April 5, 2022

"They needed Bruce Willis … and Willis may have needed them. There may have been a sincere effort..."

"... on the part of his agents and managers to keep him busy and engaged, as a way to delay the worst of what his disease would eventually bring. However, at a certain point, most likely sometime in the last two years if reports are correct, a health line seems to have been crossed. But the work continued." 

Writes Joe Ferullo in "Hollywood failed Bruce Willis" (The Hill). 

Willis made 21 movies in the last 4 years.

Directors were asked to keep the star’s dialogue short and his days on set to a minimum. Even that reportedly was sometimes challenging for the actor. Despite all this, film roles kept coming.... The majority were low budget efforts, often $10 million or less, compared to an average $65 million budget for a mainstream studio production. The movies were typically violent action stories that sell well internationally.... Independent producers — working outside the big studio system — have to raise the money on their own for these films. The most important sales tool they have is the movie’s poster.... It’s far easier to get backing if your poster includes the face of a well-known actor....
There's an old term: "exploitation film."
An exploitation film is a film that attempts to succeed financially by exploiting current trends, niche genres, or lurid content. Exploitation films are generally low-quality "B movies"....

Here, it seems, an actor was exploited in the making of exploitation films. From his Wikipedia page

In the later years of his career, Willis starred in numerous low-budget independent films that were panned by critics; he would often earn $2 million for two days of work per film. Those working with Willis noted that he appeared confused, did not understand why he was there and had to be fed lines through an earpiece. Days before Willis was scheduled to arrive on set for one film, Out of Death, the screenwriter was instructed to reduce his role and abbreviate his dialogue. The Golden Raspberry Awards, an annual award for the year's worst films and performances, created a dedicated category, the Worst Bruce Willis Performance in a 2021 Movie, for his roles in eight films released that years. 

Or do you think he benefited from keeping busy and that he must have wanted his family to take in the last few millions that could be squeezed from his face.

44 comments:

tcrosse said...

One thinks of Ulysses S. Grant, dying of cancer, cranking out his memoirs in order to support his family.

Bob Boyd said...

Maybe he just likes to work.

Kevin said...

It may be the case that all actors are just placeholders for future digital versions of themselves.

I'm sure they're working on one right now to reshoot the scenes of the current President.

gilbar said...

One thing that is True, and can NEVER change;
Bruce Willis made THE QUINTESSENTIAL Christmas Movie, of ALL TIME
When people think of Xmas Movies, The 1st Thing they think of is: bare feet running on broken glass

tim maguire said...

Today we are moving my mother-in-law to a care home because she is too old and frail to continue living alone even with 8 hours a day of PSW help. The look on Willis' face in the opening moments of that trailer remind me of the look on her face when she's trying to remember where she is (while she's sitting in her favorite living room chair).

I didn't know any of this about Bruce Willis and it's sad that he was so ill-used by those around him. It's hard to believe his family needs the money. It's easier to believe he wanted to keep working. But going by what I saw just now, the most likely explanation is abuse and manipulation.

Ron Winkleheimer said...

I saw Willis in one of those movies a few weeks ago. His role consisted of a couple of lines of dialogue and then he moved from cover (he was in a gun fight) and was almost instantly shot and killed.

WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...

Gotta keep the big money flowing. The family needs to eat... and live a posh life.

Laslo Spatula said...

"Those working with Willis noted that he appeared confused, did not understand why he was there and had to be fed lines through an earpiece."

Replace Willis with Biden, etc etc.

I am Laslo.

Owen said...

Words; fine words; yet more of them;
And do these ease one whit his plight?
I say not; he’s caught in thought
That turns to mist and dissipates.

Sad. No winners here.

John henry said...

at $2mm for 2 days work if anyone is being exploited, it is the filmmakers. Certainly not Bruce.

I'm with Bruce. If he can work, even minimally and with difficulty, I think he is better off keeping busy and being useful on some level, however low.

We'll still remember him for his great movies like Bonfire of the vanities, Nobody's Fool, Die Hard and so on. Nobody cares about the hack work. If that is what this is. And it may not be.

Good for him.

I plan on working until they close the lid on my casket. I figure I will always be able to contribute something, no matter how insignificant. I have requested a power port and ethernet connection in my casket so maybe not even then.

John LGBTQBNY Henry

tim in vermont said...

Or do you think he benefited from keeping busy and that he must have wanted his family to take in the last few millions that could be squeezed from his face.

It's like an empty net goal, just too easy. (cough cough, Joe Biden)

John henry said...

The Golden Raspberry Awards, an annual award for the year's worst films and performances, created a dedicated category, the Worst Bruce Willis Performance in a 2021 Movie, for his roles in eight films released that years.

