Cruise’s Devotion to the Movies Gone Overboard?

By: Elaine Wang

Tom Cruise’s devotion to movie production is nothing to laugh at. As one of the arguably best actors around, Cruise goes so overboard sometimes that his co-stars have remarked it’s to the point of cinematic despotism.

In Cruise’s most recent film “Top Gun: Maverick”, he utilizes his charming charisma and daring personality to gross a total of $1.19 billion.

Over the last ten years, Cruise has become fascinated by the action-adventure genre of movies, starring in “Mission: Impossible” and its five sequels, and “Top Gun: Maverick”. In the process of filming, Cruise has had to climb the world’s tallest building, hold his breath for six and a half minutes, and jump out of a plane with the cameraman, all for the sake of the viewers’ entertainment.

“…[Y]ou read about Cruise’s dogged insistence on keeping everything as real as possible – demanding a minimum of computer-generated effects, forcing himself through arduous flight training, encouraging his co-stars to bear G-force speeds until they literally throw up,” New York Times journalist Calum Marsh wrote in an article regarding Cruise’s obsession with movies.

Cruise is furthermore intent on keeping movies in the cinemas. According to the New York Times, his “interest in preserving that traditional cinematic experience shines through in the colossal scale of the productions themselves”.

“In order to do my job, I have to ask myself: Who is Tom Cruise? What is Tom Cruise? Why is Tom…Cruise?” Ben Stiller, as Tom Cruise’s stunt double Tom Crooze, stated in a video made for the 2000 MTV Movie Awards.