Peter Berg: directing projects and film work

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

Peter Berg is an American director, actor and screenwriter. Comic book fans know him from the superhero action movie Hancock, comedy fans from the movie Very Wild Things. Berg makes films of a wide variety of genres, but prefers action films and thrillers. Among the acting works of Peter Berg, the thriller "Trump Aces" gained the greatest popularity.

First directing work

The directorial debut for Peter Berg was the black comedy "Very Wild Things", filmed by him in 1998. Although the film had a small budget, only 10 million dollars, leading Hollywood stars Cameron Diaz, Christian Slater and Jon Favreau agreed to play the main roles. The film received mixed reviews from critics and audiences.

In 2003, Berg decided to try his hand at the action-adventure genre with Amazon Treasure. Berg's film was more critically acclaimed but flopped at the box office, grossing only $80 million on an $85 million budget.

The next project in Berg's directorial career wassports drama "In the rays of glory." This film was successful in all respects: it earned critical acclaim, performed well at the box office and collected several prestigious film awards. Thanks to this picture, Berg received recognition in the world of cinema.

Further career

In 2007, the political thriller "Kingdom" was released, directed by Peter Berg. The film is about a group of FBI agents investigating a terrorist attack in Saudi Arabia. The main roles went to Chris Cooper, Jennifer Garner and Jamie Foxx. It was one of the first Hollywood films to denounce international terrorism in Saudi Arabia. The film received generally positive reviews from critics.

A year later, director Peter Berg took on the first blockbuster of his career, Hancock. For the role of the brutal and irresponsible superhero Hancock, Berg chose Will Smith. The film became a box office hit, grossing $625 million at the box office. It is from the Hancock tape that most viewers now know Berg.

In 2012, the filmography of the director was replenished with another blockbuster - he was entrusted with the work on the fantastic action movie "Battleship", for which the Universal film company allocated more than 200 million dollars. Unlike previous films by Peter Berg, "Battleship" did not win much love from critics and audiences.

In 2014, Berg directed the fantasy series The Leftovers. The literary primary source for the series was the novel of the same name by Tom Perrotta, quite popular in the United States. Unlike the book, the television series was not very successful andwas closed by the producers after the third season due to low ratings.

The last film in Berg's directorial career so far is the action movie Mile 22, starring Mark Wahlberg and Lauren Cohan. According to film critics, the film turned out to be unsuccessful, especially they expressed a lot of reproaches against the script and dialogues. Mile 22 barely broke its $35 million budget at the box office.

Acting work

Peter Berg is known primarily as a director, but he started his career as an actor. Berg made his television debut in 1988 with a small role in the detective series 21 Jump Street.

Already in 1989, the actor got the lead role in Wes Craven's horror film Electroshock. Unlike other Craven films, this tape did not gain much popularity.

The next 10 years in the acting career of Peter Berg were not noteworthy projects. He acted in a lot of films and almost always played the main roles, but mostly these were low-budget or television films that were not successful. In 1992, Berg appeared in the military drama The Night Lights, which was very popular with critics, but failed miserably at the box office. More successful for the actor was the fantastic thriller Fire in the Sky and the drama The Last Seduction. They earned critical acclaim and recouped their budget, but these films did not bring the long-awaited fame to Peter Berg.

In 1998, the actor played the role of a doctor in his own film "Very Wild Things". Then Peter Berg realized that he liked making films much more,than to shoot them. However, even now he sometimes agrees to film roles. So, in 2006, Berg played the role of corrupt cop Pete Dix in the action movie "Trump Aces", and so far this is the most significant role in his acting career.

Private life

In 1993, Berg married Elizabeth Rogers, an agent for Calvin Clein. In 1998, the couple divorced. Peter Berg has two children from this marriage.