It's inevitable that every movie star has at least a few projects they regret making, and Bruce Willis is no exception, having spoken out negatively about a handful from his career. Willis made his debut as a leading role in a feature film with the 1987 rom-com Blind Date. From there, he spawned a well-known and lucrative movie career, studded with iconic gems like the Die Hard series, Pulp Fiction, The Sixth Sense, 12 Monkeys, and Nobody's Fool.
But there's been a lot more to Willis' time as an actor than delivering perpetually-quoted lines like, "Yippee-ki-yay!," as John McClane and "Zed's dead, baby," as Butch Coolidge. While he's still a household name, Willis is no longer a leading man, as he once was, and it's easy to overlook the fact that even he has some regrets about certain career choices. In 2007, he interacted with fans on the website for Ain't It Cool News, answering queries and shedding light on past films and his feelings surrounding some of them.
Within the comments, Willis shared his feelings on 1988's Sunset and 1993's Striking Distance. In Sunset, he plays veteran actor Tom Mix, who befriends real-life Wyatt Earp (James Garner) on the set of a silent film and works with him to track down a murderer. In Striking Distance, he plays homicide detective Tom Hardy, who's being taunted by a killer. He said about both films, "I reject all judgment, and in general keep my own counsel, for good or bad. Which is why I can take credit for deciding to do movies like 12 Monkey's and Pulp Fiction, as well as having to hang my head for deciding to do dogs like Striking Distance and Sunset." Though there isn't much elaboration, Willis clearly doesn't hold the latter two films in high regard.
Between the two, there were other successes, including Willis' stint on Friends. In a similar vein of criticism, he said about his brutal 2003 war drama Tears of the Sun, where he plays Lieutenant Waters, "The lesson of Tears [of the Sun] was never start a film without a finished script." In addition to his qualms with the script, it can be inferred that there are multiple reasons for his feelings on the film. For one, it performed poorly at the box office. Willis was also injured on-set after being hit in the head with a firework that was part of a special effect, prompting the actor to sue the producers. He expressed another kind of dissatisfaction in response to his sexually charged 1994 romantic thriller Color of Night, where he plays psychiatrist Bill Capa as he's stalked by a killer and strikes up a steamy relationship with a young woman. Willis, who will likely not be returning for Red 3, seemed displeased with the movie's inclusion of full-frontal nudity on his part during a sex scene in the director's cut: "When the w*** shot appeared in dailies, the director promised me it would never be in the film. But during the editing process, the Director got into a fight with the Studio, lawsuit followed, and as a concession, the Director got his director's cut, and he left the w*** shot in for all time. But it is a highly skippable movie... "
Five years before his sci-fi flick Looper with Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Willis did the 2007 psychological thriller Perfect Stranger, where he plays big-time advertising executive Harrison Hill. Speaking about the movie, he said "...Perfect Stranger was ruined by the producers." Willis also didn't quite agree with the way the MPAA decided on the film's rating: "Perfect Stranger, which was supposed to have a Hard R rating, got knocked DOWN to a PG-13 rating when all the rampant sex that was meant to be in it never materialized. What stayed in were a TON of "F***s". Way more than 2... I am not holding out any hope with these remarks, I am only saying that I found this to be a peculiar concept, and proof that there is some play in the MPAA's rules." It's unfortunate that Bruce Willis isn't keen on some of his past work, but with such an extensive career including a possible Die Hard 6, there were bound to be a few projects he didn't love.