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Tom cruise in ‘top gun: maverick’: film review.

The ace fighter pilot returns 36 years after first feeling the need for speed in Joseph Kosinski’s sequel, also starring Miles Teller, Jennifer Connelly and Jon Hamm.

By David Rooney

David Rooney

Chief Film Critic

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As inescapable a pop-cultural totem as 1986’s Top Gun became, Tony Scott’s testosterone-powered blockbuster has all the narrative complexity of a music video crossed with a military recruitment reel. It’s hard to think of many more emblematic products of the rah-rah patriotism of the Reagan years, with its vigorous salute to American exceptionalism and triumph over a Cold War enemy left purposely vague — hey, don’t want to shut out a lucrative foreign market.

All that has only continued to toxify in the post-Trump age, with patriotism curdling into white supremacy. So depending on where you sit on the political spectrum, your enjoyment of Top Gun: Maverick might depend on how much you’re willing to shut out the real world and surrender to movie-star magic.

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Cannes film festival hopes "collective" talks can prevent strike action, french #metoo film to open cannes un certain regard, top gun: maverick.

Venue : Cannes Film Festival (Out of Competition) Release date : Friday, May 27 Cast : Tom Cruise, Miles Teller, Jennifer Connelly, Jon Hamm, Glen Powell, Ed Harris, Val Kilmer, Lewis Pullman, Charles Parnell, Bashir Salahuddin, Monica Barbaro, Jay Ellis, Danny Ramirez, Greg Tarzan Davis Director : Joseph Kosinski Screenwriters : Ehren Kruger, Eric Warren Singer, Christopher McQuarrie

Which this superior sequel — directed with virtuoso technical skill, propulsive pacing and edge-of-your-seat flying sequences by Joseph Kosinski — has in abundance. Every frame of Tom Cruise ’s Maverick is here to remind you, soaking up the awestruck admiration of the young hot shots ready to dismiss him as a fossil and the initially begrudging respect of the military brass who try and fail to pull the cocky individualist into line. “He’s the fastest man alive,” one of the slack-jawed hero worshippers in the control room says early on. And that’s even before he does his signature robotic “Cruise Run.”

“It’s not the plane, it’s the pilot,” we hear more than once. And Cruise leaves no question that he’s the pilot, despite hiring a pro craft team and a solid ensemble cast who were put through extensive flight training. Even the relic F-14 Tomcat, Maverick’s tactical fighter plane of choice in the first movie, gets fired up for a glory lap, a salute to aged movie stars and old technology in one. Cruise’s character is somehow positioned by Ehren Kruger, Eric Warren Singer and Christopher McQuarrie’s screenplay as simultaneously a rule-breaking rebel and a selfless saint. That makes this a work of breathtaking egomania outdone only by the fawning tone of Paramount’s press notes.

Starting when Kenny Loggins’ “Danger Zone” accompanies footage of new-generation F-18 hornets slicing through the clouds and swooping down onto an aircraft carrier amid a sea of high-fives, fist-pumps and thumbs-up, the sequel follows the original beat for beat, to a degree that’s almost comical. And yet, as formulaic as it is, there’s no denying that it delivers in terms of both nostalgia and reinvention. Mainstream audiences will be happily airborne, especially the countless dads who loved Top Gun and will eagerly want to share this fresh shot of adrenaline with their sons.

Pete “Maverick” Mitchell lives alone in a Mojave Desert hangar with a photo shrine on the wall to his former radar intercept officer and best buddy Goose, who died during a training accident in the first film. (Anthony Edwards and Meg Ryan are seen in a helpful recap framed as Pete’s tortured memories.)

Maverick zooms into the Naval base on his Kawasaki each day and continues to get his kicks as a daredevil test pilot, resisting the advancement in rank from captain that would have grounded him by now. But when his aerial showboating pisses off Admiral Cain (Ed Harris), who’s pushing to transition to drone aircrafts and make stick jockeys obsolete, Maverick gets his wings clipped.

Despite having lasted just two months as an instructor almost 30 years ago, he’s reassigned to the elite Fighter Weapons School, aka Top Gun Academy, in San Diego, which was established in 1969 to train the top 1 percent of Naval aviators. Neither Cain nor the academy’s senior officer, call sign “Cyclone” ( Jon Hamm ), wanted him for the job. But Maverick’s former rival and eventual wingman Iceman (Val Kilmer), who went on to become an admiral and command the U.S. Pacific Fleet, convinced them he was the only man who could prepare pilots for a top-secret mission.

