You Are Wrong About Kevin Costner’s Waterworld (Probably)

Whenever you think of Waterworld, the Kevin Costner-starring dystopian action movie that turns 30 this summer, chances are you immediately think of the world “flop.” There are few films in Hollywood history that carry the stink of failure as potently as the movie where they gave Wyatt Earp gills behind the ears.

Indeed, Waterworld may be one of the film industry’s most notorious disasters, at least according to legend: the wildly expensive folly of its egotistical star that went stupendously over-budget while trying to create a realistic, err, world of water, only to then sink at the box office and become the new byword for industry disaster. Critics dubbed it “Kevin’s Gate” and “Fishtar,” alluding to two other legendary flops from New Hollywood’s heyday. Even now the film is talked about as a cautionary tale, a sign to never let insanity prevail in the face of a blank check. But all of that lore doesn’t quite tell the true tale of Waterworld. 

By the early 1990s, Costner was one of the biggest stars on the planet. Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves proved his box office prowess in spite of using a Californian accent in medieval Nottingham; JFK was a critical darling; and Costner won a slew of Oscars for his directorial debut, Dances With Wolves. He had the power to do whatever he wanted by 1995, yet he decided to sign on to a Mad Max rip-off featuring jetskis. Alongside his regular collaborator Kevin Reynolds, who directed Costner in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves and Fandango, the star rewrote the script several times and signed onboard as star and producer.

Many industry figures joked that Costner was the real Kevin in charge of Waterworld’s production, and as the shoot became an overlong nightmare of health and safety violations with an increasingly inflated budget, Costner bore the brunt of the blame. Costner was on the set for 157 days and almost died when he got stuck to the mast of his character’s sinking boat. Filming took place in a large artificial seawater enclosure, which was plagued by inclement weather and the camera crew being pushed out of position by the currents. One of the majestic floating sets sank. Joss Whedon was flown out to do seven weeks of script rewrites, which he said mostly involved adhering to whatever Costner wanted him to do.

Eventually Reynolds quit the film and wouldn’t reconcile with Costner for decades. Universal Pictures started the movie with an authorized budget of $100 million. By the time it was complete, Waterworld cost a reported $175 million, making it the most expensive film of all time up to that point. (Titanic was still a few years off.)

Reviews were not as damning as you may have expected for such a notorious production. Roger Ebert liked it, and so did Entertainment Weekly, even if its status as a wannabe Mad Max was evident to all. But the bad press surrounding it overpowered everything, to the point where the truth became a footnote. So it may surprise you to learn that Waterworld wasn’t a flop. It earned $264.2 million worldwide, making it the ninth-highest-grossing movie of 1995 (although its exorbitant budget did mean it stayed in the red in cinemas.) Conversely, its VHS and LaserDisc releases eventually did make the film profitable.

The film has also left behind a surprising cultural footprint thanks to the four Waterworld-related attractions at Universal Studios theme parks around the globe. The stunt spectacular is still playing to eager crowds every day in Hollywood, which isn’t too shabby for a film that we’re told nobody saw or liked. 

But what of the film itself? Is Waterworld all that bad? Well, no. It’s not necessarily a hidden gem but it is a highly watchable sci-fi action movie full of practical sets and stunts that are genuinely impressive to witness.

You’d never see a movie like this in 2025, at least not with this kind of physical presence shot in a tank, rather than wall-to-wall CGI employed these days (see even George Miller’s latest Wasteland epic, Furiosa). There is something fascinatingly old-fashioned about Waterworld in its earnestness and commitment to goodness winning out over evil (represented here by a never-hammier Dennis Hopper.) It’s also unabashedly pro-environmentalist, which feels a touch radical at a time when any movie with the vaguest hint of a political message is hijacked for the so-called culture wars. This is a film about how much climate change is going to destroy us! 

The biggest problem with the film is its tone. It’s often grand but largely silly in ways it doesn’t seem aware of. Costner plays the hero, a stoic loner of the sea who is also half-fish. At one point he even leaps through the air like a dolphin. The Mad Max series works because George Miller knows how to balance the sinister with the camp, but Waterworld tries so hard to make steampunk-esque goons on Kawasaki jetskis seem terrifying, and they just aren’t. Mad Max movies are also smart enough to strip away any plot complexities in favor of reaching toward the mythic, whereas Waterworld is convoluted and ends up with a strangely muddled narrative that nobody asked for. 

Still, this is not the Worst Film Ever Made, as it’s often labeled, nor is it an embarrassing mega-flop that forever stained Hollywood. There’s a lot to enjoy in Waterworld, especially if you yearn for the days when not every blockbuster was shot on a green screen or part of a 25-plus film franchise. Costner’s career is full of fascinating ambition and follies that didn’t always pay off, but there’s more to be proud of in Waterworld than ashamed of. Perhaps history will finally catch up with him when it comes to his time on the high seas.