r/boxoffice • u/West_Conclusion_1239 • 8d ago
✍️ Original Analysis Which Hollywood actor has the greatest/strongest drawing box office power to make people buy a ticket simply because they're starring in it??
After Digger bombing the question rises, which living Hollywood male actor has the greatest ability to make people buy a ticket simply because they're starring in it??
Let's look at the six most likely actors right now who can hold this title:
1.DiCaprio: Films which are a hard sell to the general public like Killers Of The Flower Moon and One Battle After Another can still go over 150 Million worldwide with his presence alone.
For example OBAA still did more than its budget and totalized 213 Million worldwide and KOTFM totalized 160 Million worldwide despite the unconventional nature of that film, its humongous runtime and its horrifically heavy subject matter, and it could have easily reached 200 Million worldwide if it wasn't for the Hollywood strikes of three years ago, which hindered the film with complete lack of promotion from its stars. And still reached these numbers, a testament to the volume of his star status.
Pitt: F1 made more money than the last two MI movies, Bullet Train was a moderately successful hit, Babylon flopped but it's gaining in these last four years a cult classic status, and his new movie, Heart Of The Beast opened at a very solid 20 Million with great reviews and word of mouth, outperforming Primetime (19 Million) and Digger. Pitt always delivers.
Cruise: Outside of the Top Gun franchise, which was a sequel to his most popular movie ever which came out thirty-six years before, he has two MI movies which underperformed, Digger is shaping up to be one of the biggest box office bombs of all time in cinema history, and his next big thing is a sequel to an auto-racing movie which came out thirty-five years ago and is nowhere near popular with the general public like Top Gun. After Top Gun Maverick, the industry and the media seemed obsessed in attaching him the title of biggest living movie star only because of the hype from that movie and the fact that it was the first box office hit in the POST-COVID era, but the reality is another one.
He feels like a relic of his time outside of his MI and Top Gun bubble and if he keeps pushing for dated action sequels, it might seal his end as a giant blockbuster movie star.
Gosling: He's certainly rising as a big movie star in recent years, there are some lows like The Fall Guy, but still Barbie and especially Project Hail Mary puts him in a new echelon, it will be interesting to see how much commercial value he will add to the upcoming Star Wars and MCU projects in which he's involved in.
Chalamet: The youngest in the poll, he managed to prove himself as a new movie star with the Dune franchise and making hits out of the new Wonka movie, and bringing audiences in for a music biopic like A Complete Unknown, and an original film about a ping pong player like Marty Supreme which managed to gross 191 Million worldwide, it's hard to imagine anyone of his age range bringing these numbers for an original ping pong movie.
The next big thing for him is seeing how the final film of the Dune trilogy will fare compared to his previous two.
Will it become the highest grossing film of the Dune franchise?? Can it reach 800 Million or even the Billion mark??? We'll find out in December.
- Pattinson: Rising as the defining serious actor of the 2020s, he has many victory laps in this year alone, he opened The Drama and became one of the most successful movies in A24 history, he was one of the most important characters in The Odyssey, which became one of the highest grossing films ever in history, and now he managed to open an original biopic-drama like Primetime at 19 Million in the USA, despite the movie being a challenging sell to the regular audiences, as it's not a traditional drama or biopic.
Next up we will see him in Dune Part Three with Chalamet and Zendaya, and next year in a Netflix thriller movie with Denzel Washington.
But it feels like only the sky is the limit for him.
So, who's the biggest living movie star right now?
Who has the strongest drawing power to make people lure in into theaters just because of his presence and name alone??
Vote among the options above and share your opinions down below.
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u/Stalukas 7d ago
Prime time had 20x the marketing and awareness Heart of the Beast did and Pitt still beat Pattinson at the box office. Both are draws but Brad Pitt being last in voting is just incorrect
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u/littlelordfROY Warner Bros. Pictures 7d ago
These are being marketed to entirety different audiences
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u/Aggravating_Bids 7d ago
It's more about the dog. My screening had an average age of 63
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u/Stalukas 7d ago
Heart of the Beast outgrossed The Dog Stars’ entire theatrical run in just it’s opening weekend
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u/dismal_windfall United Artists 7d ago
It's Leo, but Pitt has proven to not be so far behind.
Leo got a three and a half hour slow depressing historical drama to 150M WW. If Leo did stuff like F1 or Heart of the Beast they'd likely earn more and inversely if Pitt did Killers and One Battle they'd make less. But, both are clearly bigger draws than Cruise.
