As you might have noticed from one of my recent asides, I went to see Tropic Thunder over the weekend. Not much point doing a full review – the film's not one of Ben Stiller's best, most of the cast are either underused or indifferent (Jack Black I'm thinking of you, but Danny McBride is excellent) but it does have some great moments as well as Robert Downey Jr mumbling as per usual.
Yet it does have a simply fantastic performance by Tom Cruise as well. It really is worth going to see Tropic Thunder just to see Tom Cruise acting his socks off. And dancing.
Which had me thinking. Is there any other movie in history in which the main reason to see it has been Tom Cruise? There have been plenty of good or at least enjoyable films that have starred Tom Cruise, including Top Gun, Rain Man, A Few Good Men, Mission Impossible and The Last Samurai. But most of them were good despite his presence.
So has there ever been a movie that you would go to see purely because of Tom Cruise? Enquiring minds wish to know.
Incidentally, if you'd like to see a camcorder clip of Tom Cruise in action and shaking his booty from them end credits, here you go.
PS I confess I haven't seen Magnolia, which might be the other standout Cruise job.
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September 22, 2008 | Reply
Actually, for me, if Tom Cruise is in a movie, I won't go see a movie. And there have been a few I would have liked to have seen - "Minority Report", 'War Of The Worlds", and now "Tropic Thunder". But he's in it, so I don't.
Nothing to do with his religiion, he wants to be a nutcase on his own time, let him. No, it's because as the producer as well as star of "Mission: Impossible", he allowed my memories of the original show to be trashed.
Spoilers ahead! If Peter Graves had been involved and accepted the treatment of his character of Mr. Phelps, then fine. I'd have gone along with it. But he balked at the idea of it and passed on the project. That should have been the end of it. The role should have been written so that Jon Voigt played somebody else as the IMF boss, not Phelps! If you're not going to get the original actor, why bother?
I liked the idea TV critic David Bianculli had - 25 years down the line, somebody should buy the rights to "Jerry McGuire" and violate people's memories of Cruise's character ans see how he likes it!
Rant over. I'll get off my soapbox before I lose my balance......
September 22, 2008 | Reply
Tom Cruise is never a reason for me to see a film - I haven't let him put me off many (Minority Report is okay), but he wasn't my incentive for seeing Magnolia. That would have been the lovely Julianne Moore and Philip Seymour Hoffman. But TC was horrifically good.
September 22, 2008 | Reply
Tom Cruise is brilliant in Magnolia, he is actually one of the (many) reasons to see it. Although that still doesn't make up for Jerry Maguire.