Sam Neill, the New Zealand actor, has died aged 78. He will forever be most associated with the film that made him an international star: Jurassic Park. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing BBC News.

The 1993 blockbuster dominated his filmography and sparked a series of sequels and reboots, including the recent Jurassic World series, in which he reprised his role as palaeontologist Dr Alan Grant.

Across a career spanning five decades, Neill showed himself to be an actor of depth, capable of taking on a wide range of roles in films ranging from box office hits to acclaimed arthouse movies.

He became a global household name relatively late in his career. By the time Jurassic Park came out, Neill was 43 years old and already had a string of screen credits under his belt.

Neill was born in 1947 in Northern Ireland, where his father was serving as an officer with the Royal Irish Fusiliers. "I was born in Omagh, we lived in Armagh and my favourite place here was Tyrella beach," Neill told the BBC in 2012.

The family relocated to New Zealand when Neill was seven. His real name was Nigel, but he began calling himself Sam after finding his new school already had several boys with his name. He later joked that "being christened Nigel set me back for years".

Neill decided not to pursue a legal career and instead embarked on acting. He starred in student productions of Macbeth and A Midsummer Night's Dream.

Various film and TV series in New Zealand followed, with a breakout role in 1977's Sleeping Dogs, before Neill moved to Australia and began to land bigger parts.

He credited 1979's My Brilliant Career as "a most important role for me, because that's the film that took me out of New Zealand, and allowed me to live and work in Australia".

Highlights from his filmography include 1981's cult horror Possession, 1988's A Cry in the Dark opposite Meryl Streep, Omen III: The Final Conflict as Damien Thorn, and Jane Campion's 1993 drama The Piano.

Jurassic Park grossed more than $970m (£720m), becoming the highest grossing film of all time until Titanic. Neill told the BBC the film's reception was a "big surprise".

His other Hollywood roles included The Hunt For Red October, Dead Calm, Bicentennial Man, and Hunt for the Wilderpeople. Director Taika Waititi gave Neill small parts in Thor: Ragnarok (2017) and Thor: Love and Thunder (2022).