A uranium enrichment plant has been detected on enemy soil — once again, exactly which enemy is unclear — and two pairs of F-18s need to sneak in, bomb the bejesus out of it and then get out fast, overcoming a near-impossible quick climb over rocky peaks and then surviving the inevitable blast of enemy missiles and aerial dogfights.

The candidates for that mission are “the best of the best,” former star graduates who are pretty much a repeat of the 1986 bunch aside from being more culturally diverse. There’s even — gasp! — a woman, Phoenix (Monica Barbaro). The two that matter most, though, are swaggering blowhard Hangman (Glen Powell) and Goose’s son Rooster ( Miles Teller ), still carrying around the ghost of his father and hostile to Maverick for stalling his career by taking his name off the Naval Academy list.

The Hangman-Rooster dynamic more or less mirrors the Iceman-Maverick friction from Top Gun , just as the incongruously homoerotic shirtless volleyball scene is echoed here with a rowdy team-building football game on the beach.

The only notable place where the screenwriters don’t genuflect to the original model is with Kelly McGillis’ astrophysicist and civilian Top Gun instructor Charlie, who declined a plum Washington job to stick with her man but doesn’t even rate a mention here. Instead, Maverick sparks up an old romance with Penny ( Jennifer Connelly ), a single mom with fabulous highlights. She runs a local bar — its name, The Hard Deck, doubles as a tactical plot point — which apparently puts her in an income bracket to own a sleek sailboat and drive a Porsche. (Producer Jerry Bruckheimer never met a power vehicle he didn’t love.)

Maverick’s task during training is to test the limits of the super-competitive candidates, whittling them down from 12 to six and choosing a team leader. “It’s not what I am. It’s who I am,” he says of his aviator vocation during a rare moment of self-doubt. “How do I teach that?” Anyone failing to guess who’ll land the team leader spot and who’ll be their wingman isn’t paying attention.

The simmering conflict between Maverick and Rooster — who can’t see past his resentment to perceive the protective responsibility his dad’s friend feels toward him — provides an emotional core even if the role makes scant demands on Teller’s range. But that’s true also of Connelly, Hamm and everyone else in the cast; all of them get the job done while remaining satellites that merely orbit around Cruise’s glittering Planet Alpha, eventually having to acknowledge that Maverick’s a helluva guy no matter what stunts he pulls.

The film’s most moving element comes during the brief screen time of Kilmer’s Iceman, whose health issues reflect those suffered by the actor in real life, generating resonant pathos. There’s reciprocal warmth, even love, in a scene between Iceman and Maverick that acknowledges the characters’ hard-won bond as well as the rivalry that preceded it, with gentle humor.

Kosinski (who directed Cruise in Oblivion ), the writers and editor Eddie Hamilton keep a close eye on the balance between interpersonal drama and flight maneuvers; scenes intercut between field practice and classroom discussions during which Maverick points out fatal errors on a computer simulator are particularly sharp. This is all nuts-and-bolts buildup, however, to the mission itself, in which hair-raising action, seemingly insurmountable setbacks and miraculous saves keep the tension pumped.

This is definitely a film that benefits from the Imax experience and the big-ass soundscape that comes with it. The muscular score by Harold Faltermeyer, Lady Gaga and Hans Zimmer also pulls its weight, with Gaga’s song, “Hold My Hand,” getting prime romantic placement. Musical choices elsewhere tend to lean into a retro vibe — Bowie, T. Rex, Foghat, The Who — while Teller gets to hammer the piano keys and lead a Jerry Lee Lewis sing-along that pays direct homage to his screen dad.

The most memorable part of Top Gun: Maverick — and the scenes that will make new generations swell with pride and adulation for good old American heroism — are the dogfights and tactical maneuvers of the pilots. Just as they should be. The best thing this movie does is boost visceral analog action over the usual numbing bombardment of CG fakery, a choice fortified by having the actors in the airborne cockpits during shooting.

Cinematographer Claudio Miranda’s work benefits from the technological advances of the past three decades, with camera rigs allowing for you-are-there verisimilitude. Cruise’s insistence on doing his own flying is undeniably impressive, even if the headgear’s breathing apparatus gets in the way of his trademark clenched-jaw intensity. No one is going to dispute that he works hard in this movie, justifying the labor of love. But no one is going to come out of it concerned for his self-esteem, either.

