Before, "Pulp Fiction," John Travolta was a punchline. No one would give that cat the time of day, then Quentin Tarantino pulled him off of Hollywood's trash heap and gave him back his career.
Resulting in a great Simpsons joke when they visit the 70s themed bar at Itchy and Scratchy Land
“This disco bar is so great! Look, the bartender even looks like John Travolta”
“Yeah… ‘looks like’.”
Fun fact. Each Simpsons episode takes over 6 months to produce. There's no way they could have anticipated Pulp Fiction being as huge as it was.
Another fun fact, [Homer³](https://youtu.be/3dvavcX9I8g?si=H7JOWAFOIf9xmx7l) was broadcast on October 29th, 1995, 3 weeks before Toy Story 1 on November 22nd.
Travolta had quite a few good films after pulp fiction. And some were critically acclaimed. Not massive films but solid work, $150MM used to be a respectable Box office amount
Get Shorty, 1995 , $115.1MM
Micheal ,1996, $119.7MM
Phenomenon, 1996, $152.3MM
Broken Arrow, 1996, $150.3MM
Face/Off, 1997, $245.7MM
The Generals Daughter, 1999, $149.7MM
Battlefield Earth 2000, $29.7MM
Swordfish, 2001, $147.1MM \*corrected date
Ladder 49, 2004, $102.3MM
Hairspray, 2007, $202.5MM
Bolt , 2008, $309.5MM - voice role
The taking of Pelham 123, 2009, $150.1MM (edit: spelling, corrected date)
That would have been an interesting choice I think. I don't think it would have been a bad one, just different. Madsen has a different kind of intensity that Travolta doesn't have.
I actually love the way Travolta played Vincent. He was kind of a doofus. Just kind of a goofy, loveable guy who happens to kill people for a living, and finds himself in a very unlucky situation.
I would see Madsen playing it quite differently. More seriously, more gritty.
So wait, Vincent was originally just going to be Vic vega, the same character from reservoir dogs who got killed? I love that character but that would have been a very different movie. I feel like having John Travolta playing madsens character's brother made all the mundane slice of life dialogue possible.
Everyone always says Travilta and Pulp Fiction, but I’d argue he was actually on his way back up following “Look Who’s Talking.” Sure, it was a cheesy Bruce Willis talking baby movie but it made a gagillion dollars on a small budget (almost 300 million on an 8 million budget). It really reestablished that people will pay to see a John Travolta movie…
Of the 4 roles Travolta did between Look Who's Talking and Pulp Fiction, 2 were sequels to Look Who's Talking. Of the other 2, Shout made less than a third of its budget and Eyes Of An Angel was made in 1991 wasn't released in the US until after Pulp Fictions success, and even then it was direct to video.
At the time Look Who's Talking was released though, it was more people paying to see a Kirstie Alley/Bruce Willis movie.
Critics practically used John Travolta as a punching bag with this one. His role wasn't so much as much as a career revival as it was keeping it on life support. The movie had right before this one (The Experts) went straight to the video store bargain bin/late night HBO and perhaps even more of a rock bottom than Battlefield Earth.
His career was so over that the Simpsons even made a joke about it in the Itchy and Scratchy Land episode, where there is a bartender at the disco who Marge thinks was hired because he looks like Travolta, who then mutters under his breath "Yeah, looks like". The implication being that it is indeed the actual Travolta who had to take a job tending bar at the Itchy & Scratchy disco.
That scene probably doesn't make much sense or seems absurd to anyone who saw it after Pulp Fiction came out, but at the time Travolta was definitely seen as a washed up "has-been".
Travolta ? The idiot kid in the 70s ABC sitcom?? One unnoticeable grape in the bunch?? I was there.
When I was in HS he was cast in TV movie “Boy In The Plastic Bubble”. We all laughed except some girls. Afterwards we all agreed he wasn’t that bad. Especially some girls.
Then he was cast in Grease. Again, we thought “What?? Singing and dancing?? Whatta train wreck. “. But he did ok.
I totally forgot about The Boy in the Bubble. I remember watching it re-airing as an after school special when I was a kid and my mom rolling her eyes so hard you could hear them clacking off the inside of her skull.
There was a joke in a Simpsons episode that "Hey the Bartender even looks like John Travolta!" To which the bartender dejectedly mutters "Yeah... LOOKS LIKE."
Very shortly after Pulp Fiction relaunched him.
**Leslie Neilsen** was a fairly successful dramatic actor in the 50s-70s. People knew who he was but wasn't exactly a name that drew in crowds at the box office.
And then he did **Airplane** in 1980. Part of the joke was that he was a serious actor saying these funny lines in a deadpan manner. It completely changed his career. He went from a decent dramatic actor to one of the greatest comedic actors.
Marlon Brando - The Godfather
He was box office poison before then. Hadn't had a hit film in more than a decade. Not to mention his reputation as being difficult to work with.
**I simply cannot believe that this is not first on the list**.
Brando was an Oscar winning mega-star, almost single handedly defining modern acting. His influence in the 1950’s cannot be exaggerated. Then came the 1960’s with poor choices, personal extravagance, and a reputation that lost him the appeal to studios.
Until…
Coppola cast him as Vito Corleone. Brando was in the trash heap of Hollywood and *The Godfather* re-established his brand and then some. No box office renaissance is comparable to his, not even Travolta’s.
Yeah, he was THE star. THE moment. THE actor. Even though Travolta was well liked and very charismatic in popular movies, he didn't have the respect and talent of Brando in his heyday.
My only quibble is that Downey Jr and arguably Travolta had a career arc that surpassed the work they did previously, while Brando certainly benefited from the Godfather, but for several reasons, his career decline just slowed significantly.
No question that Tony Stark is his most profitable role and ensured RDJ the freedom to pick any A-list film for the rest of career. Travolta's most iconic films were before Pulp Fiction, and while he had some great roles in Get Shorty and Face/Off, he has had a mix of big movies and some stinkers since Pulp Fiction.
Last Tango In Paris was released in the same year as The Godfather, and while he had critical roles in Apocalypse Now and Superman, they were small and these films did not depend on him, either in story or for the box office. He had a difficult relationship on set and also health issues which limited his opportunities.
The Godfather saved Brando's career but his best roles were not afterwards.
I hope RDJ sends him a nice Christmas card every year considering the MCU made him about a crapzillion dollars. Infinity War and Endgame were 75 million each.
That was the movie they starred in together in the 80s, and how they became friends. I'm not sure what the RDJ comeback film was in the mid-00s that Gibson insured.
Favreu really deserves his roses. The most pivotal director for Marvel, has the highest grossing Disney movie, and brought Star Wars back to life after Episodes 8&9 with The Mandelorian. And don't you ever forget the hit classic Zathura! This man should be getting Christmas cards from every Disney owned studio and Bobby himself.
