![\"Denzel](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Denzel-Washington-Actor-1992-Far-Out-Magazine-1140x855.jpg\")
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Credit: Far Out \/ YouTube Still<\/p>\n
Wed 1 July 2026 20:15, UK <\/p>\n
There\u2019s enough evidence to suggest that the Oscars curse is a very real thing, but of all the stars who\u2019ve gone from the industry\u2019s highest high to their lowest low in double-quick time, you wouldn\u2019t think of Denzel Washington<\/a> as one of them.<\/p>\n If you want to split hairs, then he isn\u2019t, since he hadn\u2019t yet claimed his first Academy Award. On the other hand, the incontrovertible truth is that his first big-screen credit after Edward Zwick\u2019s Glory, which won him the prize for \u2018Best Supporting Actor\u2019, was and remains the worst movie of his entire career.<\/p>\n To qualify as a victim of the curse<\/a>, an actor usually follows up the biggest night of their professional life with their onscreen nadir, so technically, Washington missed the cut. However, seven weeks after Glory arrived in cinemas, and less than eight weeks before he took to the stage in front of his peers to collect his Oscar, the risible Heart Condition was released in cinemas.<\/p>\n It\u2019s the sort of thing that nobody batted an eyelid at in February 1990 when it premiered, but today, it\u2019s a horrible piece of work. On paper, Washington and Bob Hoskins as a bickering odd couple does have some amount of potential, but through a modern lens, the execution could generously be called eyebrow-raising<\/a>.<\/p>\n In director James D Parriott\u2019s caper, the diminutive geezer plays an openly racist cop who loathes Washington\u2019s lawyer, and the latter even dates the former\u2019s ex-girlfriend. When Washington\u2019s Napoleon Stone is killed, though, Hoskins\u2019 Jack Mooney wakes up from a near-fatal heart attack to discover that he\u2019s been gifted his arch-enemy\u2019s ticker.<\/p>\n Obviously, he\u2019s also being haunted by Stone\u2019s ghost, and they form a reluctant partnership to solve his murder. That doesn\u2019t sound too bad, and it may not have been, were it not for the script shoehorning in jokes about the size of Washington\u2019s package or Moony\u2019s shock at discovering that African-Americans enjoy bowling, to which Stone replies, \u201cWe swim, too.\u201d<\/p>\n Urban legends have whispered that Washington\u2019s arm was twisted into making Heart Condition by his agent, and the film\u2019s woeful reception, which sees it endure as the worst-reviewed picture he\u2019s ever been in more than 35 years after its release, saw him make the conscious decision to keep comedy at arm\u2019s length for decades<\/a>.<\/p>\n Further reading: Cutting Room Floor<\/p>\n Whether that\u2019s true or not, the two-time Oscar winner couldn\u2019t be faulted for his enthusiasm before it was released. \u201cThe script has humour, wit, zaniness; people haven\u2019t seen me in that light,\u201d he explained. \u201cThis is different for me. My friends say I\u2019m crazy, saying I have a good sense of humour, and I\u2019m finally able to show it,\u201d with the star adding that he was \u201chaving fun just being silly.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s great, and it came at exactly the right time,\u201d Washington concluded. \u201cI needed it.\u201d He may have felt that way in 1990, but based on the reception, you\u2019d be hard-pressed to find anyone who\u2019d agree with him. Heart Condition is, in fact, an atrocious movie that\u2019s often galling in both its casual and overt racism, and it\u2019s unlikely to ever be dislodged as the worst thing the icon has ever made.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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