Today’s hottest actors are still referred to as movie stars … but it’s clear the label ain’t what it used to be.
Rare is the actor who can guarantee full houses on opening weekend. Even Will Smith struggled to bring audiences to see his melodramatic 2008 film “Seven Pounds.”
So this rant from frequent commenter JIC really hit home:
There are no major movie stars anymore; just well-known, highly-paid actors. This isn’t the start of some sort of nostalgic rant, it’s a statement of fact: there are no actors active in American movies who can ‘open’ even a medium-budgeted movie – up to about ten years ago, the ability to open a movie was virtually the sole qualification to be a star. Even Will Smith and Adam Sandler can’t do it anymore.
Related posts:
on 
on 
on 
on 
{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
Agreed. Back in the day stars were larger than life, and they also seemed to be much better at picking roles that they were suited for. Maybe that is the result of the studio system being in more control over actors destinies. It seems that with the rise of the agent stars are miscast more and more. It is hard to be bigger than life when you turn in inconsistent performances.
Take Leo DiCaprio, for example. Clearly talented, and I have liked him in numerous roles, but he is miscast so often that he canted seem to establish the star power required to be a big movie star.
I meant “can’t.” Canted is not a word…yet
I’ve heard this argument before and I find it questionable. I think it just means that no one can overcome a bad movie, but we still know who the big stars are. An “Iron Man” with Robert Downey Jr. is almost certainly going to be a bigger event and a better movie than an “Iron Man” with some tv actor, a Matt LeBlanc say. Put Downey in some dog that registers 30 percent at Rotten Tomatoes and bombs and I bet even John Wayne couldn’t save it (Green Berets anyone?).
We know more about celebrities now, the type of people they are. It’s not just that there is endless coverage everywhere about their personal lives, it’s that because of the internet celebrities are talking themselves and it’s made them smaller and quite frankly many of them we find we don’t like as people and have discovered they don’t like us either.
I think a talented celeb who strives to keep his personal life personal is more likely to be forgiven a few bad choices of roles than a celeb who is more public.
Why Matt LeBlanc, of all people? But are you really claiming that Robert Downey Jr. opened that movie, i.e. that a large proportion of the audience went to that movie primarily to see him in it? Of course a big movie will usually have a name actor in it, but a major movie star is more than a big actor, he’s what makes the movie big.
Except that The Green Berets Was the eleventh highest grossing movie of 1968. That’s very impressive for an epic-length pro-war movie that was released at the height of anti-Vietnam feeling and attracted appalling reviews. Now, tell me that John Wayne had nothing to do with that…
blackhawk12151 03.13.10 at 10:13 pm
I meant “can’t.” Canted is not a word…yet
cant 1 (knt)
n.
1. Angular deviation from a vertical or horizontal plane or surface; an inclination or slope.
2. A slanted or oblique surface.
3.
a. A thrust or motion that tilts something.
b. The tilt caused by such a thrust or motion.
4. An outer corner, as of a building.
v. cant·ed, cant·ing, cants
v.tr.
1. To set at an oblique angle; tilt.
2. To give a slanting edge to; bevel.
3. To change the direction of suddenly.
It’s a word now.
I think alot of it has to do with more choices. Why go to the movies when they come to use (satellite, cable, netstreaming, dvd) The “interest” is just spread out. It says more about the medium of the “movie theater” than movie stars themselves.
I think you could probably say there’s been an elevation of directors over movie stars lately as folks are more interested in presentation/story than cast.
But we aren’t talking about the decline of the theatrical movie, we are talking about the decline of the movie star. And anyway, the theatrical release is still where the commercial success or failure of a movie is primarily gauged.
I’m not convinced that the bulk of the movie-going public have become autuerists. Unless we are talking about a Spielberg, a Cameron, a Scorsese, or a Tarantino, I doubt that most of the audience for most movies know or care who directed them.
There are no more movie stars because there are no more affordable movies. Good, bad or indifferent the admission to a movie at my local multiplex is $10.50. Twenty-one dollars (for you and your significant other) is a lot to risk on the entertainment value of a movie …especially when a Blu-ray disk costs only $5 more for unlimited viewings. Add soda, popcorn and candy to the tab and you are in the high $30s to low $40s. What movie star can GUARANTEE that this investment is going to come through for you? Today there are no great movie stars: Only stellar concepts, superb visuals (remember the movies are a VISUAL medium) and great storytelling can loosen that $21 at the box office. It wasn’t Shia Leboeuf who made Transformers a hit, but the SFX. It obviously wasn’t Matt Damon who made the Bourne movies popular (or the magic would have carried over to Green Zone), but the story and action. Did anyone buy a ticket for Up because they yearned to hear Ed Asner’s voice characterization …or was it the touching story and superb animation? The ways deals are being structured for actors lately seems to indicate that the studios and producers are starting to wake up to this new reality.
The failure of the old studio system is what killed the “Hollywood Star.” The studio trained them, nurtured the best (usually), protected them and promoted them. The same could be said for writers.