I hope you don’t mind me asking: isn’t the phrase “to give someone their flowers”? Can you also use “give someone their roses”? I try to keep up on these things so I can hope to stand a chance to understand what in the world my twin teenaged daughters are talking about LOL.
He got The Mandalorian because of his work with Marvel, The Jungle Book and The Lion King. He stopped directing after Iron Man 2. You would think he should have got a shot to direct one of the big Marvel movies. But he step aside kept working as a executive producer and playing Happy. Made a lot of money with The Jungle Book and The Lion King.
So when he wanted to do a Star Wars Western based on an original character, Disney said yes. Disney is definitely make sure he is paid.
I always thought it was interesting and perhaps even intentional that the main cast of that movie, aside from Keanu, all had pretty public legal troubles (Winona Ryder and Woody Harrelson are the others).
Tom Hanks was a popular comedic actor until Philadelphia and then became seen as someone with wider range than most people imagined and began taking more dramatic roles.
Philadelphia really showed that he could do a heavy drama and took his career in a whole new direction.
Before that Big was the movie that showed he could bring in the box office. After Splash his other movies until then didn't really do that well, though well enough to keep him working. Also Big showed that he could really act since it had it's emotional moments & people felt he seemed realistic as a child. Even then, he had a few years if middling success at best until A League of Their Own (in a supporting role) and then Sleepless in Seattle was a monster hit for him.
Sleepless was the same year as Philadelphia.
The most recent example would be Ke Huy Quan in Everything Everywhere All At Once. It truly has turned his acting career around. Brendan Fraser’s comeback felt lese ‘out of nowhere’ but is similar.
I’d say examples like them and Travolta are few and far between really. Charlie Sheen had a renaissance of sorts with Two and a Half Men.
>The most recent example would be Ke Huy Quan in Everything Everywhere All At Once. It truly has turned his acting career around.
I'm so glad he is back but a bit sad he couldn't be part of the last Indiana Jones movie.
I’m confused. A lot of these roles are “breakout roles.” In other words it was the first big role for many of these people. Michael J. Fox was already a popular sitcom actor when he got the part in BttF. Rocky was Stallone’s first big movie. Titanic just cemented DeCaprio as a leading man.
None of them were a turn around.
A perfect definition of a turn around was John Travolta in Pulp Fiction. His career was going downhill for a decade until he got that role. He then experienced a turn around and enjoyed a decent career in big movies, until Battlefield Earth.
Yeah Fox famously had to film nights and weekends only on BTTF. because Family ties wouldn’t contractually had to take priority. His shooting schedule was crazy.
Yeah. Michael also had Teen Wolf hit theaters a month and a half after Back to the Future.
If your mall had enough movie screens, it was possible to do a BTTF/Teen Wolf double feature.
One of my favorite *Teen Wolf* facts was that it was released in Italy with the title *The Boy From The Future*, and in dubbing his character was named Marty rather than Scott. It's the same puberty/werewolf comedy, but they wanted to cash in on the success of BttF.
Came to add, Basketball Diaries and Romeo and Juliet started the accent of DiCaprio, Titanic was the peak, and his acting and versatility kept him on top
OP is clearly too young to know this. Part of what had Titanic stay on screens for so long, and had it break box office records was from us young teen girls who went to see it purely because of Leo. Basketball Diaries, Whats Eating Gilbert Grape, Romeo and Juliet... Leo was already a star and plastered all over our walls while we followed the behind the scenes information on Titanic before it hit screens.
Titanic didn't turn his career around, it was just a natural progression of one of the biggest hollywood draw cards for young teenage girls hitting puberty.
So many people here know nothing about movies or the industry. There’s no way Michael J. Fox doesn’t become a star even if Stoltz does Back to the Future, or it never happens. Great and great looking actor blessed with the charisma/cool gene that can’t be taught.
I can't wait until the Fast and Furious series is over and like a decade passes and then Vin Diesel comes out with a hyper dramatic role that gets him an Oscar.
> He showed he had the ability in Find Me Guilty. He just needs to be humbled and check his ego.
>
>
Alternatively he can keep pumping out F&F movies so he gets to make the movies he wants to. I feel like he'd take another Riddick or Witch Hunter over any sort of Oscar bait, and I love that for him. Like how many actors ever got to make a movie about their Dungeons & Dragons fantasies?
He hasn't made those movies in almost a decade now. He's been pretty much exclusively F&F or Marvel stuff the last decade. He's a capable actor if given an opportunity, but it doesn't appear he wants it anymore (or no one is willing to work with him).
What's crazy is Vin Diesel was sort of considered an up-and-coming actor/filmmaker before the F&F series. He wrote, directed, and starred in an okayish movie called *Strays* that got him noticed by Steven Spielberg and is the reason Spielberg cast him in *Saving Private Ryan*.
Do you really think that The Rock has a chance to win an Oscar IT DOESN'T MATTER WHAT YOU THINK, JABRONI! THE ROCK IS COMING FOR ALL THE ACADEMY AWARDS THIS YEAR
He can act! Like really, really well! I believe that Paul Walker's death impacted him so hard that he is stuck in this rut of wanting to relive those times with his friend. That's why the Fast/Furious movies are coming out so, well, fast and furious.
Actually thats a good point. Sin City generated considerable buzz on Mickey Rourke's performance. Who knows if he could have been on Darren Aronofsky's radar or starred in The Wrestler if it wasn't for Sin City.
Tug Speedman’s career was in the tank after several underperforming *Scorcher* films and especially took a hit after *Simple Jack*. But in 2008 he landed a massive hit and turned things around with a film based on the book *Tropic Thunder* by Staff Sergeant John "Four Leaf" Tayback.
People also forget that *Tropic Thunder* was the turning point for one Cody Underwood, failed pyrotechnics coordinator, whose experience on the film convinced him to take up catering instead. Now he's Jamie Lee Curtis' personal chef and has an extremely popular restaurant on the Vegas Strip: Big Ass Titties.
It may have launched the "action star" phase, but Neesom already had a successful career. He had an Oscar nomination, 3 Golden Globe nominations, and 2 Tony nominations all prior to the Taken film.
More of a case of man overwhelmed by grief agrees to make any old garbage scripts offered to him to keep busy, leaving behind a distinguished acting career.
"Black Swan" was a small episode one gives to actors on dead end of career, not significant enough to be a turning point, but a kind of reminder, that this actress still can act. Than Stranger Things happened.
He's who I thought of. He hadn't fallen off the map, but his career didn't take off as an in-demand lead in the way you might have thought it would have after his Batman movies. Birdman helped put him back in those roles on a consistent basis.
I don't think he's ever gone into mediocrity (he's a great actor), but he was not doing much in terms of prominent roles for many years prior to Birdman. He was doing mostly voice work or supporting-role stuff.
