A decade later The New York Times was calling it the "defining cult movie of our time," and its Rotten Tomatoes score has since climbed to a certified-fresh 81% — the same messy, confrontational satire that scandalized critics in 1999 is now taught as a snapshot of the era.