Mel Gibson

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Spoken like a true "no worries" Australian heart-throb. Well, not quite. Although he was first introduced to international audiences as an all-new Aussie star, Mel was in fact born in Peekskill, New York, on January 3, 1956. He is the sixth of 11 children, and has five brothers and five sisters. The family relocated to Australia when he was 12 after his father, a railroad worker, won a large settlement for a job injury. The move came, in part, because Gibson senior wanted to avoid having his sons drafted to fight in the Vietnam War. As Mel's paternal grandmother had been an Australian opera singer, the move down under was, in a way, a return to the old country.

After attending an all-boys Catholic school in Sydney, Mel won a place at the prestigious National Institute of Dramatic Art when one of his sisters, recognising his latent talent, sent in an application behind his back. Mel landed his first movie lead, Mad Max, soon after graduation, despite the result of a bar-room brawl the night before the audition which left him looking like "a busted grapefruit". In fact, Mel's burnt-out, beat-up appearance was a plus – it was exactly the look director George Miller was looking for for his post-apocalyptic road flick.

Other roles in film and theatre soon followed, and in 1979 Mel scooped the first of a pair of Australian Film Industry Awards as best actor, playing a retarded handyman in Tim. He got the second two years later for his lead as an Aussie soldier caught up in WWI in Peter Weir's Gallipoli. Then came the worldwide success of Mad Max 2, and a romantic lead opposite Sigourney Weaver in The Year Of Living Dangerously, which clearly established Mel as an international star.

In the midst of all this heady success he married dental nurse Robyn Moore, and, despite his potent sex-symbol persona, the two remain happily married. They have seven children – the eldest, Hannah, was born in 1980, followed by twins Christian and Edward, Will, Louis, Milo, and the youngest addition to the clan, Thomas, who came into the world in 1999.

The actor has worked hard to shed the image of good-looking hunk with meagre acting talents which dogged his early career. In addition to starring in action fare such as 1988's Tequila Sunrise, he has proved he's not just a pretty face in more demanding roles, memorably surprising the critics with his interpretation of Shakespeare's Hamlet in 1990.

Mel is probably best known for his role opposite Danny Glover in the Lethal Weapon movies, but it would be for his work behind the camera that he garnered his highest acclaim – a best director gong for 1995's Braveheart. For Mel, who also produced the film, it was only his second time in the director's chair. The first being two years earlier for The Man Without A Face.

Clad in a kilt, sporting blue war-paint and speaking with a Scottish lilt, he also starred in the epic, which focused on the life of Sir William Wallace, a 13th-century Scottish nobleman persecuted for his efforts to free Scotland from English rule. The film earned five Oscars, including best film.

In 2004 he released one of the most controversial film projects ever, The Passion Of The Christ, a portrayal of the last 12 hours of Jesus' life. Extremely violent, the film was equally praised and criticised, with many labelling the movie as anti-semitic. Mel co-wrote and directed the epic, filmed in a mixture of Aramaic, Hebrew and Latin with English subtitles, and, it being a labour of love for the deeply religious star, funded it with $25 million of his own money. The box office takings of The Passion Of The Christ more than covered the investment, raking in $125.2m (£68.2m) - and breaking the record set by The Lord Of The Rings: The Return Of The King - in its first five days.