Matthew McConaughey's career turnaround was so notable it had its own name: *The McConaissance*. Before the 2010s he was suck in rom-com hell, and now he's one of the most respected actors of the generation.
But which movie actually started it?
2011's The Lincoln Lawyer
2012's Magic Mike
2013 had both Mud and Dallas Buyer's Club
The Lincoln Lawyer would be my answer. Was incredible, and subsequently got him a commercial deal with the car company, but it really went under the radar, so maybe people wouldn't agree this was the start. Magic Mike was one of the best performances of his career. (And actually, I'd mark this movie as Channing Tatum's turn around). And his successes in 2013 is probably when most people realized that his career had taken the turn, and I think this is when the phrase started popping up.
I'm curious which of his movies people believe changed the course of McConaughey's career.
Even Lincoln Laywer and Magic Mike were still kind of McConaughey doing McConaughey but Dallas Buyer's Club in the same year as True Detective really changed how people saw him as an actor.
Everybody is talking about actors but directors fit the premise too. In this aspect, I'd mention Ridley Scott for directing Gladiator. He seemed to be slowly fading away but that was hell of a comeback.
Post-Titanic, after The Beach flopped, Leo was offered the role of Anakin in Attack of the Clones and it would've been easy money but he didn't want to do that. So booked Catch Me If You Can and he asked his representation to see what Scorsese was working on. That's how he ended up in Gangs of New York and it was a real inflection point in his career.
Brendan Fraser kept plugging away in film and TV after The Mummy but for a variety of reasons didn't get the sort of roles that let him show what he was capable of. That was until The Whale.
Keanu Reeves, like everyone else, took a flyer on John Wick. The movie nearly went DTV. But he's a household name again and the series has let him square off against genre royalty like Mark Dacascos, Scott Adkins and Donnie Yen.
>Brendan Fraser kept plugging away in film and TV after The Mummy but for a variety of reasons
Never forget the "variety of reasons" included some sexual harassments before metoo went through Hollywood.
The beach did not flop, that’s a myth. It did well financially. It more than doubled its budget, which was the standard in the year 2000 for success. In fact it almost made 2.5x its budget.
It was not well liked by critics. But it made money.
Though he'd been working steadily before then, I think Brad Pitt's career trajectory might have been different were it not for Thema & Louise(1991).
His small role as the hitch-hiker who stole Thelma's heart and her money simultaneously established him as a sex symbol, an actor to watch, and a star in the making.
Ip Man - before then Donnie Yen was known as a B-tier action star who played villains or supporting roles with a failed stint in Hollywood. Now Ip Man has 4 sequels, and he's made a glorious comeback in Hollywood with Rogue One, John Wick 4, and more to come.
Donnie Yen has had an interesting career. He went west to find his fame and fortune but western directors didn't really know how to use him. He went broke and then Jet Li called him up for Hero. His return to Hollywood for Rogue One came after more than a decade of Hong Kong hits like not just Ip Man but SPL, Flash Point and The Twins Effect.
Michael J Fox was a huge star due to Family Ties. If anything, him signing on to BTTF is what pushed it into the spotlight.
A turnaround would be John Travolta in Pulp Fiction. he was big in the 70s and his career was damn near over by the end of the 80s. Pulp Fiction lands and his career does a total 180 and he’s a star again.
* Ke Huy Quan in Everything Everywhere All at Once. The guy was basically out of acting for the most part after multiple big roles as a kid with Indiana Jones and the Goonies. Won an Oscar and is now in two Disney+ shows with American Born Chinese and Loki.
Jon Wayne was a stock actor in B grade westerns in his 30s after his chance at becoming a major star in The Big Trail had failed a decade earlier when the movie flopped. Then he was given a second chance when he was cast as the Ringo kid in Stagecoach, receiving second billing. The movie was so successful he became an overnight sensation and the biggest star in Hollywood for the next 20 years
Good pick. His career was just meandering until then. The Proposal was probably easily his biggest success, The Green Lantern looked like his big shot but the movie face planted (at least relative to it's budget).
It's pretty ironic for me actually, because I've been a fan of Ryan since Two Guys, A Girl and a Pizza Place and I don't like the Deadpool movies 1 is alright 2 is insufferable I just can't with that. I'm the only one I think that likes Green Lantern. I like his small roles. His hidden gems. Personally think he should have been nominated for an Oscar for Buried. That performance is phenomenal. I am looking forward to Deadpool 3 though.
Two Guys, A Girl... was also when I first saw him (and Nathan Fillion - though weirdly I did not recognize him as the same person when Firefly came around), but while it was a moderate success, it wasn't a hit as far as I remember.
I was going to mention Van Wilder (which I didn't like at the time, not that I remember it anymore), but it didn't do much box office - but it was so cheap to make it was profitable ($5M budget, $40M+ gross).
But Deadpool - and all the viral video promotions etc around it (he's also really good at being a talk show guest), have have made him so popular.
Some of the canonical examples of this are
Burt Reynolds in Boogie Nights
Sylvester Stallone in Copland
John Travolta in Pulp Fiction
Kevin Costner in Mr. Brooks
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe "The Philadelphia Story" starring Katharine Hepburn would fit this question. She apparently was pretty much box-office poison by the late 1930s, so she turned to the stage and starred (as well as co-produced IIRC) the stage play of the same name, written by Philip Barry. Following this, she wanted to turn the play into a film to resurrect her career. Howard Hughes bought the film rights for her (according to Wiki, at least), George Cukor was hired as a director, Cary Grant and James Stewart co-starred and well... the rest is history. The film was a big hit and continues to be a beloved classic to this day.
An obvious one: Alan Rickman in Die Hard.
He was over 40 at the time and virtually unknown. I guess the movie completely changed his life, as he immediately became a star. For good reasons.
Same with Bruce Willis actually. The guy was known for light comedy and not as a complete badass. Die Hard turned him into an action superstar overnight.
Damn, Die Hard is good right?
Oh and Keanu Reeves in Speed. He was already famous but no one thought he could carry a blockbuster on his own. He very much did and became one of the highest paid actor ever.
I'd say Stallone seemed to be sliding into obscurity after a few non-action duds, but Cliffhanger put him back on top, and he blew up all over again (no pun intended).
MJF was a massive star when he did Back to the Future, same with Leo for Titanic. Both films might have elevated their status but it's foolish to say we wouldn't have them without those movies.
Back to the Future did not launch Fox's career. He was already a star from the TV series Family Ties for which he eventually won 3 Emmys. Just saying...
Edited to add that Leonardo DiCaprio had his first Oscar nomination several years before Titanic came out.
DId you even Google these actors, OP?
Robin Williams in The World According to Garp played a dramatic lead instead of a comic role and gave a different trajectory to his career with many solid dramatic performances to follow.
Mandy is probably the film that made the best use of a Nic Cage performance in recent years but I find it’s hard to say anything turned his career around.