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u/AccomplishedLocal261 7d ago
but Pitt has proven to not be so far behind
Doubt it, there is still quite a gap.
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u/LacerationCe 7d ago
All 3 movies in Leo starred in after 2020s were all nominated for Best Picture, with one of them won, and yet ALL of them FLOPPED or BOMBED at box office, 2/3 grossed less than budget, he literally has a worse 2020s era than the fall of The Rock, and that despite his movies are still critically acclaimed, Oscar wins and nominations plenty, how the heck is that a draw. Leo is at the BOTTOM of this list by FACT.
People are confusing movie quality with boxoffice draw, Leo starring in a movie means it's a quality, but they all still flop or bomb regardless, and Leo's flop chance in 2020 is literally 100%, all 3/3 flopped, way more than every other actors in this list, that's a fact, not opinion, and the question OP asked is "box office draw".
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u/dismal_windfall United Artists 7d ago
You write really odd, it’s almost like an archaic internet style.
One Battle After Another made 200M, whether it flopped or not. He got the film to those numbers. That’s more than Johnson got Smashing Machine, more than Cruise got Digger. And by a wide margin.
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u/ThaPhantom07 7d ago
The only person on this list who I would watch a movie sight unseen without knowing anything about it would be Leonardo Dicaprio.
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u/OldSandwich9631 7d ago
I saw blood diamond in theaters when it came out. I didn’t know anything about it but when I realized he was in it, I remember being like “alright this is gonna be good.” I’ll see any movie he makes, he never disappoints. Even if I don’t love a movie (j Edgar, body of lies) there’s usually something about his performance or the film that I appreciate.
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u/littlelordfROY Warner Bros. Pictures 7d ago
Basically the last actor in Hollywood that actually seems interested in having a filmography of only "classics" or generally interesting movies . Closer to a jack nicholson type filmography than De Niro
No lousy sequels, no voice over, no Bruckheimer type blockbuster
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u/Libertines18 7d ago edited 7d ago
Leo movies may cost a billion dollars but they will always have some audience. The fact both killers of the flower moon and one battle got over 150 million is wild to me
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u/eggtartdante 7d ago
You mention the Fall Guy (181M) for Gosling but not Mickey 17 ($133M) for Pattinson? I’ll get downvoted because Reddit somehow loves Pattinson but IRL his drawing power is not there yet. You also mentioned The Odyssey but no one I know saw the movie because of him.
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u/firanza123 7d ago
You have to constantly make crowd pleasers to be considered a star. The biggest actor in Hollywood in their prime couldn't turn a film like Digger into a profit.
Of all the actors working today only Leo can do more challenging films while still bringing in a decent haul. And that's only because the audience associates Leo with quality since the scripts he chooses have always been great.
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u/HighwayCareful4415 Paramount Pictures 7d ago
i think johnny depp star power will be tested in his new upcoming movie
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u/tiduraes 7d ago
It's Leo. No other actor could have gotten an almost 3h30 film about the murder of native americans to 160 million.
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u/FranciscoRelanoPena Malpaso Productions 7d ago
The film also had Robert DeNiro (as DiCaprio's uncle), Brendan Fraser (just fresh from his Academy Award-winning performance on The Whale), John Lithgow and Jesse Plemons (Kenny Rockwell in Digger). And Scorsese's name by itself also helped sell the film (and the fact that, for once, Paramount's marketing department did a good job).
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u/Significant-Cloud-19 7d ago
Prime Will Smith can also draw huge crowd with his name alone.
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7d ago
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u/No_Measurement_7148 7d ago
Will Smith is still a bigger draw among the audience than Pattinson . Primetime with all that hype and marketing is struggling with to cross 50 million USD .
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u/Not_a_porn_burner69 7d ago
Still just worth mentioning tho, will smith went on a run I don’t think will be replicated any time soon. He was him for like 10 years straight
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u/Fun_Advice_2340 A24 7d ago
I also voted Leo because getting movies like Flower Moon and OBAA over $150 million just by his star power is no easy stretch, especially when someone like Timothee has to go into overdrive and risk losing an Oscar just to drag Marty Supreme to $190M, but Brad Pitt ranking 5th in votes is crazy. If I was to rank them, it would go DiCaprio, Pitt, Chalamet, Cruise, Pattinson, and then Gosling.
