Bad movies come in all shapes and sizes. Sometimes it is the acting, sometimes it is the direction and then editing and music even that ruins films. However, nothing ruins a film like a bad script and most bad movies are actually bad because they are just bad stories or bad scripts.

Heartburn (1986) stars two of the most promising Hollywood actors: Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep. It is written by a celebrated Hollywood writer: Nora Ephron, and directed by a celebrated Hollywood director, Mark Nichols (Graduate, Who's afraid of Virginia Wolf, Catch-22, Carnal Knowledge, Working Girl and so on) and yet Heartburn is one of the most boring, lifeless, trite films you will ever see. There is really just nothing in the story. Loosely based on a real-life affair and marriage between Nora Ephron and Carl Bernstein, this film just has nothing going for it. The story is just not interesting or appealing in any sense.

Meryl Streep and Jack Nicholson and both good as they generally are but there is nothing for them to do that would be of interest to anyone proving that even beautiful people are a chore
when they are not interesting.