Credit: Far Out / Lionsgate
Thu 30 July 2026 15:30, UK
Underrated hasn’t really been a word Robert De Niro has been associated with for the last two decades; he’s either starring in something reprehensible or he’s showing odd flashes of the old brilliance.
Then again, maybe he’s being held to a higher standard than most, and he should be. After all, he’s Robert De Niro, one of the greatest actors in cinema history, so when he phones it in or sleepwalks through another horrific attempt at comedy, it stings that little bit more.
The other side of the argument is that he’s allowed to do so because he is, again, Robert De Niro, one of the greatest actors in cinema history. He’s paid his dues, collected his flowers, and his legacy as one of the best to ever step foot in front of the cameras was secured by the end of the 1970s.
These days, he’s either good or he’s not. He’s added two Academy Award nominations for acting to his collection since 2013, with Silver Linings Playbook and Killers of the Flower Moon showing that he’s still got it, as did Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman, even with that laughable scene where he’s kicking that fella.
And yet, the terrible comedies and bargain-basement thrillers keep coming. Having made his screen debut in 1965, you’d be well within reason to assume that De Niro would pick an older, deeper cut as the single most underrated picture he’s ever made. Instead, he opted for a 2009 drama that barely anyone saw.
When asked that very question, writer and director Kirk Jones’ Everybody’s Fine was the first and only thing that came to mind. “Everybody did such a great job,” the famously taciturn legend put it. “I wished he had done more.” The ‘he’ in this case being disgraced mogul Harvey Weinstein, who barely put any of his once-mighty marketing power behind the film, which is why it flopped.
Joined by a starry ensemble that included Drew Barrymore, Kate Beckinsale, Sam Rockwell, and Melissa Leo, the Raging Bull and Goodfellas headliner plays a retired widower who heads off across the country to stop in and visit his four kids after their family reunion is cancelled, only to discover that they aren’t living the quaint, idyllic, and altogether perfect lives he’d been told they were.
Further reading: Cutting Room Floor
It’s alright, but not really worthy of being called the most underrated movie that De Niro has ever made. However, he’s Robert De Niro, as we’ve mentioned, and we’re not, so if he wants to place Everybody’s Fine at the pinnacle of his underappreciated pile, then nobody else is in a position to argue.
How much does he love the film? So much that he also called it his favourite role that he’s ever played, and when that comes from the guy who took top billing in Taxi Driver, Mean Streets, Heat, The Deer Hunter, The King of Comedy, Cape Fear, Casino, and countless others, that’s saying an awful lot.
