Bruce Willis retires from acting

KieferFan69

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118862838#Comment_118862838

Indeed my man indeedi

Big Gerry

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118862884#Comment_118862884

It was a shame they never brought John McTiernan back to make another die hard film.

Beechwoodspark

Was never a fan of him.

Homer Simpson Arsing around the place in a vest summed him up.

yet I sympathise with him and his family for this ordeal.

Agent Coulson

I wonder does this go all they way back to when Willis considered challeneging Apple for the right to leave his digital content to his daughters.

If I rememeber rightly he said at the time he was contemplating his death and what what he would leave his family.

That also reminds he had a couple of hit songs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTIG_eqR8PY&ab_channel=LuvDup

bassy

could never stand the sight of him,good riddance...............................................................

pixelburp

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118862832#Comment_118862832

Not as such. The films are part of a churn of bottom feeders called "geezer teasers"; cheap DTV Movies with ageing stars, hired for a few scenes and their fading star power. This article goes into detail about it. It operates with the "stack em high and sell em cheap" mentality towards filmmaking.

Willis' involvement was initially rumoured to be an attempt to make easy money for his family before the illness completely took hold; recent news confirming these rumours.

https://www.vulture.com/article/randall-emmett-movies.html

While this popular YT channel's video actually watched a bunch of the "movies", and examines just how sloppy and bad they are, alongside Willis'history in this cottage industry. They bookend their videos with some skits, but the meat of the subject is interesting.

https://youtu.be/cd1eNS9HtXo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118862973#Comment_118862973

Blast from the past that.

Did well in the UK but not in the US apparently.

Big Gerry

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118863031#Comment_118863031

So those "movies" were basically a scam that were sold on the back of Bruce's name ?

Loafing Oaf

Bruce Willis has retired from acting 

Full-time acting. He might do a bit of moonlighting though

MEGA BRO WOLF 5000

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118862059#Comment_118862059

Doubling down on being an asshole is such a classy move.

Big Gerry

I can't see any other action film ever topping Die Hard.

They can't top Die Hard so other films just copy it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R1zcEhztxR0

pjcb

Surely he was already loaded, was he not willing to quit? https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/movies/story/2022-03-30/bruce-willis-aphasia-memory-loss-cognitive-disorder

Tork

You'd think he should be loaded but I certainly wouldn't be betting the farm on it. When people get rich, their lifestyle usually expands to match their income. We don't know what Bruce Willis's outgoings were, whether his investments were good or bad or anything else really. Also, heaven knows what sort of healthcare bills (American stylee) are coming over the horizon for him. If his condition deteriorates, he's going to need increasing levels of care. That's not cheap anywhere, so we can only guess as to what it'll cost in the USA.

I just hope that there weren't people behind the scenes pushing Bruce into doing all these films to keep the gravy train going. Regardless of whether you liked him or his films very much, it's a sad ending to a solid acting career.

Loafing Oaf

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118862423#Comment_118862423

not all there

Luckily his acting career has prepared him for the ne plus ultra of that...

Big Gerry

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118863847#Comment_118863847

At his level you need millions every year just to maintain an A list lifestyle.

I read that it cost Johnny Depp 4 million a year just to pay for the upkeep on his various mansions.

Strumms

Just sell a couple of mansions. Nah he’s a multi millionaire… 3 years from his 70th birthday, covid and shít…

retiring would be precisely what I’d be doing too…

He'll always be Hudson Hawk

Sexual Chocolate

Sad to hear about Bruce. Most recent film of his I've seen is probably Red so I'm not aware of anything with him after that.

Die Hard is probably one of my most favorite films, I watch it every Christmas without fail and never get fed up with it. Enjoyed some of his other stuff such as Mercury Rising, Tears of the Sun, Hostage and The Kid.

He also plays a good villian as he did in The Siege and in one of the early episodes of Miami Vice as a weapon buyer/wife beater.

Little fun fact for Die hard and Lethal Weapon fans. Bruce and Mel used the same prop Beretta 92f pistol in both original movies.

Big Gerry

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118864089#Comment_118864089

Hostage is an underrated gem that is better than the last 2 Die Hard films IMO.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCt4L7RPweE

Spon Farmer

I read about this morning.

