8 Actors Who Turned Down Crazy Money To Appear In Movie Sequels

4. Keanu Reeves Turned Down $11 Million To Star In Speed 2

Whilst Speed is often thought to be one of the greatest action movies of the '90s, Speed 2 is regarded as one of the worst movies ever committed to celluloid. Thank God, then, that Keanu Reeves had the foresight to bail out before he became entangled in its awfulness (unfortunately Sandra Bullock didn't turn down the movie; it's one of her worst career mistakes, and she has made quite a lot of those over the years). "He didn€™t want to do two action movies back-to-back," said Reeves' agent. In the process of denying to reprise his role, however, Reeves passed on a whooping $11 million, the sum of cash that Sandra Bullock ultimately received for her role. Now, $11 million is a lot of money, but have you seen Speed 2: Cruise Control? It's like they took everything that was good about Speed and just did the opposite of that, casting the terrible Jason Patric as the male lead. $11 million really might not have been enough.
Contributor

Sam Hill is an ardent cinephile and has been writing about film professionally since 2008. He harbours a particular fondness for western and sci-fi movies.