Mel's officially off the wagon

Mel was clocked at nearly twice the speed limit before failing a breathalyser test.

Mel has been arrested for drink driving, 15 years after he first gave up drinking and joined Alcoholics Anonymous.

The 50-year-old actor and director was arrested in Malibu, California, on Friday morning on suspicion of drink driving.

He failed a breathalyser test and was booked, but was later released on bail.

A statement from the Los Angeles County sheriff's department said Mel was detained while driving along Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu at 2.36am on Friday.

The statement said Mel was speeding in his Lexus LS 240 when deputies stopped him.

"He was going 87 miles [140 kilometres] per hour in a 45-mile-per-hour zone," said Steve Whitmore, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.

Whitmore said a field sobriety test was conducted by officers and a breath test indicated Mel's blood-alcohol level was .12 per cent. California drivers 21 and older must remain under .08 per cent.

The star was taken to the Lost Hills sheriff's station, where he was booked at 4.06am. He left the police station more than five hours later, after posting $US5000 ($6550) bail.

The Oscar-winning star has been previously arrested for drink driving, but it was 22 years ago. The 1984 arrest prompted Mel to return to Australia for two years to "clean up" before returning to his Hollywood acting career.

In 1991, he gave up drinking for good, revealing he was regularly attending Alcoholics Anonymous meetings to try to save his marriage.

"When my wife threatened to leave me I went to Alcoholics Anonymous," Mel revealed.

"I used to drink six bottles of beer for breakfast but now I only drink water."

Mel has been married to wife Robyn for 26 years and the couple has seven children together.

Mel, who graduated from NIDA in Sydney, had earlier revealed his drinking intensified with his increasing level of fame.

"Things got out of hand," he said. "When you first get famous you don't know that you can't go back to a normal life any more. That you've walked into a flytrap; that it's dark down there and that there is no way out of it, not really."

Mel's battle with the booze lead him back to the devout form of Catholicism in which he was raised, prompting his decision to finance and direct the film The Passion Of The Christ, which was one of the world's highest box-office earners.

Apart from making his controversial but phenomenally successful religious film, Mel's fervent Catholicism has also prompted him to fund the building of independent Catholic chapels in Malibu and West Virginia.

Mel has been working on another epic film, titled Apocalytpo, which is due for release in December. The film is based on the decline of the Mayan civilisation.

The Sun-Herald