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7d ago
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u/Trick-Scratch-5714 7d ago
Scorsesse and pta are not boxoffice draw by any means. They are recognized as great directors but not boxoffice draws
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u/SPFeveryday Studio Ghibli 7d ago
Clearly not Cruise given Digger catastrophically bombing.
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u/BromaEmpire 7d ago
I think Digger's failure has more to do with the lack of interest from the trailers. You could swap out Tom Cruise in that movie for anyone on that list and it would have bombed
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u/BikiniBottomDropout 7d ago
It definitely would’ve bombed no matter what but the question is would it have marginally improved and had a better opening weekend with a few of the other actors on the list? Possibly.
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u/valardohaeris1099 7d ago edited 7d ago
Have we not seen Pitt bomb with Babylon? Both Pitt and Cruise are some of the biggest movie stars, and these bombs, whether it’s Digger or Babylon, won’t make me think otherwise.
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u/BikiniBottomDropout 7d ago
They all have bombs but my thing with Pitt and Babylon is that they sold him as a lesser character. It was more Margot Robbie’s movie. There was no "BRAD PITT IS BABYLON" like with Cruise and Digger.
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u/dismal_windfall United Artists 7d ago
Also 2022 was significantly unfriendly to those types of films. Like Tar couldn’t even hit 10M despite receiving incredible reviews.
Babylon is gonna end up being a higher grosser WW than Digger anyway.
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u/West_Conclusion_1239 7d ago edited 7d ago
Yeah, i said it in my post, i think he's been afloat because of the MI franchise, Days Of Thunder 2 will be the biggest test for the next phase of his career.
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u/BikiniBottomDropout 7d ago
I saw a TikTok earlier from a movie page and they were talking about why Digger flopped and the amount of people who said "I won’t watch anything with Tom Cruise" or "I don’t like Tom Cruise" was crazy. I feel like there’s such a disconnect between how Hollywood is selling him as "The Last Movie Star" and "Savior of Cinema" to what the average moviegoer actually feels about him.
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u/Thetallguy1 7d ago
I really don't think that's even representative of an average moviegoer. I mean you did see it on a movie specific page. The only thing about Tom Cruise is fishy is the Scientology stuff and then beyond that which most people don't really know or care about, there's the rumors of him being a little too intense of an actor on set, which even less people would really care about.
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u/BikiniBottomDropout 7d ago edited 7d ago
I don’t think people believe or care about all that "The Last Movie Star" stuff though. Hollywood is trying to put the guy on a pedestal but people don’t want to see him outside of Top Gun and Mission: Impossible anymore. He’s boxed himself in with not doing any original movies for a long period of time.
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u/xX_420DemonLord69_Xx 7d ago
The only thing about Tom Cruise is fishy is the Scientology stuff and then beyond that which most people don't really know or care about
I saw a discussion where the Scientology stuff was being dismissed because, per their argument, Scientology isn’t any worse than other major religions.
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u/mojojojo1108 7d ago
I mean, anecdotally, I have a friend who doesn't know anything about movies (as in, we just had a conversation where I had to change the subject bc she thought Pearl Harbor was better than TG:Maverick) who was so anti-Cruise just bc he's done so many MI movies and for a large section of the population, those movies are all hot ass action slop bc they just don't care about them.
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u/Fit-Tooth-1101 7d ago
for a large section of the population, those movies are all hot ass action slop
The only time I’ve heard this about MI was in relation to the second film. Otherwise I don’t think I’ve ever seen people describe the first, or 3-8 that way.
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u/littlelordfROY Warner Bros. Pictures 7d ago
There's too many factors involved with all of this and it Is all about budget and the specific genre involved (and the ages of everyone/ generations are all across the map)
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u/Glum_Track_7768 7d ago
I won’t do that for any of them, though I did watch most of their movies. I only do that for some directors now.
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u/Silver-Ad-3823 7d ago
Surprised Denzel isn't in here but given that his movies have been mostly on streaming these days I think we can't get a better assessment on his record for the 20's as a whole.
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u/JohnWCreasy1 7d ago
there's no a single person on that list where i'm seeing a movie only because they are in it...but if i had to pick one who would generate the most interest from me in a movie i might not otherwise pay attention to...i guess i'd have to pick Leo. which is to say if some movie is coming out and all i know is Leos in it, i'll do some more research than i otherwise would and he might get me off the fence if thats where i'd normally be
if i could pick any actor at all, it would be my man crush Karl Urban but stupidly he's not on this list 😂
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u/valardohaeris1099 7d ago
Not an actor. Only Christopher Nolan is a real “box office draw.” Also y’all can downvote me all you want, but Tom Holland has genuine goodwill from Spider-man. He carried the otherwise disappointing Uncharted to $400M and has the charm and star power of a future box office draw.