Full credits

Venue: Cannes Film Festival (Out of Competition) Distribution: Paramount Production companies: Skydance, Jerry Bruckheimer Films Cast: Tom Cruise, Miles Teller, Jennifer Connelly, Jon Hamm, Glen Powell, Lewis Pullman, Charles Parnell, Bashir Salahuddin, Monica Barbaro, Jay Ellis, Danny Ramirez, Greg Tarzan Davis, Ed Harris, Val Kilmer Director: Joseph Kosinski Screenwriters: Ehren Kruger, Eric Warren Singer, Christopher McQuarrie Story: Peter Craig, Justin Marks, based on characters created by Jim Cash, Jack Epps Jr. Producers: Jerry Bruckheimer, Tom Cruise, Christopher McQuarrie, David Ellison Executive producers: Tommy Harper, Dana Goldberg, Don Granger, Chad Oman, Mike Stenson Director of photography: Claudio Miranda Production designer: Jeremy Hindle Costume designer: Marlene Stewart Music: Harold Faltermeyer, Lady Gaga, Hans Zimmer Editor: Eddie Hamilton Visual effects supervisor: Ryan Tudhope Aerial coordinator: Kevin LaRosa II Casting: Denise Chamian

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Mission impossible 4: how tom cruise did the burj khalifa stunt.

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Tom Cruise's 14 Mission: Impossible Stunts Ranked By Most Dangerous

Mission impossible movies ranked - from the 1996 original to dead reckoning part 1, mission: impossible 8 - release date, story & everything we know about dead reckoning part 2.

• Cruise's Burj Khalifa stunt in Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol is a defining, heart-stopping moment for the franchise.
• With dangerous stunts like the HALO jump in Fallout, the Burj Khalifa climb remains Cruise's most famous feat.
• From carefully fixing harnesses to rigorous training, the Burj Khalifa stunt was a logistical nightmare that paid off well.

The Burj Khalifa stunt in Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol is a defining moment for the franchise, but audiences wonder if Tom Cruise climbs the Burj Khalifa in real life. With a growing list of extremely dangerous stunts on his resume, scaling Burj Khalifa's exterior in the fourth installment of the Mission Impossible franchise is one of Cruise's most famous feats of courage. Since then, Cruise has continued to defy death in multiple movies with stunts like Mission Impossible: Fallout 's HALO jump. Still, the Tom Cruise Burj Khalifa stunt has become a cinema landmark.

Ghost Protocol takes Tom Cruise's Ethan Hunt to Dubai in search of nuclear launch codes after Kurt Hendricks, a.k.a. Cobalt (Michael Nyquist), steals a devastating weapon. It's obvious by now that Hunt never takes the easy route. Ethan must reach the 130th floor of the 2,722 ft skyscraper and ditch the elevator in favor of a pair of questionable suction gloves. Starting the climb 123 floors up is the easy part as he then rappels down the building and makes a jump of faith. The Tom Cruise Burj Khalifa stunt is one of the most intense and thrilling scenes ever.

Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol is available to stream on Amazon Prime Video and Paramount+

Tom Cruise continues to perform his own dangerous stunts for the Mission: Impossible movies, each death-defying sequence upstaging the last.

Tom Cruise's Burj Khalifa Stunt Explained

The actor was equipped with a harness that was fixed to strategic points on the building.

For the Tom Cruise Burj Khalifa stunt, the actor had to be equipped with a harness that was carefully fixed to strategic points in the building , which required that the studio get special permits to drill on the floors and walls, and the Mission: Impossible 4 crew broke 35 windows . Director Brad Bird ( The Incredible s) consulted with multiple professionals from different areas like engineers, pro climbers, and stuntmen to ensure the safety of the shoot. He even considered using a dedicated stuntman, but, as he's done for the majority of his career, Cruise did his own Mission: Impossible 4 stunts.

Tom Cruise didn't know that the tight harness would cut off his circulation, so the shoot had to be completed as efficiently and quickly as possible. Otherwise, his lower body would start feeling numb. The helicopters that were shooting had a flight limit of 30 minutes at a time too, so the crew had to make every take count. The sequence was also shot in IMAX, which meant that the cameras would run out of film fast. The footage had to be flown back to Los Angeles, and Bird couldn't check if everything was perfect until the film was developed.