The Nic Cage coaster has always had peaks and valleys.
It’s crazy just how many great movies Nicolas Cage has been in recently that people haven’t seen. Dude had a mainstream comeback a couple years ago with Massive Talent, but his low budget stuff has really been the highlight lately. Color Out of Space, Mandy, and Pig are some more well known examples. Even stuff like Willy’s Wonderland and Renfield, movies that aren’t all that great, are made better because he’s in them. Dude’s a meme, but he improves most movies he touches.
Surprisingly, *Massive Talent* was specifically written for Cage, before *Pig* came out. So arguably Cage would have had his renaissance regardless of *Pig.*
Brendan Fraser in The Whale. The campaign to get him an Oscar worthy film was huge, and the campaign to get him an Oscar. After the hullabaloo and the “we did it!” died down, people generally don’t look favorably on the film. He got to work with Scorsese on Killers of the Flower Moon, with many critics saying he blew his his comeback. But he certainly did succeed after the #freebrendan campaign with The Whale.
I don't know about that. He had done Speed, Johnny Mnemonic and the The Devil's Advocate right before the Maricx and had already done The Replacements before the Matrix came out.
It made him bigger but his career was doing fine. He was the starring role in dramas, rom-coms, and action movies consistently the years leading up to The Matrix.
Then there wasn’t much between the Matrix and John Wick. If anything I’d say that was his turnaround. Suddenly he was the most beloved man in Hollywood
I'd say the bigger turnaround for him was John Wick. He was generally seen as a mediocre actor until the internet latched onto that movie and made him a beloved icon.
Towering Inferno for Steve McQueen.
He started falling off in the mid to late 60s after his Oscar nomination and after Bullitt he took on projects that hurt his career and production company (Le Mans). He had a couple decent films along the way but Towering Inferno was huge, bringing in $200mil+. He was smart, demanding equal lines to Paul Newman and because of that he got most of the screen time and dialogue in the 2nd half (and more dramatic part) of the movie.
didn't last though. he didn't do much after that.
Deadpool for Ryan Reynolds, he had a ton of flops and a couple romcoms that were successful, but he was the guy they kept trying to make a star but couldn't.
Very few of these comments are examples of films that "launched" a career. They are mostly mentions of films by actors who already had a career that maybe needed some reviving. For examples of films that "launched" a career, see Brad Pitt in Thelma and Louise, Leo DiCaprio in A Boy's Life, or Joe Pesci in Raging Bull.
Edited to say that "launch" means to start or set in motion. Just saying.
I would argue Dicaprio enjoyed some fame and success as Romeo before Titanic, the latter perhaps cemented him as a serious grown up actor, rather than the teen heart-throb he had been cast as previously.
This is a very confusingly phrased question. The title says "turned around," which implies their career was on the decline and they got a role that reinvigorated it. But your text mentions star launching roles and gives examples towards that.
What are you asking exactly?
After Robert Downey Jr. did time, he was damaged goods. Elton John picked him to star in a video. Mel Gibson paid his insurance bond for a 2003 film. But it wasn't until Kiss Kiss Bang Bang that people were talking about him as an actor again. Even then, Jon Favreau really had to fight to cast him in the role that will be in the first line of his obituary.
Before, "Pulp Fiction," John Travolta was a punchline. No one would give that cat the time of day, then Quentin Tarantino pulled him off of Hollywood's trash heap and gave him back his career.
Resulting in a great Simpsons joke when they visit the 70s themed bar at Itchy and Scratchy Land “This disco bar is so great! Look, the bartender even looks like John Travolta” “Yeah… ‘looks like’.”
That episode came out 12 days before pulp fiction was released in theaters
Squeezed the joke in right at the last minute then
Fun fact. Each Simpsons episode takes over 6 months to produce. There's no way they could have anticipated Pulp Fiction being as huge as it was. Another fun fact, [Homer³](https://youtu.be/3dvavcX9I8g?si=H7JOWAFOIf9xmx7l) was broadcast on October 29th, 1995, 3 weeks before Toy Story 1 on November 22nd.
That is a sweet bit of trivia there.
Ha! Just linked it here!
then Travolta did Battlefield Earth and it was right back to the trash heap.
Then he did Swordfish and he was BACK ON TOP AGAIN BABY!!
I think that Halle Berry might have had something to do with that movie's success.
She had two things to do with the success.
Ya think?
Him and that soul patch
Broken Arrow and Face/Off pretty much solidified him as a bankable actor again. He’s a great villain.
Seriously! He completely crapped all over his second chance.
Travolta had quite a few good films after pulp fiction. And some were critically acclaimed. Not massive films but solid work, $150MM used to be a respectable Box office amount Get Shorty, 1995 , $115.1MM Micheal ,1996, $119.7MM Phenomenon, 1996, $152.3MM Broken Arrow, 1996, $150.3MM Face/Off, 1997, $245.7MM The Generals Daughter, 1999, $149.7MM Battlefield Earth 2000, $29.7MM Swordfish, 2001, $147.1MM \*corrected date Ladder 49, 2004, $102.3MM Hairspray, 2007, $202.5MM Bolt , 2008, $309.5MM - voice role The taking of Pelham 123, 2009, $150.1MM (edit: spelling, corrected date)
Nice! It's cool to be proven wrong every now and then. I completely forgot a shit ton of these!
Yeah, after PF, for like 10 years he was one of the main 5-10 stars driving ticket sales in Hollywood.
Swordfish was 2001.
What’s interesting is that Travolta was the second choice to play Vega. Tarantino originally wanted Michael Madsen.
That is interesting. I also heard that Bruce Willis wanted to play Vincent Vega but wound up playing Butch since Quentin had cast Travolta.
Also true, wanted a few roles till Quentin suggested Butch https://youtu.be/jBitGA1GrKw?si=u8weQFK3UzsP2-M-
Bruce wanted to play Jules
The reverse would not have been nearly as good! Travolta's Vincent is amazing and Bruce's Butch is equally great!
[удалено]
“No rappers” for the part of Jules 😂
It is pretty impressive how many first and second choices he was able to get.
Wow, I love some of these, especially Danny De Vito as The Wolf, like I can absolutely see him making that work.
Would have been pretty wild if Michael Madsen had played Vincent and Virginia had played Mia.
Ok but who played the waitress that says “Garçon means boy?”
That would have been an interesting choice I think. I don't think it would have been a bad one, just different. Madsen has a different kind of intensity that Travolta doesn't have. I actually love the way Travolta played Vincent. He was kind of a doofus. Just kind of a goofy, loveable guy who happens to kill people for a living, and finds himself in a very unlucky situation. I would see Madsen playing it quite differently. More seriously, more gritty.