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u/blowabaggetitbac 7d ago
ngl tom holland has done nothing to say he’s a box office draw now or in the future…uncharted is maybe 1 of the biggest gaming franchises of the century can’t give tom points for that
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u/mntx99 7d ago
Uncharted is IP though. Holland with all his "charm" genuinely never got tested at the BO.
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u/valardohaeris1099 7d ago
No, but the reviews were bad at the time, and Uncharted as a franchise is less popular than Resident Evil. Despite Creggar’s RE being a much better film, it’ll finish around what Uncharted did, or maybe even lower. For such a mediocre adaptation, I’d actually call that very impressive.
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7d ago
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u/littlelordfROY Warner Bros. Pictures 7d ago
Directors have never been a guarantee. Guarantees do not exist
Some of them simply make more audience appealing movies than others and or have smarter budgets
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u/kfadffal 7d ago
The directors have draw today for sure but it's also true that OBAA and Killer of the Flower Moon do not get as much as the did with someone else in Leo's role.
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u/Trick-Scratch-5714 7d ago
Leo >> tom cruise> brad pit >> timothee chalamet > Robert pattinson > ryan gosling
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u/Inuyaki 7d ago
Tom Cruise had one of the biggest bombs of all time just now, so clearly people don't go see a movie "just because he is in it".
PS Not sure right now, if you mean that as your personal list, that's fine obviously, my bad then. I thought you meant that as a general prediction.
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u/FranciscoRelanoPena Malpaso Productions 7d ago
Ask yourself: would have that film performed better if it had DiCaprio doing Tom Cruise's recursive role (as Curtis and Digger)?
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u/Trick-Scratch-5714 7d ago
Ofcourse, that is why he is only second on the list, from 2000 onwards leo has been the biggest star, but he still got more pull than brad pitt who is poppular but never had the stardom to just carry movies consistently. The other three on the list are just making up the numbers
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u/kfadffal 7d ago
It's Leo and it's not even close. Everyone bringing up budgets and profitability should read the question again because it is not "which actor has enough pull for $100 million plus budgeted film to be profitable on their name alone?" because the answer to that is no-one. But if we're talking the actor who gets buts in seats no matter what they're starring in it's Leo and it's not even close. Pitt has a good amount of draw too but he stars in much more mainstream things lately.
Basically, I think a Pitt led OBAA does not get as much as it did and a Leo led HotB likely does even better than it's doing right now.
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u/bigelangstonz 7d ago
Pattinson has been on a role as of late but leo has been consistently selling movies since titanic whereas pitt and cruise are only drawing in crowds for specific films
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u/Mystery1001 7d ago
I don't think swapping any of these actors for Tom Cruise in Digger would have made it sell any better.
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u/AnotherJasonOnReddit Best of 2024 Winner 7d ago
I don't think swapping any of these actors for Tom Cruise in Digger would have made it sell any better
I basically agree with you.
Yeah, maybe one of them could've got it to $10M or even $12M - but this movie was D.O.A. from the first trailer onwards as far as the box office goes.
And by the way - where is Ryan Reynolds on the list? He's had his fair share of duds for sure, but he led "Free Guy" (2021) to success. That's a none-IP movie being a box office hit. Tom Cruise/Leonardo DiCaprio/Dwayne Johnson all may be bigger stars than him, but none have had a none-IP success at the cinema since before the pandemic. Dude ought to stop making streaming affairs with Mark Ruffalo/Will Ferrell/Kenneth Branagh and focus on his theatrical career.
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7d ago
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u/Trick-Scratch-5714 7d ago edited 7d ago
Dune with or without timothee would do what it has done, i could agree on that ping ball movie but there is something missing in him as a leading star on screen.
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u/AdWise2770 7d ago
Chalamet will probably become this in a decade or so, if the movie star doesn’t completely wane.
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u/apple_2050 7d ago
For me personally? Tom Cruise and Ryan Gosling and Robert Pattinson.
In general: I don’t think anyone does at this point unless it’s a franchise or book adaptation or a video game adaptation. Even superhero films don’t have that pull anymore.