I had assumed that all the “straight to video” movies (most of which he isn’t even billed as the lead) he has been doing was because of some finance or tax trouble.

If that wasn’t the situation and he has no money problems then I don’t understand the need to do these movies - isn’t he a millionaire? That isn’t a criticism or snark about the man - I’m just trying to figure out why he threw himself into those movies.

Anyway it is sad news. He made some great movie. I thought aphasia was only something that could happen after a stroke.

Spon Farmer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118863137#Comment_118863137

I don’t see how they are a “scam”.

They are just low budget badly made movies. They’ve been around since VHS appeared.

They obviously make money somehow otherwise how can they get made or hire someone like Bruce Willis?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118861170#Comment_118861170

You stay classy

On the "forcing" him to work angle. He, honestly, may just have wanted to be working for as long as he could. Something a bit in his control.

He was in the best superhero origin film, Unbreakable

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118864132#Comment_118864132

Yeah I think rather than a scam, they're always just hoping for that one that becomes a cult hit.

As for why Bruce would continue trying to make money when he's already rich, no one can really say how much money he has, how much his care is going to cost into the future, plus its not just about money for him but also for his family. Even if he made 2m per movie for his last 10 movies, that's 20m. That's nothing to be sniffed at even if he's already rich.

If I knew I was leaving behind 100m to my family and I had a chance to earn another 20m to leave behind too, I'd do it. Regardless of how it may be seen to tarnish his acting legacy or how many Razzies they give him, I can't fault him for that.

Though if he has been cognitively impaired and they had him on film sets using weapons with blanks... that's not fantastic....

pixelburp

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118864273#Comment_118864273

From what I've seen of these shovelware films, they don't use squibs but those awful CGI ones; indeed if the RLM video is to be believed, Willis rarely appears in action scenes anyway, a bad body double instead used in action scenes. The double shot from behind or in the background, out of focus.

And yeah, the Willis' might be "rich" by any conventional wisdom but we can't know how much of that is liquid, tied up in investments, assets - or just will get lost once Bruce passes and the tax-man, inheritance comes along.

And TBH, if I knew my mind was about to leave me and had no way to enjoy my grey years with my family, becoming an actual burden? I'd 100% consider taking some shítty job if it paid a crazy amount of cash up-front. No worries then about those investments crashing, or discovering your accountant f'ed you over and the IRS takes it all.

pixelburp

As to the "scam" angle, these Geezer Teasers are no different from the Asylum business model of making "mockbusters", and those shítty rip-off films budgeted at $1 million; or the entire career of someone like Roger Corman; or the Golan-Globus era of Cannnon films. There has always been a bottom feeding, sub-industry in Hollywood of cheap garbage pushed out by the shovel full. Fadó it was about titillation and X-rated schlock. Now it's throwing some cash at a fading star to sit in a chair for 3 scenes.

Spon Farmer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118864273#Comment_118864273

I knew it was said that it was for his family but I guess I never considered the cost of care and yes, more money to leave for your family is always better. I never thought that maybe a millionaire (I assume he is) would think that too - they just like the rest of us.

Looking at it like that I would be be very sympathetic to him for taking chances on films sets with weapons, etc. No one was hurt thank goodness but I’d be more inclined to blame the risk on the the producers and filmmakers - as understand it several have commented that they knew “something was wrong”.

I was very disappointed how Willis (and Jackson too) was sidelined in GLASS in favour of McAvoy. This sad news makes GLASS makes that disappointment greater.

The “straight to video” type thing has happened to Hollywood stars even before VHS - there was a lot old time stars that up in Italy’s film industry in the 1950s (I think) becasue of declining careers in Hollywood.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118864295#Comment_118864295

For the most part it'd definitely be a stunt double. But there was a report of Bruce himself accidentally firing a gun with a blank at the wrong time while in a scene with an actress.

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118864310#Comment_118864310

Seeing "A Golan Globus Production" in the opening credits was the sign of a good time to come

second toughest in the infants

Poor fella. These kind of illnesses are always tragic.

He's left some great movies behind him. My favourite is probably The Fifth Element.