Ben Affleck Calls 'Gigli' The 'Perfect Storm;' Says 'It Couldn't Be Worse'

A new year typically means you’re looking ahead at the future, and establishing goals for the next 365 days.

For Ben Affleck, his new year is having him reflect on the past, including the good, the bad and the “Gigli.”

If you’re not familiar with how to pronounce “Gigli,” or just have no clue what the heck it even means, it was a movie Affleck starred in alongside his girlfriend, Jennifer Lopez.

In fact, the two were dating during the filming of the movie and got engaged soon after.

According to IMDB.com, “Gigli” is a 2003 comedy, crime romance film starring Affleck and Lopez. It received two-point-five stars out of ten.

The film synopsis is as follows: “Larry Gigli is assigned by a crime boss to kidnap the brother of a prominent district attorney. A beautiful woman known only as Ricki is sent to stay with him to make sure he doesn’t mess up the job.”

It received dogs**t reviews, yet somehow is still talked about nearly 20 years later.

Affleck recently sat down with his real-life best friend, Matt Damon, for an interview with Entertainment Weekly.

The two BFFs talked everything from “Gigli,” J.Lo and his years-long friendship with Damon.

In regard to his 2003 film with the “Let’s Get Loud” singer, he said, “It’s just that it became a story in and of itself. The funny name, the Jennifer Lopez romance and overexposure of that, it was kind of a perfect storm.”

He told director Marty Brest it “couldn’t get worse.”

“The Friday it came out and I was like it’s just spectacular, it’s a tsunami, it couldn’t be worse. This is as bad as it gets…if the reaction to Gigli hadn’t happened, I probably wouldn’t have ultimately decided, ‘I don’t really have any other avenue but to direct movies,’ which has turned out to be the real love of my professional life,” he explained.

He explained the film was in some ways a “gift,” and it led to him meeting Lopez.

Despite critics saying Affleck and Lopez didn’t have chemistry on-screen, their romance was heating up off-screen.

The two got engaged in November 2002 and were planning their big day for September 2003.

Sadly, the two called it quits just days before their wedding day and confirmed their split in January 2004.

But as fate would have it, the two rekindled their romance in 2020 after Lopez broke off her years-long engagement to Alex Rodriguez.

They’ve been moving full-steam ahead ever since.

In terms of the tabloids constantly covering their relationship when they first got together, the “Argo” actor said, “Jennifer and I happened to be together at a time where the whole industry of celebrity journalism, if you want to call it that, sort of exploded. But I thought, “S**t, this is really not how I had hoped to go, where I’m going to be, what? Famous for being an a**hole or a failure and not able to work?’”

Despite setbacks such as “Gigli,” a divorce, and fighting alcohol addiction, one thing is for sure; Affleck loves the fact that he’s still acting at 49-years-old.

He explained that he’s no longer “bulls****ing” himself while acting.

Affleck explained, “You start going, ‘You know, I actually know where my feelings are.’ And the more I figured it out, the more accessible that was. I know what painful is and I know what disillusioned is and I know what ambivalent is, I know what nostalgia is.”

#PREACH

Speaking of nostalgia, Damon and Affleck have been friends for over 24-years.

“This friendship has been essential and defining and so important to me in my life,” he said of Damon. “Your support is so profoundly meaningful to me, and I don’t think I would have been able to be successful without it.”