Dizzy heights for Isabel Lucas

SHE will walk the red carpet at five movie premieres this year – but Cairns’ homegrown Hollywood actress Isabel Lucas is not about to let stardom cloud her vision.

A down-to-earth Lucas, who was discovered while strolling through the Port Douglas markets with her family, was more at home this week talking about her recent trekking adventure than her role in Daybreakers which opened in Cairns this week.

Pictures: Isabel Lucas in Cairns

The 25-year-old former St Monica’s College student shares the screen with Hollywood heart-throb Ethan Hawke, William Defoe, Sam Neill, Claudia Karvan and Vince Colosimo in the genre-bending vampire movie that was actually filmed before Twilight fuelled a vampire frenzy at the box office.

Lucas, who is ambushed by vampires in the movie, sees it as darker but also, on another level, as strangely relevant.

“We’re running out of fossil fuels, oils and water in much the same way vampires are running out of blood sources in Daybreakers,” the passionate environmentalist said of her latest flick.

She attended Daybreakers premiere just weeks after scaling Africa’s Mt Kilimanjaro on a “Summit on the Summit” mission to raise awareness of the world’s growing water problems and to raise money for a safe drinking water supply for all children.

Forty-five trekkers, including Hollywood actress Jessica Biel, Grammy-nominated artists Kenna and Lupe Fiasco, UN executive Elizabeth Gore and the granddaughters of luminaries Jacques Cousteau and Robert F. Kennedy, made it to the 19,340 foot summit to launch the cause.

“It’s the most physically challenging thing I’ve ever done – I had altitude sickness at the top with headaches and nausia but to stand on the summit and to have done it together for such a good cause was one of the most incredible feelings,” Lucas said.

“Right now a third of the global population is living in water-scarce areas – it’s not just something for the developing countries, it’s one of the most critical issues of our time.”

She attributes teenage years in the Far North and a year living with her family at Kakadu National Park for her strong desire to be an environmental advocate

Lucas, who is best known for television soapie Home and Away and her part in Hollywood blockbuster Transformers, begins a starring role in A Heartbeat Away next week when filming starts in Brisbane.

Movie-goers will see her on the big screen in Daybreakers, romantic comedy Kin, The Waiting City and eighties remake Red Dawn this year, as well as the mini-series Pacific.

“It sounds busy but there have been a lot of breaks in between,” she said.

“It’s been so diverse – from blockbuster to vamp-thriller to family drama-comedy. I’m lucky with the way things have unravelled.”

Working alongside Hawke had been “cool” and with Sam Neill “a real honour”.

“I didn’t have many scenes with (Hawke) but I know him now as a talented writer, very innovative and just cool,” Lucas said.