8 Worst Jared Leto Movies, Ranked

So, Jared Leto. He’s an actor. He is in movies. He is also in a band. He does stuff. He divides people. He could be divisive. Or maybe he’s not divisive, because most people seem to not be particularly fond of his movies, at least of late, perhaps because he’s been in some questionable ones, he himself has acted questionably, or because he has acted questionably.

To be a little balanced up front, he has been in some good movies. He had small but fairly memorable roles in Fight Club and American Psycho, was solid as one of the main characters in Requiem for a Dream, had a part in Blade Runner 2049 (though perhaps was the weakest part of the overall cast), and won an Oscar for Dallas Buyers Club. In essence, you might not want to avoid a movie just because it has Jared Leto in it, but you also might want to avoid these particular movies with Jared Leto in them.

8

‘Black and White’ (1999)

Image via Sony Pictures Releasing

This one is obscure, but for good reason, since Black and White is not very good as a social drama with an impressive (but wasted) ensemble cast, maybe like Crash but not nearly as notorious. It’s set around the hip-hop world and even stars some members of the Wu-Tang Clan, but they don’t play themselves, but then Mike Tyson is in the movie and does play himself.

Also here, beyond Leto, are the likes of Robert Downey Jr., Joe Pantoliano, Brooke Shields, Ben Stiller, and Elijah Wood, with Black and White also being helmed by Joe Toback, who was more recently ordered to pay $1.68 billion after a lawsuit… in case you want another reason to find Black and White uncomfortable to watch nowadays. It’s pretty bad, but of course it is and, again, it’s not hard to see why it’s forgotten.

7

‘House of Gucci’ (2021)

Like a dish made with an ingredient you don’t like very much, it’s possible to watch House of Gucci and eat around (so to speak) Jared Leto, because some of the movie is fun if you like particularly campy crime movies. The emphasis there should be on “some of,” though, because there are admittedly Leto-less scenes here that really drag; a natural consequence of stretching what should’ve been an approximately 100 to 120-minute-long movie to 158 minutes for no good reason. So, it’s a dish with an off ingredient in it, but also, the dish itself feels far too big to eat in one sitting.

House of Gucci should’ve been an approximately 100 to 120-minute-long movie, but it’s stretched out to 158 minutes for no good reason.

It’s one of many Ridley Scott movies that’s not irredeemable, but is very flawed, though Lady Gaga, Adam Driver, and Al Pacino are sometimes amusing with the hammy material they’re given. Jared Leto is also really going for it, but he probably comes the closest to making a genuine clown out of himself, and so even if House of Gucci might technically be better in other areas compared to Black and White, it’s being ranked ahead of that one here, just because of the Leto factor.

6

‘Alexander’ (2004)

A lesser movie in the rather chaotic filmography of Oliver Stone, Alexander is all about Alexander the Great, including his early life, some of his key relationships, and the various conquests he led/battles he took part in. There is a scale to it all that’s impressive in small bursts, but Alexander is muddled overall, and no matter which cut you watch (they range from long to incredibly lengthy), things do kind of drag.

It’s not a very good epic at all, and there are some questionable casting choices, as well as a lack of unity when it comes to accents between all the various actors. Jared Leto isn’t in it too much, as Hephaestion, who was friends (or maybe something more) with Alexander himself, but in Leto’s defense, no one in the cast really comes out of this one entirely unscathed.

5

‘TRON: Ares’ (2025)

Truthfully, none of the movies in the Tron series are all that good, and it’s this baffling thing that just keeps on going throughout pop culture, even though the movies themselves become sort of cult classics at best. They’re all eye-popping visuals, and the occasionally interesting sci-fi concept, but not much more, and so TRON: Ares being yet another film in the series was confounding. Why do they keep Tronning? Who wants Tron?

And who wants a Tron movie starring Jared Leto? Apparently, not many people, if the lackluster box office response is anything to go by, with TRON: Ares costing as much as $220 million, but only making about $142 million worldwide. It’s probably got even less of a shot at becoming a mild sort of cult classic in the coming years/decades; less compared to Tron (1982) and Tron: Legacy (2010), which themselves aren’t all that great either (sorry).

4

‘The Little Things’ (2021)

Jared Leto as Albert Sparma, holding his hand in front of him as headlights shine on him in The Little Things

One of many movies about some kind of dark and emotionally taxing search for a potential serial killer, The Little Things is the sort of film that’ll make you wish you were watching something helmed by David Fincher (like Se7en or Zodiac) instead. Denzel Washington and Rami Malek play two detectives on the hunt, and Leto plays an unsettling individual who might be responsible for the murders being investigated.

Blah, blah, blah, it’s been done before, it’s whatever, it’s flat, it’s there, it exists, but not many people remember it – or talk about it all that much – even though 2021 wasn’t all that long ago in the overall scheme of things. The Little Things is content masquerading as a movie, and you deserve better. You can also easily find better, too, since there are – as mentioned before – plenty of crime/thriller/mystery/horror movies about detectives and serial killers.

3

‘Chapter 27’ (2007)

A fairly pointless instance of method acting can be found in Chapter 27, as it’s a movie no one knows or really cares about, but Jared Leto still purportedly put on 67 pounds to play Mark David Chapman, who murdered John Lennon (formerly of the Beatles) in 1980. Chapter 27 is all about the lead-up to that event, seemingly wanting to explore the mind of Chapman, but it feels exploitative and kind of crass.

It’s a tricky event to handle well on screen, acting and writing-wise, and Chapter 27 falls flat, feeling like a pretty shallow attempt to either win awards or stir some controversy. It’s best avoided, and that’s what most people have done since it came out in 2007, because you really don’t hear much about Chapter 27, unless the topic at hand is bad and/or notorious Jared Leto movies. Case in point, the last 142 words.

2

‘Suicide Squad’ (2016)

There are some very good DC movies out there, and then there’s also Suicide Squad, which might not even be the very worst, but it does have Jared Leto feeling miscast and seemingly willing to tank any momentum the film might otherwise have. The entire thing struggles to get into any particular groove, admittedly, but you feel that messiness more when Leto is trying to do his thing (whatever that thing is) as the Joker.

And there have also been some legendary performances done bringing this character to the big screen, like Jack Nicholson, Heath Ledger (of course), and Joaquin Phoenix (more so in the first Joker movie than that confounding second one)… then there’s Leto’s Joker. If you find someone who likes any other live-action Joker less than Jared Leto’s one, then let a scientist know or something, because you’ve found a truly rare specimen. Also, just watch The Suicide Squad (2021) instead of this one, because it’s Suicide Squad done right.

1

‘Morbius’ (2022)

And then there’s an even more notorious superhero movie Jared Leto starred in, and it is, of course, Morbius. The film so nice they released it twice, the existence of Morbius is a bit of a joke, and the ironic memes about it were kind of funny for a while, but the film itself is tedious, unappealing, and visually bland, with that scene of Matt Smith dancing being about as fun as it gets.

Morbius is about a man who tries to cure himself of a blood disease, but his attempts end up turning him into a vampire, and also a pretty underwhelming/edgy anti-hero. The joke kind of continued with further Spider-Man-less Sony Marvel movies, like Madame Web and Kraven the Hunter, but Morbius could well be the most memed, and thereby perhaps the worst (Madame Web is admittedly tough competition, though).