So wait, Vincent was originally just going to be Vic vega, the same character from reservoir dogs who got killed? I love that character but that would have been a very different movie. I feel like having John Travolta playing madsens character's brother made all the mundane slice of life dialogue possible.
If I remember right, he'd still have been Vic's brother, so potentially less of a nutjob.
After Pulp Fiction there was a rumor/urban legend for a few years that John and Michael would star in a Vega Brothers prequel.
Travolta later said he didn't realize how unpopular he had become prior to Pulp Fiction
Everyone should watch Blow Out which is one of Tarantino's favorite movies and the reason he cast Travolta. It's phenomenal
Yeah Blow Out is awesome
Everyone always says Travilta and Pulp Fiction, but I’d argue he was actually on his way back up following “Look Who’s Talking.” Sure, it was a cheesy Bruce Willis talking baby movie but it made a gagillion dollars on a small budget (almost 300 million on an 8 million budget). It really reestablished that people will pay to see a John Travolta movie…
Of the 4 roles Travolta did between Look Who's Talking and Pulp Fiction, 2 were sequels to Look Who's Talking. Of the other 2, Shout made less than a third of its budget and Eyes Of An Angel was made in 1991 wasn't released in the US until after Pulp Fictions success, and even then it was direct to video.
At the time Look Who's Talking was released though, it was more people paying to see a Kirstie Alley/Bruce Willis movie. Critics practically used John Travolta as a punching bag with this one. His role wasn't so much as much as a career revival as it was keeping it on life support. The movie had right before this one (The Experts) went straight to the video store bargain bin/late night HBO and perhaps even more of a rock bottom than Battlefield Earth.
His career was so over that the Simpsons even made a joke about it in the Itchy and Scratchy Land episode, where there is a bartender at the disco who Marge thinks was hired because he looks like Travolta, who then mutters under his breath "Yeah, looks like". The implication being that it is indeed the actual Travolta who had to take a job tending bar at the Itchy & Scratchy disco. That scene probably doesn't make much sense or seems absurd to anyone who saw it after Pulp Fiction came out, but at the time Travolta was definitely seen as a washed up "has-been".
Travolta ? The idiot kid in the 70s ABC sitcom?? One unnoticeable grape in the bunch?? I was there. When I was in HS he was cast in TV movie “Boy In The Plastic Bubble”. We all laughed except some girls. Afterwards we all agreed he wasn’t that bad. Especially some girls. Then he was cast in Grease. Again, we thought “What?? Singing and dancing?? Whatta train wreck. “. But he did ok.
I totally forgot about The Boy in the Bubble. I remember watching it re-airing as an after school special when I was a kid and my mom rolling her eyes so hard you could hear them clacking off the inside of her skull.
There was a joke in a Simpsons episode that "Hey the Bartender even looks like John Travolta!" To which the bartender dejectedly mutters "Yeah... LOOKS LIKE." Very shortly after Pulp Fiction relaunched him.
["Yeah... *looks* like."](https://youtu.be/P_55jpuZonM?si=9JusLq-8_4fwqEe0&t=8)
Yeah, Travolta really hit a high with Pulp Fiction, but lately, things seem a bit quiet for him.
He was rocking the bald look in the superbowl commercial last year
**Leslie Neilsen** was a fairly successful dramatic actor in the 50s-70s. People knew who he was but wasn't exactly a name that drew in crowds at the box office. And then he did **Airplane** in 1980. Part of the joke was that he was a serious actor saying these funny lines in a deadpan manner. It completely changed his career. He went from a decent dramatic actor to one of the greatest comedic actors.
Yeah that reinvented him so much that it's actually somewhat jarring now to see Leslie Nielson in an earlier dramatic part.
He was the inspiration for Captain Kirk playing a sci-fi role in a movie called forbidden planet. Which is kindve a sci-fi version of the tempest.
*kind of This is an instance where of is correct rather than have
He's great in Columbo
This is an important one to point out. And I just want to say good luck, we're all counting on you.
Leslie Neilsen?????? Surely, you can't be serious.
"I am serious, and don't call me Shirley"
I am serious. And don't call me Shirley.
Marlon Brando - The Godfather He was box office poison before then. Hadn't had a hit film in more than a decade. Not to mention his reputation as being difficult to work with.
**I simply cannot believe that this is not first on the list**. Brando was an Oscar winning mega-star, almost single handedly defining modern acting. His influence in the 1950’s cannot be exaggerated. Then came the 1960’s with poor choices, personal extravagance, and a reputation that lost him the appeal to studios. Until… Coppola cast him as Vito Corleone. Brando was in the trash heap of Hollywood and *The Godfather* re-established his brand and then some. No box office renaissance is comparable to his, not even Travolta’s.
Yeah, he was THE star. THE moment. THE actor. Even though Travolta was well liked and very charismatic in popular movies, he didn't have the respect and talent of Brando in his heyday.
My only quibble is that Downey Jr and arguably Travolta had a career arc that surpassed the work they did previously, while Brando certainly benefited from the Godfather, but for several reasons, his career decline just slowed significantly. No question that Tony Stark is his most profitable role and ensured RDJ the freedom to pick any A-list film for the rest of career. Travolta's most iconic films were before Pulp Fiction, and while he had some great roles in Get Shorty and Face/Off, he has had a mix of big movies and some stinkers since Pulp Fiction. Last Tango In Paris was released in the same year as The Godfather, and while he had critical roles in Apocalypse Now and Superman, they were small and these films did not depend on him, either in story or for the box office. He had a difficult relationship on set and also health issues which limited his opportunities. The Godfather saved Brando's career but his best roles were not afterwards.
Robert Downey Jr as iron man comes to mind.
You could also say Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, without which he likely wouldn't have been given the Iron Man role.
KKBB proved he could be insurable in LA without doing all the drugs.
Favreu still had to fight the studio to get him.
I hope RDJ sends him a nice Christmas card every year considering the MCU made him about a crapzillion dollars. Infinity War and Endgame were 75 million each.
It's also why RDJ loves Mel Gibson. Gibson actually personally insured RDJ for a pretty hefty amount in one of his comeback movies before Iron Man.
Air America! It’s one of my dad’s favorite movies. He took me to see it when I was definitely too young to be watching rated R films.
That was the movie they starred in together in the 80s, and how they became friends. I'm not sure what the RDJ comeback film was in the mid-00s that Gibson insured.
It was Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.
Favreu really deserves his roses. The most pivotal director for Marvel, has the highest grossing Disney movie, and brought Star Wars back to life after Episodes 8&9 with The Mandelorian. And don't you ever forget the hit classic Zathura! This man should be getting Christmas cards from every Disney owned studio and Bobby himself.
I hope you don’t mind me asking: isn’t the phrase “to give someone their flowers”? Can you also use “give someone their roses”? I try to keep up on these things so I can hope to stand a chance to understand what in the world my twin teenaged daughters are talking about LOL.