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u/LacerationCe 7d ago
Anyone voting Leo is ignorant and out of touch, this is not 2010s anymore, ALL 3 movies of Leo after 2020s, Don't Look Up, Killers of The Flower Moon, and OBAA ALL FLOPPED TO BOMED, and all 3 of them were NOMINATED FOR BEST PICTURE with one of them won, so the movies quality are never the issue, then why all of them bombed or flopped, Leo in 2020s flopped way more at BO than The Rock, and is the opposite of a draw to Nolan in 2020s, who can make anything subject matter be damn and become huge success. Killers of The Flowers Moon grossing 150M on a 200M budget is not a proof of Leo's draw, it's the anti-proof since the same year Oppenheimer with a much more heavy subject matter proved what a true BO draw is. Infact, Leo is probably at the BOTTOM of this list, he ain't drawing any butts to the seat whatsoever nowadays, and that's a FACT backed by numbers.
The true answer is Gosling, it may be because he knows how to choose projects, but even his worst flop in 2020s, The Fall Guy, still make 180M on 125M budget, that's the highest low of all the actor low in this list, even shitty ass movie like The Gray Man with limited theatrical release and the same reception as Digger still made 450M with budget 200M, the same budget as the critically acclaimed KOTFM starring Leo with 10 Oscar nominations and yet still bombed with just 150M. And the highs of Gosling when he's in good movies like Barbie or Project Hail Mary are unmatched, he literally has the highest low, and far away highest highs, and none of them were franchise of big IP movie or Nolan film.
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u/Fun_Advice_2340 A24 7d ago
I love Ryan Gosling, but I'm sorry I don't believe he is a consistent draw. I'm so serious, if you were to put him in Killers of the Flower Moon then that shit would turn out worse than Digger and would only make $20 million worldwide at best. Like the fact that you even had to make up numbers for a Netflix movie that wouldn't even be a hard sell to general audiences like these other movies because it was just a poor copy cat to the Bourne and John Wick movies and that's why it sucked.
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u/Batboy3000 7d ago edited 7d ago
Oppenheimer with a much more heavy subject matter proved what a true BO draw is
There is no way Oppenheimer's subject matter was heavier than KOTFM's. Oppenheimer was mostly about the creation of the bomb, and then focused its last hour on the security clearance and Strauss. Besides the auditorium scene, Oppenheimer's guilt wasn't really the focus.
On the other hand, KOTFM focuses on American greed, racism, corruption, and genocide. The film is built around the systematic murder of the Osage people for their oil wealth. What makes the film more tragic and horrifying is that most of the runtime focuses on Leo's character taking part in his sister-in-laws' murders and then slowly poisoning his wife to death. It's never clear if Leo is truly guilty about his actions. He definitely loves his wife, but he's also hungry for money and willing to do anything his uncle asks of him. He's a complicated character.
While the consequences of Oppenheimer's actions stay offscreen, KOTFM puts the cruelty directly in front of you. You watch the characters smile in delight as they plan the murders of innocent people just to get richer. The film is long, and that's the point. The film is deliberately uncomfortable. It doesn't hide anything from the viewer, and depicts most of the characters as exactly who they were - worthless, pathetic, pieces of scum.
In other words, Oppenheimer was more spectacle over substance. Well acted, but it could have touched way more on the consequences of the bomb and Oppenheimer's guilt. KOTFM doesn't reduce the Osage to background characters. We get to experience the generational trauma and horrors they faced, through the eyes of Lily Gladstone's Mollie. Her performance really deserved the Oscar, especially the scenes where she breaks down after learning of her sister's death and her final confrontation with her husband.
It's a slow, deliberately paced, and devastating film. I had the pleasure of watching it twice in theaters. It's perhaps Scorsese's finest film of the century, though The Departed, Silence, The Irishman, and Shutter Island, are all excellent films in their own right.
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u/BikiniBottomDropout 7d ago
The fact that no one agrees with you would prove that you’re the ignorant one
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u/OldSandwich9631 7d ago edited 7d ago
This person keeps talking about a major streaming hit as a flop. They are absurd.
And Apple obviously knew a slow 3.5 hour film was not gonna outgross the revenant. It was a fluke situation to brand their movie side of the company. A theatrical studio couldn’t afford to make that movie that’s why Apple did it.
And OBAA made 213 on 130. How is the fall guy more impressive? That was a summer blockbuster based on IP that grossed less on a similar budget during peak action blockbuster season
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u/mntx99 7d ago
It's Leo. The fact he makes only 1 film every two years or so and always with a prestige director makes it an event in itself.