Ben Affleck and J.Lo’s Romance Destroyed ‘Gigli’—Here’s Why They Think So!

Jennifer Lopez’s 2003 film Gigli remains one of the most infamous box office flops in Hollywood history. Despite starring in the film alongside Ben Affleck, the romantic comedy was met with near-universal ridicule, and it still holds the distinction of being Lopez’s lowest-rated movie on Rotten Tomatoes. Over two decades later, Lopez has spoken candidly about what she believes went wrong with the film, offering an unexpected take on its failure: she attributes much of its lackluster reception to her own skyrocketing popularity at the time.

In an interview with W Magazine shortly after the film’s release, Lopez acknowledged the movie’s poor reception but defended its merit, stating that parts of it were “genius.” Despite this, she thought the film didn’t get the attention it deserved, primarily because not enough people saw it. She explained that the constant media focus on her personal life, particularly her highly publicized relationship with Ben Affleck, overshadowed the movie itself.

“I really think it will have a resurgence on cable!” Lopez predicted at the time. “Now people may look at me and say, ‘She’s totally off her f***ing rocker,’ but hey, that’s my theory.” Lopez believed the film suffered because of “overexposure” in the media. “But if you’re in the paper every damn day, people are like, ‘Who cares?’ And then nobody goes to see your movie!” she added. Lopez felt that audiences were tired of hearing about her personal life and that this overexposure led to Gigli being dismissed without fair consideration.

Ben Affleck, who was in a highly public relationship with Lopez at the time, agreed with her assessment. In a separate interview, Affleck described how the constant media attention surrounding their romance overshadowed the film. “It’s just that it became a story in and of itself,” he told Entertainment Weekly. “The funny name, the Jennifer Lopez romance and overexposure of that, it was kind of a perfect storm.” Affleck also admitted that their situation created “the worst of both worlds,” with their personal lives dominating headlines, but failing to translate into box office success. He expressed frustration at becoming a tabloid fixture and feared his career would be defined by negative press rather than his work.

The film’s director, Martin Brest, was even more critical of Gigli. When asked about the film years later, he admitted that he hardly remembered what the finished product looked like. “Of all the movies that I’ve worked on, I know them inside and out. I don’t even know what that movie looks like, frankly, because of the manner in which it took shape,” Brest told Variety. Brest also revealed that the film’s original vision was vastly different from what was ultimately released. He took responsibility for the film’s failure, acknowledging that the film deserved its harsh reception. “It’s so weird — I literally don’t remember the movie that was released,” he admitted. “So it’s really a bloody mess that deserved its excoriation.”

Despite Gigli’s failure, Lopez’s career continued to thrive. She went on to have a string of successes in both music and film, proving that a single flop didn’t define her. Gigli, while largely forgotten in the broader scope of her career, remains a significant moment in the early 2000s media landscape—one where the personal lives of celebrities often took precedence over their professional work. Lopez’s reflective comments about the film show her awareness of how fame, especially the intense media scrutiny surrounding her at the time, played a key role in the film’s lack of success. However, her ability to bounce back from this setback further solidified her status as a resilient and versatile star in the entertainment industry.