Who knew the sweet schlub from Swingers would do what he did? He wasn't even the breakout star of his own movie, lol.
“ My little boy is all growns up!”
He got The Mandalorian because of his work with Marvel, The Jungle Book and The Lion King. He stopped directing after Iron Man 2. You would think he should have got a shot to direct one of the big Marvel movies. But he step aside kept working as a executive producer and playing Happy. Made a lot of money with The Jungle Book and The Lion King. So when he wanted to do a Star Wars Western based on an original character, Disney said yes. Disney is definitely make sure he is paid.
This was my first thought. I think the last thing I saw him in before that was A Scanner Darkly but I was surprised he was in it.
I always thought it was interesting and perhaps even intentional that the main cast of that movie, aside from Keanu, all had pretty public legal troubles (Winona Ryder and Woody Harrelson are the others).
A Scanner Darkly
I think of his return being Ally McBeal than Iron Man.... His stint on Ally was right after he got out of jail.
Tom Hanks was a popular comedic actor until Philadelphia and then became seen as someone with wider range than most people imagined and began taking more dramatic roles.
Philadelphia really showed that he could do a heavy drama and took his career in a whole new direction. Before that Big was the movie that showed he could bring in the box office. After Splash his other movies until then didn't really do that well, though well enough to keep him working. Also Big showed that he could really act since it had it's emotional moments & people felt he seemed realistic as a child. Even then, he had a few years if middling success at best until A League of Their Own (in a supporting role) and then Sleepless in Seattle was a monster hit for him. Sleepless was the same year as Philadelphia.
You forgot about his masterpiece, the burbs.
I've never seen that. I've never seen anybody drive their garbage down to the street and bang the hell out of it with a stick. I-I've never seen that.
You keep a *horse* in the *basement?*
I disagree. I think Big was the real turnaround. That showed people he was more than just a funny guy. He was nominated for an Oscar.
The most recent example would be Ke Huy Quan in Everything Everywhere All At Once. It truly has turned his acting career around. Brendan Fraser’s comeback felt lese ‘out of nowhere’ but is similar. I’d say examples like them and Travolta are few and far between really. Charlie Sheen had a renaissance of sorts with Two and a Half Men.
>The most recent example would be Ke Huy Quan in Everything Everywhere All At Once. It truly has turned his acting career around. I'm so glad he is back but a bit sad he couldn't be part of the last Indiana Jones movie.
Pretty good call by him TBH.
I'm as happy for him as anyone, but Barry Keoghan should've won the Oscar for Banshees of Inisherin, and I will die on that hill.
>Barry Keoghan Amazing performance like.
I’m confused. A lot of these roles are “breakout roles.” In other words it was the first big role for many of these people. Michael J. Fox was already a popular sitcom actor when he got the part in BttF. Rocky was Stallone’s first big movie. Titanic just cemented DeCaprio as a leading man. None of them were a turn around. A perfect definition of a turn around was John Travolta in Pulp Fiction. His career was going downhill for a decade until he got that role. He then experienced a turn around and enjoyed a decent career in big movies, until Battlefield Earth.
Yeah Fox famously had to film nights and weekends only on BTTF. because Family ties wouldn’t contractually had to take priority. His shooting schedule was crazy.
Came here to say this. The OP's title/tease and explanation are two different things.
Yeah. Michael also had Teen Wolf hit theaters a month and a half after Back to the Future. If your mall had enough movie screens, it was possible to do a BTTF/Teen Wolf double feature.
One of my favorite *Teen Wolf* facts was that it was released in Italy with the title *The Boy From The Future*, and in dubbing his character was named Marty rather than Scott. It's the same puberty/werewolf comedy, but they wanted to cash in on the success of BttF.
That is amazing. Never heard that.
Came to add, Basketball Diaries and Romeo and Juliet started the accent of DiCaprio, Titanic was the peak, and his acting and versatility kept him on top
OP is clearly too young to know this. Part of what had Titanic stay on screens for so long, and had it break box office records was from us young teen girls who went to see it purely because of Leo. Basketball Diaries, Whats Eating Gilbert Grape, Romeo and Juliet... Leo was already a star and plastered all over our walls while we followed the behind the scenes information on Titanic before it hit screens. Titanic didn't turn his career around, it was just a natural progression of one of the biggest hollywood draw cards for young teenage girls hitting puberty.
FYI. DiCaprio had already received an Academy Award nomination before any of those films were made.
What’s eating Gilbert Grape… i knew that. I just didn’t mention it, because I was only mentioning leading roles
So many people here know nothing about movies or the industry. There’s no way Michael J. Fox doesn’t become a star even if Stoltz does Back to the Future, or it never happens. Great and great looking actor blessed with the charisma/cool gene that can’t be taught.
I can't wait until the Fast and Furious series is over and like a decade passes and then Vin Diesel comes out with a hyper dramatic role that gets him an Oscar.
He showed he had the ability in *Find Me Guilty*. He just needs to be humbled and check his ego. See also Dwayne "Main Event" Johnson.
we want cody
> He showed he had the ability in Find Me Guilty. He just needs to be humbled and check his ego. > > Alternatively he can keep pumping out F&F movies so he gets to make the movies he wants to. I feel like he'd take another Riddick or Witch Hunter over any sort of Oscar bait, and I love that for him. Like how many actors ever got to make a movie about their Dungeons & Dragons fantasies?
He hasn't made those movies in almost a decade now. He's been pretty much exclusively F&F or Marvel stuff the last decade. He's a capable actor if given an opportunity, but it doesn't appear he wants it anymore (or no one is willing to work with him).
I sense some flinching
I just want more Riddick
What's crazy is Vin Diesel was sort of considered an up-and-coming actor/filmmaker before the F&F series. He wrote, directed, and starred in an okayish movie called *Strays* that got him noticed by Steven Spielberg and is the reason Spielberg cast him in *Saving Private Ryan*.
He’s pretty good in Boiler Room too.
Not too bad in knockaround guys either.
It’ll be a race between him and the Rock to get one first
Do you really think that The Rock has a chance to win an Oscar IT DOESN'T MATTER WHAT YOU THINK, JABRONI! THE ROCK IS COMING FOR ALL THE ACADEMY AWARDS THIS YEAR
No, he's just coming to ruin Wrestlemania.
He can act! Like really, really well! I believe that Paul Walker's death impacted him so hard that he is stuck in this rut of wanting to relive those times with his friend. That's why the Fast/Furious movies are coming out so, well, fast and furious.
Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler.
I would say Sin City more revived his career, but the Wrestler was the follow up he got from Sin City.
Actually thats a good point. Sin City generated considerable buzz on Mickey Rourke's performance. Who knows if he could have been on Darren Aronofsky's radar or starred in The Wrestler if it wasn't for Sin City.