On finding out the backstory, the Razzies rescinded the award and cancelled the category.

At least we have one awards organization with a sense of class.

John LGBTQBNY Henry

Dave Begley said...

I didn't see a single one of his 21 movies that were made in the last four years. This is so frustrating to me since I can't get my "Frankenstein, Part II" produced. It would be BIG!

Achilles said...

So we have to be careful on this thread to make sure we stay on topic.

No mentioning any other evil families squeezing the last several millions out of an old senescent old man.

NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...

I think Bruce Willis was exploited by Bruce Willis. Any crap about Hollywood "failing" him is just horror porn for the many, many "movie stars" we have these days who haven't made a movie in years and years.

RideSpaceMountain said...

Kinda reminds me of "Once Upon A Time In Hollywood". Back then they'd put the action star 'out to pasture' making spaghetti westerns in Italy. Now you end up like Baldwin and Willis making westerns and action flicks, but they don't send you to Italy anymore.

Which is totally unacceptable. If it were me I'd be like, "Yes I know my career is on the downslope, SEND ME TO ITALY YOU FRIGGIN PUTZES!" What. A. Gyp.

hawkeyedjb said...

"[Handlers] were asked to keep the [president’s] dialogue short and his days on set to a minimum. Even that reportedly was sometimes challenging for the [president]."

Lurker21 said...

"They needed Joe Biden … and Biden may have needed them. There may have been a sincere effort on the part of his agents and managers to keep him busy and engaged, as a way to delay the worst of what his disease would eventually bring. However, at a certain point, most likely sometime in the last two years if reports are correct, a health line seems to have been crossed. But the work continued."

Washington DC failed Biden?

Howard said...

There's no shame in taking a legal job. From what I understand, he has a ton of family support. Bruce's body failed him, which is something we all face.

Wince said...

Those working with Willis noted that he appeared confused, did not understand why he was there and had to be fed lines through an earpiece. Days before Willis was scheduled to arrive on set for one film, Out of Death, the screenwriter was instructed to reduce his role and abbreviate his dialogue.

Willis has one more movie in him: "The Joe Biden Story"

LordSomber said...

At least he has an excuse now for having phoned it in for so long.
Personally, I wouldn't get involved in things I couldn't give a 100 percent effort to.

robother said...

Laslo beat me to it. At least no one gave Willis access to the Football.

Original Mike said...

There have been a lot of Bruce Willis movies in the TV rotations the last few days.

I generally don't feel much emotion over the tribulations of celebrities, but this one makes me sad. Cognitive decline sucks, and he seemed like a good guy.

mikee said...

Family often sucks when elder care and even a pittance of an inheritance is involved. Without further evidence, don't think it was Bruce deciding to work until he couldn't any longer.

tim maguire said...

gilbar said...When people think of Xmas Movies, The 1st Thing they think of is: bare feet running on broken glass

Maybe, but what does Home Alone have to do with Bruce Willis?

mccullough said...

He has 5 daughters, two of them are minors.

21 movies times $2 million a pop is $42 million.

Willis did what he had to do.

Ann Althouse said...

"On finding out the backstory, the Razzies rescinded the award and cancelled the category. At least we have one awards organization with a sense of class."

They used him to promote themselves twice. I don't see anything classy about it at all.

Balfegor said...

Re: Kevin:

It may be the case that all actors are just placeholders for future digital versions of themselves.

That future is fast approaching, with what Disney is doing with Mark Hamill on their Star Wars TV shows. And for an older actor, so long as they (or their estate) retain some rights to their likeness, this seems like a better way of ensuring that they have revenue coming in, in their late age. But that also raises a question for me -- what about the actors who died decades ago? Disney created a digital double for Peter Cushing for a Star Wars movie. Were his heirs compensated? Could someone make a deepfake of, say, the young Gielgud without having to pay off rights holders? I am a bit uncomfortable with the idea of taking the likenesses of, to take an example, Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing, and making yet another Dracula sequel, but less so if the rights are worked out while the actor is still alive.

Anyhow, a digital double of young Bruce Willis could be entertaining us on direct to video and streaming for decades to come.

Ann Althouse said...

"Now you end up like Baldwin and Willis making westerns and action flicks...."

Watch the trailer for "Out of Death" that I embedded. They use the cheesy meme of aiming the gun right at the camera. I thought of bringing up Baldwin but didn't want to clutter the post.

glam1931 said...

Althouse: "They use the cheesy meme of aiming the gun right at the camera."
That cheesy meme goes back 119 years to Edwin S. Porter's THE GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY (1903) acknowledged generally as the first American narrative film. The shot is at the very end of the film for no reason whatsoever than to be sensational, after the story has ended; the gun-flash is even tinted red! Easily found on Youtube.
- Archie H. Waugh

NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...

