But I am convinced that enough time has gone by that it deserves its day in the cinematic court of appeals. I want to be clear, I don’t think that Waterworld is some misunderstood masterpiece. And after re-watching it for the first time earlier this week, I think it’s quite a bit better than that. I remember seeing Waterworld on opening day 25 years ago and thinking it wasn’t all that terrible. If I wasn’t writing this, I’d probably be thinking that, too. That this is just another one of those insincere, contrarian hot takes where a critic goes to bat for some dinged-up piece of pop-culture flotsam in the hopes of getting a few clicks. But let me propose a possibly heretical idea: What if Waterworld isn’t actually that bad? What if it’s actually…kind of good?

In retrospect, there was really no way that it couldn’t have become the biggest cinematic folly of the ‘90s. For months, the tabloids had chronicled the film’s ever-escalating budget, its seemingly endless string of production delays, and the off-screen trials of its star, Costner, who’d become ensnarled in a messy private divorce from his wife at the time and an even messier public one from his Waterworld director, Kevin Reynolds.

It's got memorable characters, solid action sequences, a unique post-apocalyptic setting, and themes that are depressingly still relevant today.Like any $180 million ego trip-especially one top-lined by a guy who America had decided was overdue for a crash-and-burn bit of karmic comeuppance- Waterworld was doomed to fail before it ever stood a chance. Costner plays a nameless loner with webbed feet called The Mariner, who's searching for a mythical body of land called 'Dryland.' It checks a lot of boxes. Waterworld is set 500 years in the future, when global warming has melted the polar ice caps and left Earth nearly entirely covered in water. The consensus is, it's better than we all remember. And recently, critics have been giving it a second look.

While it wasn't a smash hit domestically, it did gross $264 million worldwide against a budget of $175 million (via The Hollywood Reporter), and that doesn't include home video or TV broadcasting rights. Waterworld is a post-apocalyptic action thriller that came out in 1995 and starred Kevin Costner, and it's still considered one of the most notorious movie flops of the 1990s. Hopefully, this guide will be a bit more useful. Algorithms can only be so precise, and sometimes their recommendations can be nonsensical - I.E., if you liked Jaws, you'll love Free Willy, right? Even so, it can still be difficult to find great new movies to watch. With streaming services and traditional studios churning out hundreds of new movies a year, moviegoers have more choices than ever before.

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