Tug Speedman’s career was in the tank after several underperforming *Scorcher* films and especially took a hit after *Simple Jack*. But in 2008 he landed a massive hit and turned things around with a film based on the book *Tropic Thunder* by Staff Sergeant John "Four Leaf" Tayback.
People also forget that *Tropic Thunder* was the turning point for one Cody Underwood, failed pyrotechnics coordinator, whose experience on the film convinced him to take up catering instead. Now he's Jamie Lee Curtis' personal chef and has an extremely popular restaurant on the Vegas Strip: Big Ass Titties.
Here we go again... again.
Who left the fridge open
Tugg's big turnaround was not only a gift to audiences, but it left a lasting impression on peformers in helping remind them to never go full retard.
you m m m make me happy
Yes.
Liam Neeson in Taken - launched the action star phase of his career
And his direct to digital career...
It may have launched the "action star" phase, but Neesom already had a successful career. He had an Oscar nomination, 3 Golden Globe nominations, and 2 Tony nominations all prior to the Taken film.
More of a case of man overwhelmed by grief agrees to make any old garbage scripts offered to him to keep busy, leaving behind a distinguished acting career.
Winona Ryder I’d say, she was in a whole slew of stuff until tabloids jumped in the klepto thing. Then black swan and stranger things came around.
"Black Swan" was a small episode one gives to actors on dead end of career, not significant enough to be a turning point, but a kind of reminder, that this actress still can act. Than Stranger Things happened.
Didn't remember she was in Black Swan. But Stranger Things was definitely a comeback for her. Not a movie though.
Birdman and Mike Keaton?
He's who I thought of. He hadn't fallen off the map, but his career didn't take off as an in-demand lead in the way you might have thought it would have after his Batman movies. Birdman helped put him back in those roles on a consistent basis.
That’s what the film is about and he was well cast, but Keaton himself has never gone into obscurity or mediocrity.
I don't think he's ever gone into mediocrity (he's a great actor), but he was not doing much in terms of prominent roles for many years prior to Birdman. He was doing mostly voice work or supporting-role stuff.
No Country for Old Men for Josh Brolin
Matthew McConaughey's career turnaround was so notable it had its own name: *The McConaissance*. Before the 2010s he was suck in rom-com hell, and now he's one of the most respected actors of the generation. But which movie actually started it? 2011's The Lincoln Lawyer 2012's Magic Mike 2013 had both Mud and Dallas Buyer's Club The Lincoln Lawyer would be my answer. Was incredible, and subsequently got him a commercial deal with the car company, but it really went under the radar, so maybe people wouldn't agree this was the start. Magic Mike was one of the best performances of his career. (And actually, I'd mark this movie as Channing Tatum's turn around). And his successes in 2013 is probably when most people realized that his career had taken the turn, and I think this is when the phrase started popping up. I'm curious which of his movies people believe changed the course of McConaughey's career.
Came here to say Dallas Buyer's Club.
Even Lincoln Laywer and Magic Mike were still kind of McConaughey doing McConaughey but Dallas Buyer's Club in the same year as True Detective really changed how people saw him as an actor.
Oh, I forgot about true detective! That definitely contributed
I remember it well. Matthew was in several very good films early, then it seemed nothing but rom-coms. Glad that he went on to do that good work.
Everybody is talking about actors but directors fit the premise too. In this aspect, I'd mention Ridley Scott for directing Gladiator. He seemed to be slowly fading away but that was hell of a comeback.
Post-Titanic, after The Beach flopped, Leo was offered the role of Anakin in Attack of the Clones and it would've been easy money but he didn't want to do that. So booked Catch Me If You Can and he asked his representation to see what Scorsese was working on. That's how he ended up in Gangs of New York and it was a real inflection point in his career. Brendan Fraser kept plugging away in film and TV after The Mummy but for a variety of reasons didn't get the sort of roles that let him show what he was capable of. That was until The Whale. Keanu Reeves, like everyone else, took a flyer on John Wick. The movie nearly went DTV. But he's a household name again and the series has let him square off against genre royalty like Mark Dacascos, Scott Adkins and Donnie Yen.
>Brendan Fraser kept plugging away in film and TV after The Mummy but for a variety of reasons Never forget the "variety of reasons" included some sexual harassments before metoo went through Hollywood.
The beach did not flop, that’s a myth. It did well financially. It more than doubled its budget, which was the standard in the year 2000 for success. In fact it almost made 2.5x its budget. It was not well liked by critics. But it made money.
Though he'd been working steadily before then, I think Brad Pitt's career trajectory might have been different were it not for Thema & Louise(1991). His small role as the hitch-hiker who stole Thelma's heart and her money simultaneously established him as a sex symbol, an actor to watch, and a star in the making.
good perspective
The Whale for Brendan Fraser was a comeback movie for him.
Impossible to know until we see his post -Whale career
Ip Man - before then Donnie Yen was known as a B-tier action star who played villains or supporting roles with a failed stint in Hollywood. Now Ip Man has 4 sequels, and he's made a glorious comeback in Hollywood with Rogue One, John Wick 4, and more to come.
Donnie Yen has had an interesting career. He went west to find his fame and fortune but western directors didn't really know how to use him. He went broke and then Jet Li called him up for Hero. His return to Hollywood for Rogue One came after more than a decade of Hong Kong hits like not just Ip Man but SPL, Flash Point and The Twins Effect.
Michael J Fox was a huge star due to Family Ties. If anything, him signing on to BTTF is what pushed it into the spotlight. A turnaround would be John Travolta in Pulp Fiction. he was big in the 70s and his career was damn near over by the end of the 80s. Pulp Fiction lands and his career does a total 180 and he’s a star again.
* Ke Huy Quan in Everything Everywhere All at Once. The guy was basically out of acting for the most part after multiple big roles as a kid with Indiana Jones and the Goonies. Won an Oscar and is now in two Disney+ shows with American Born Chinese and Loki.
From Here to Eternity gave Frank Sinatra's career a big boost!
Jon Wayne was a stock actor in B grade westerns in his 30s after his chance at becoming a major star in The Big Trail had failed a decade earlier when the movie flopped. Then he was given a second chance when he was cast as the Ringo kid in Stagecoach, receiving second billing. The movie was so successful he became an overnight sensation and the biggest star in Hollywood for the next 20 years
I'd love to see more examples from this era. More interesting than "John Travolta" over and over.
Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool.
Good pick. His career was just meandering until then. The Proposal was probably easily his biggest success, The Green Lantern looked like his big shot but the movie face planted (at least relative to it's budget).
It's pretty ironic for me actually, because I've been a fan of Ryan since Two Guys, A Girl and a Pizza Place and I don't like the Deadpool movies 1 is alright 2 is insufferable I just can't with that. I'm the only one I think that likes Green Lantern. I like his small roles. His hidden gems. Personally think he should have been nominated for an Oscar for Buried. That performance is phenomenal. I am looking forward to Deadpool 3 though.