Dave Begley said...

I didn't see a single one of his 21 movies that were made in the last four years. This is so frustrating to me since I can't get my "Frankenstein, Part II" produced. It would be BIG!

Too bad. If you'd been aware of this, you might've known that the guy who produced these movies was floating on a sea of Qatari oil money and I'm betting he would have been very interested in your script.

Anthony said...

That's kind of sad. I had actually noticed that there seemed to be an awful lot of Bruce Willis movies out lately, none of them Big Deals.

My favorite movie of his? The Fifth Element. Just a wildly fun, quirky SciFi movie.

Anyway, I don't know what to believe about the situation, whether he was being manipulated or he just wanted to keep working, even if he hasn't been all there. I hope he's getting the care he needs.

Yancey Ward said...

I am obviously late to the party, but at least Willis' family didn't run him for President like Joe Biden's family did.

I have no problem with Bruce Willis and his family raking in big money from Hollywood producers willing to pay 2 million dollars for a few days work. I don't think for a second that this was done without Willis' imput to some great extent, at least in the beginning. It may have devolved in the last year into something less his doing, but it surely didn't start out that way.

On the clip provided- yes, there is no doubt in my mind that Willis is already deep into dementia at that point- I recognize the speech problems immediately given my experience with my own father's descent in that illness. The lack of inflection, and the slowness of it is a dead giveaway. This isn't just aphasia by itself- it is full blown Alzheimers or similar malady.

I haven't seen any of these recent films- the last film of Willis' I have seen is probably Red 2 which was made 9 years ago, and in it he was his very recognizable normal self. I had considered watching the remake of Death Wish, made in 2017-2018, and I may still do so at some point- it is likely that he was still normal at that point. I won't, however, ever watch any of the things made in the last 2-3 years- I don't need to see any more than that clip above. I don't usually get maudlin over celebrities in their decline, but Willis' plight bothers in a way that surprises me. It hurt watching him in that clip.

Rabel said...

As I understand, he has been diagnosed with aphasia, not dementia.

JaimeRoberto said...

Here I thought they were exploiting each other. He got paid big money for little work, and the filmmakers got a big name on their crappy film. And boy are those films crappy.

Chris Lopes said...

"at $2mm for 2 days work if anyone is being exploited, it is the filmmakers."

They got exactly what they paid for, Bruce Willis' name and picture on the movie poster. That's what got them the financing in the first place. That's what they are selling the movie as, a "Bruce Willis" movie. The movies themselves are total crap with or without Willis. With him, they can be sold to ad supported streaming services at a profit.

Readering said...

Long time since I've seen a shout out for Bonfire of the Vanities. Maybe I'll finally try it. Great book and I lived through that NYC era.

Kevin said...

But that also raises a question for me -- what about the actors who died decades ago? Disney created a digital double for Peter Cushing for a Star Wars movie. Were his heirs compensated?

What if the actor did not wish to have their image manipulated, but the heirs wished to be compensated?

How would you even go about determining the wishes of the long since dead?

Might someone profit from you and me in the future, in a way neither of us could conceive of today?

Readering said...

Folks are in for a treat. Bruce's filmography site shows lots of films still to be released. Those producers must be passed at this disclosure. Last I saw him in was Motherless Brooklyn.

Joe Smith said...

I think he just liked getting out of the house.

There is no possible way that he needed the pocked change that came his way...

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

What is it Like?

Still Alice (2015) Movie CLIP

John henry said...

Ann, if an actor makes a bad movie or a string of bad movies a Razzy is a legitimate award. Especially for someone as well known as Willis.

Nothing classy or unclassy. Just another fun award.

The classy part was taking it back when they found out the reason last week. It's the best he can do right now and I love him for doing it.

John LGBTQBNY Henry

John henry said...

Readering,

I just rewatched bonfire a few weeks ago. Full movie is on YouTube. I loved the book when it came out and have read it5-6 times. Most recently as part of Ann's reading prophecy a few years back.

I recently listened to a podcast series 7 60 minut eps iirc by Ben mankewitz. Very interesting.

Also in the same series a series on of Peter bogdanovich and a series on Lucille Ball. Both excellent though I'm not really a fan of either

The podcast series is called the plot thickens and is a turner class movies production

John LGBTQBNY Henry

readering said...

John Henry: Thanks. You are a big fan of the book!! I just ordered the film DVD from my library. But the youtube teaser for the Ben Mankiewicz podcast I just watched makes it sound like he's not the movie's biggest fan!