No-Name Box Office

Eric Bana. Who is he? What else has he been in? Where did he come from?
If you can answer any of these questions then you are obviously one-up on most of us who have never even heard of the actor until his big screen--big green--stint as Stan Lee's hero The Hulk. Yet, he has managed to open a movie over the weekend with $60 million plus. A feat ususally reserved for stars with bigger names, bigger salaries and bigger egos.

Some questions:

I feel a new trend in Hollywood, do you? A trend that means a little or unknown actor can indeed be a box office draw. How can this be? I mean look at the quest for the new Superman, or the search for an actor to revive the roll of Batman.

Do you think that movies based on comic books are popular because of the star playing the hero, or because the real star is the comic book hero himself? Huh..and the star of the Hulk isn't even a real actor, but a CGI creation who works for free!!

Input...input.

__________________
I have been formatted to fit this screen.

r66-The member who always asks WHY?

The first time I ever heard of Eric Bana was in Black Hawk Down… but apparently he’s pretty well known in Australia…

And as strange as it may be, I think the real star is the comic book hero… Look at Christopher Reeves and Tobey Maguire… neither of them were really that well known but who is the first person you think of now when you hear Superman or Spiderman…

__________________

Like Caitlyn said, Black Hawk Down is the only film I've seen him in.

I disagree. The trend I see is the super hero/comic book trend. (X-Men, Daredevil, Spiderman, you name it). The reason to why this film was such a hit had nothing to do with Bana, but a lot to do with the Hulk concept and the marketing of that concept. Since it is an animated character (Eric Bana plays in fact the "dull" Dr Banner - not the cool Hulk) the company has been able to make and feed us with exciting trailers and stuff plus a computer game a long time now. The Hulk is also one of the most well known super heros a lot thanks to the 80's series. I couldn't care less about Daredevil but I sure as hell will see my man The Hulk! I watched the series and read the magazines.

And another reason for the hit: Ang Lee.

Oh, there we had it... Well, as I said above - yes, that is exactly what I think is the case. But Daredevil would never have pulled that one off - it needed a star like Affleck.

Maybe him being australian has someting to do with that.

I don't agree with you completely on Tobey Maguire. I was very familiar with him and liked him a lot after having seen him in great films like The Ice Storm, Ride with the Devil (both by Ang Lee) and Wonder Boys. I think he made his real breakthrough to the big masses with Spiderman though. Great choice to pick him, by the way. He is just the right actor for the slightly ironic Spiderman/Peter Parker.

Another trend that I see, and that kind of bothers me a little, is all the trilogies. This is a very smart way of making more money especially when you make all three at the same time and then portion them out one at the time. Selling three movies for the produciton cost of one. It irritates me that the film industry has turned into some soap opera who makes us addicted to the trilogies. I didn't like the first two Star Wars prequels, but I know I will see the last one. I thought the second LOTR-film was nothing like the first one, but of course I will have to see the last one. I get irritated by the fact that Matrix has turned into a concept just like Batman or Star Wars and is incorporated in several commercials for all kinds of stuff, and comes complete with a computer game and an animated version. It has lost all that air of cult status and mystique that the first episode created - and I actually don't feel very tempted to see Reloaded. But I know I will anyway. And everything I've read about it confrims my fear of the story having to step aside in favour of more action. Spiderman is a trilogy too, right? I don't care so much about this since the first one didn't really do it for me. A bit too much of a kids-film for me.

__________________
The novelist does not long to see the lion eat grass. He realizes that one and the same God created the wolf and the lamb, then smiled, "seeing that his work was good".

--------

They had temporarily escaped the factories, the warehouses, the slaughterhouses, the car washes - they'd be back in captivity the next day but now they were out - they were wild with freedom. They weren't thinking about the slavery of poverty. Or the slavery of welfare and food stamps. The rest of us would be all right until the poor learned how to make atom bombs in their basements.

Ah… that would be the answer then… I wasn’t sure if he was Australian or not and I was too lazy to go look...


I knew who Tobey was too… I loved him in The Wonder Boys and Ride With the Devil (haven’t seen The Ice Storm yet) but when they announced he was going to play Spiderman, there were a lot of people asking who he was… I couldn’t agree with you more about Tobey being the perfect choice for Spidey/Parker though… he was great…

Bad girl!! This is one of the best films of the 90's! You will love it if you like films like Wonder Boys. It has an excellent cast: Maguire, Sigourney Weaver, Elijah Wood, Kevin Kline, Christina Ricci, and other great actors, and it's beautifully shot (it's Ang Lee for god's sake) and the story is original and important. See it!!!

I think that it's better that big budget movies are casting unknowns to play the big roles instead of the usual BIG names, like Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt because there is no guarantee that the movie will do well because of the name of the star

__________________
http://free.eh-solutions.net/spheric...0Signature.jpg

Yeah, that is acutally a good thing.

I think we're witnessing a generation change in the big blockbuster stars department.

Gaahhh! I haven't seen The Ice Storm either Piddy. I love Ang Lee's other movie's. Alright.....you've convinced me. I have to see it now. Please don't hurt me.....too badly.

If I ever see The Hulk it would be because of Ang Lee.

Hey, you're the one with a love for whips!!

Yeah, that's one of the reasons to why I am so interested in it too.

Okay…. Okay… I added it to my list...

You better.........

Even though it's not a comic book, I'm interested to see if 28 Days Later can be a big opener here. I think that would do the most help to your theory, since the cast is comprised entirely of unkowns and character actors.

__________________
You're not hopeless...

I've been meaning to buy 28 Days Later on DVD for about a month now, I just haven't got around to it. Anyway I think it did alright at the UK Box Office

It kind of flopped here....

I'm guessing that you mean America, I'll get around to purchasing it eventually and when I do I'll make sure to post my opinion on it, by the way if you're gonna suggest renting it - don't, because I refuse to rent DVDs

eric bana is mark chopper reid in "chopper"

one of the best performances ive seen in the last 10 years.

he was also a stand up comic in oz.

im not austrailian by the way!

__________________
i hate hugh grant

It's not out in america for a couple days he might mean another europeon country perhaps?

__________________
Boards don't hit back

No, I mean Sweden and probably several other european countries as well.

I'd like to comment on something here that has me questioning my Ameri-ccentric attitude toward Europe and the US when it come to entertainment.

Not all movies are released at the same time around the world. Piddzilla has pointed this out in another thread. For instance 28 Days Later will be released theatrically in the US on the 27th of June. Whereas it has already had a theater run everywhere else in the world and is on DVD (with loads of extras BTW) in Europe.

So I feel that this thread topic might address that too. Just because I haven't heard of Eric Bana, doesn't mean he is not a top star in other films in other countries. I just feel that Hollywood runs a risk of low box office returns when they decide to cast a part to a European, or otherwise non-American star in heavily hyped movies. I wonder why this is. I mean it feels like American movie-goers are more likely to spend their money on movies with American stars, than non American stars. But Bana has proved that an Austrailian actor can open a US movie in the millions of dollars range. Why? What made Hulk so special? And will this trend continue.....

Eric Bana isn't a top star, you're absolutely right. But as I have said before it doesn't really matter since it's the animated character, not Bana as Banner, that is the attraction here. Also, there are so many new big budget releases nowadays that it's impossible to score a top movie star every time. Also, it is a good thing sometimes not to have Tom Cruise or Will Smith in the main role since they draw attention from the actual movie. In this case you don't need a big name since the name Hulk is big enough, and the same goes for Superman or Batman. We're in an age of superhero-mania and people will watch these films even if the actor isn't extremely wellknown.