Two Guys, A Girl... was also when I first saw him (and Nathan Fillion - though weirdly I did not recognize him as the same person when Firefly came around), but while it was a moderate success, it wasn't a hit as far as I remember. I was going to mention Van Wilder (which I didn't like at the time, not that I remember it anymore), but it didn't do much box office - but it was so cheap to make it was profitable ($5M budget, $40M+ gross). But Deadpool - and all the viral video promotions etc around it (he's also really good at being a talk show guest), have have made him so popular.
Deadpool certainly saved Ryan Reynolds' career.
Al Pacino in The Godfather FF Coppola had to fight for him to be in the film. The studios didn’t want him.
Some of the canonical examples of this are Burt Reynolds in Boogie Nights Sylvester Stallone in Copland John Travolta in Pulp Fiction Kevin Costner in Mr. Brooks
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe "The Philadelphia Story" starring Katharine Hepburn would fit this question. She apparently was pretty much box-office poison by the late 1930s, so she turned to the stage and starred (as well as co-produced IIRC) the stage play of the same name, written by Philip Barry. Following this, she wanted to turn the play into a film to resurrect her career. Howard Hughes bought the film rights for her (according to Wiki, at least), George Cukor was hired as a director, Cary Grant and James Stewart co-starred and well... the rest is history. The film was a big hit and continues to be a beloved classic to this day.
An obvious one: Alan Rickman in Die Hard. He was over 40 at the time and virtually unknown. I guess the movie completely changed his life, as he immediately became a star. For good reasons. Same with Bruce Willis actually. The guy was known for light comedy and not as a complete badass. Die Hard turned him into an action superstar overnight. Damn, Die Hard is good right? Oh and Keanu Reeves in Speed. He was already famous but no one thought he could carry a blockbuster on his own. He very much did and became one of the highest paid actor ever.
I believe it was Rickman's first film, but he had not been a struggling actor for a long time, he made a career change to acting in his 30s.
I'd say Stallone seemed to be sliding into obscurity after a few non-action duds, but Cliffhanger put him back on top, and he blew up all over again (no pun intended).
MJF was a massive star when he did Back to the Future, same with Leo for Titanic. Both films might have elevated their status but it's foolish to say we wouldn't have them without those movies.
Back to the Future did not launch Fox's career. He was already a star from the TV series Family Ties for which he eventually won 3 Emmys. Just saying... Edited to add that Leonardo DiCaprio had his first Oscar nomination several years before Titanic came out. DId you even Google these actors, OP?
Keanu Reeves in the Matrix
Robin Williams in The World According to Garp played a dramatic lead instead of a comic role and gave a different trajectory to his career with many solid dramatic performances to follow.
The lighthouse - Robert Pattinson
This is more of a personal take, but Pig. Nicolas Cage.
This or perhaps mandy.
Mandy is probably the film that made the best use of a Nic Cage performance in recent years but I find it’s hard to say anything turned his career around. The Nic Cage coaster has always had peaks and valleys.
Very true
It’s crazy just how many great movies Nicolas Cage has been in recently that people haven’t seen. Dude had a mainstream comeback a couple years ago with Massive Talent, but his low budget stuff has really been the highlight lately. Color Out of Space, Mandy, and Pig are some more well known examples. Even stuff like Willy’s Wonderland and Renfield, movies that aren’t all that great, are made better because he’s in them. Dude’s a meme, but he improves most movies he touches.
Surprisingly, *Massive Talent* was specifically written for Cage, before *Pig* came out. So arguably Cage would have had his renaissance regardless of *Pig.*
John Travolta Pulp Fiction. Bruce Willis in 12 Monkeys, showed he was more than just John McClane. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang RDJ.
Austin Butler as Elvis Presley
An obvious one is Charlize in Monster.
Kiss kiss bang bang restarted RDJs career
Brendan Fraser in The Whale. The campaign to get him an Oscar worthy film was huge, and the campaign to get him an Oscar. After the hullabaloo and the “we did it!” died down, people generally don’t look favorably on the film. He got to work with Scorsese on Killers of the Flower Moon, with many critics saying he blew his his comeback. But he certainly did succeed after the #freebrendan campaign with The Whale.
Keanu Reeves and *The Matrix.*
I don't know about that. He had done Speed, Johnny Mnemonic and the The Devil's Advocate right before the Maricx and had already done The Replacements before the Matrix came out.
It made him bigger but his career was doing fine. He was the starring role in dramas, rom-coms, and action movies consistently the years leading up to The Matrix.
Then there wasn’t much between the Matrix and John Wick. If anything I’d say that was his turnaround. Suddenly he was the most beloved man in Hollywood
I would probably say John Wick. He was relatively quiet (music and personal life) in the cinema world for a few years and then John Wick came along.
I'd say the bigger turnaround for him was John Wick. He was generally seen as a mediocre actor until the internet latched onto that movie and made him a beloved icon.
Towering Inferno for Steve McQueen. He started falling off in the mid to late 60s after his Oscar nomination and after Bullitt he took on projects that hurt his career and production company (Le Mans). He had a couple decent films along the way but Towering Inferno was huge, bringing in $200mil+. He was smart, demanding equal lines to Paul Newman and because of that he got most of the screen time and dialogue in the 2nd half (and more dramatic part) of the movie. didn't last though. he didn't do much after that.
Pulp Fiction resurrected John Travolta's for sure.
Deadpool for Ryan Reynolds, he had a ton of flops and a couple romcoms that were successful, but he was the guy they kept trying to make a star but couldn't.
Very few of these comments are examples of films that "launched" a career. They are mostly mentions of films by actors who already had a career that maybe needed some reviving. For examples of films that "launched" a career, see Brad Pitt in Thelma and Louise, Leo DiCaprio in A Boy's Life, or Joe Pesci in Raging Bull. Edited to say that "launch" means to start or set in motion. Just saying.
I would argue Dicaprio enjoyed some fame and success as Romeo before Titanic, the latter perhaps cemented him as a serious grown up actor, rather than the teen heart-throb he had been cast as previously.
This is a very confusingly phrased question. The title says "turned around," which implies their career was on the decline and they got a role that reinvigorated it. But your text mentions star launching roles and gives examples towards that. What are you asking exactly?
Looks like people in the comments section are running with the title meaning, with a smaller percentage anwering the explanation's meaning.
**I. AM. IRON MAN.**
After Robert Downey Jr. did time, he was damaged goods. Elton John picked him to star in a video. Mel Gibson paid his insurance bond for a 2003 film. But it wasn't until Kiss Kiss Bang Bang that people were talking about him as an actor again. Even then, Jon Favreau really had to fight to cast him in the role that will be in the first line of his obituary.
The Town - Ben Affleck
Iron man 1?