The training for the Tom Cruise Burj Khalifa stunt was also extremely thorough and calculated. The crew built a wall of glass to simulate the exterior of the real building and had Tom Cruise climb up and down several times to get him familiarized with the discomfort of the harness and the physical toll of the climb. They went so far as to heat up the wall with artificial lights to simulate the temperature of the windows of the Burj Khalifa. The stunt was a logistical nightmare, but the planning all paid off.

Mission: Impossible is one of the most consistent movie franchises out there, but we've accepted the nearly-impossible task of ranking them.

Why Tom Cruise On Burj Khalifa Is The Best Mission Impossible Stunt

The stunt is like a live-action incredibles scene.

Tom Cruise always does his own Mission: Impossible stunts , including hanging off a plane, holding his breath for six minutes to perform an underwater heist, and conducting 109 HALO jumps to get the perfect shot. But of all these movie stunts, the iconic Burj Khalifa sequence is the best proof of the actor's dedication to his craft. The Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol scene is the most nail-biting sequence for audiences, and it was extremely dangerous, exhausting, and probably terrifying for Cruise himself.

Nevertheless, the results are impressive, to say the least; Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol has one of the best stunt scenes caught on camera. Having scaled the side of the world's tallest building – for real – grants eternal franchise bragging rights for any self-respecting action series. The stunt plays out like a live-action Incredibles scene too, as the sequence is layered with clever action comedy, such as the suction gloves having a mind of their own. The Tom Cruise Burj Khalifa stunt has an equal balance of edge-of-your-seat thrills and laugh-out-loud comedy, which few other Mission: Impossible stunts have.

The Mission: Impossible 8 release date is set for 2025, and there's intense speculation on what's next for Ethan Hunt after Dead Reckoning Part One.

Was The Tom Cruise Burj Khalifa Stunt His Most Dangerous?

The motorcycle jump in mission: impossible - dead reckoning as arguably more dangerous.

Following the Tom Cruise Burj Khalifa stunt, the actor performed more stunts that were just as dangerous. In Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation , Cruise hung onto the side of a plane as it took off. The actor also held his breath underwater for a record-breaking 6 minutes (that's until the record was broken by Kate Winslet in Avatar: The Way of Water ). Following that, Cruise committed to a HALO jump for Mission: Impossible - Fallout . The HALO jump was so dangerous that Henry Cavill wasn't allowed to take part because it would have put Cruise's life at risk (via AutoEvolution ).

However, the motorcycle jump in Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part 1 was the actor's most dangerous stunt yet . It would have been impossible to foresee where the bike would land when Cruise let go, and so many other things that the production couldn't properly plan for. Accurately conducting a risk assessment of the scene must have been the most frustrating part of the movie's development. The impossible-to-determine physics, along with controlling a vehicle in mid-air and being dangerously close to rocks on a cliff edge, makes Cruise's motorcycle jump the most dangerous stunt in the Mission: Impossible franchise.

Tom Cruise has injured himself a number of times due to his commitment to performing his own stunts (via MovieWeb ).

However, it's comical to compare the Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol stunt and the motorcycle-parachute stunt, as neither are things that anybody should ever attempt. Nevertheless, Cruise competes with himself, and Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part 2 could feature his two most dangerous stunts yet. Mission: Impossible 8 features a water stunt in which Cruise could claim back his breath-holding record from Winslet. The upcoming movie also features another airplane stunt, only this time it isn't taking off but is sky-high. Either way, Mission: Impossible's stunts are almost equally dangerous, and Cruise is happily risking his life for the audience's entertainment.

Sources: AutoEvolution , MovieWeb

Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol

*Availability in US

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The fourth film in the franchise, Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol, is an action-thriller film set years after the events of Mission: Impossible 3. It sees Ethan Hunt and the Impossible Missions Force (IMF) see themselves falsely accused of a crime. Following a terrorist attack on the Kremlin, the IMF is implicated in the attack, forcing the government to disavow knowledge of them. To clear their names and find the true culprit, the United States initiates the "Ghost Protocol," forcing them all to go off the grid with no support to solve the case.

• Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011)

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How Tom Cruise pulled off that 'Mission: Impossible 4' skyscraper climb and canceled his retirement from the blockbuster franchise

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As the star of the Mission: Impossible movie series, Tom Cruise has been pulling off impossible missions — and improbable stunts — for a quarter century and counting. From the 1996 franchise-starter to the currently filming seventh and eight installments, the first of which will hit theaters in 2022 , the actor's alter ego, super-agent Ethan Hunt, has traveled the globe and saved the world many times over.

But Cruise's license to thrill almost got revoked a decade ago in the fourth installment, Mission: Impossible — Ghost Protocol . Directed by Brad Bird and released in theaters on Dec. 15, 2011, the movie was widely assumed at the time to be the star's final outing. In a new interview with Yahoo Entertainment, Ghost Protocol stunt coordinator Gregg Smrz confirms that's how things went down in the original script, which features an extended climax where Ethan chases rogue nuclear strategist Kurt Hendricks (played by Michael Nyqvist) around a towering carpark.

"There was a point in the script when he's fighting Michael Nyqvist where he was supposed to get his leg broken," Smrz remembers now. "They wanted it hyper-extended at the knee, just shredded — end of career, you know? The studio was going to write him out, and Tom did not want it. He was strapping in his harness, looked at me and said, 'I ain't going nowhere.' Then he walked out on set and did his thing. We had [the leg break] all set and ready to go, and it disappeared."

Turns out that Cruise called his shot correctly. Far from becoming his last Mission: Impossible movie, Ghost Protocol relit the franchise's fuse with a mighty $210 million domestic box-office gross and a wave of ecstatic reviews. The movie also boasts a sequence that consistently ranks on or near the top of any list of the very best Mission: Impossible stunts : Ethan's nail-biting climb up the side of Dubai's world-famous Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world.

As stunt coordinator, Smrz — who first collaborated with Cruise on Mission: Impossible 2 — oversaw that scene and agrees that it's one for the record books. "I said to Brad, 'Do you have any idea what we're doing?'" he recalls. "'We're climbing 1,700 feet in the air, 200 feet up a building. This has never been done before, and it'll never be done again, because they're never going to allow it.' It's a work of art, and I don't think it can ever be beat as far as a climbing sequence on a building."

And as Smrz reveals, it's a stunt that very nearly didn't happen. Early on in pre-production, Paramount seemed poised to cancel Ghost Protocol outright before shooting started. "We had started prepping the building climb immediately on a studio lot, and were on the payroll for about before weeks when we heard that they were going to pull the plug. Tom went to have a meeting with [the studio] and we would know the outcome at the end of it."

Fortunately, Cruise emerged from that meeting with a greenlight, and Smrz and his team restarted preparations for pulling off the Burj Khalifa climb — a sequence that was always designed to serve as the movie's spectacular centerpiece. Initially skeptical that the building's owner would let them turn the 2,722-foot skyscraper into a movie set, the crew recreated three floors of the Burj on a soundstage in Prague. "We built an adjustable wall, slowly raised it until it was vertical and practiced for 200 hours on it with a crew of seven or eight guys. But Tom kept saying, 'I really want to climb that building.'"

Eventually, a compromise was reached: the production could shoot for one day on the exterior of the building, and the rest of the sequence would be shot on another 60-foot adjustable wall that has been constructed in the desert outside of Dubai. Once again, though, Cruise changed the course of production with a single sentence. "The first day [on the Burj] went so well that Tom said, 'We're filming the whole thing here on the real building.' We ended up doing one day of shooting over on the set, and the rest of it was on the real building."

With Cruise leading the charge, the Ghost Protocol crew worked out a deal with the building's owners that gave them full access to several floors that weren't yet in use. Smrz and his team then knocked out roughly 17 glass panels to make room for the stunt and camera cables and other rigging.

"I told them, 'We won't scratch your building; we're not going to damage anything.' As they saw that we were not destructive and really cared about their building, they started to work with us. There was this one guy I called Dr. No, because every time I'd ask if we could do something, he'd go, 'No!' at first. But towards the end, if I said, 'Hey, we need to drill another hole,' he'd say, 'Just tell me where.'"

As designed by Cruise, Bird and Smrz, the eight-minute Burj sequence has two distinct movements: Ethan's slow, deliberate climb up the side of the Burj in order to recover all-important nuclear launch codes and then his rapid descent. The upwards journey includes a gasp-inducing plunge where Hunt falls from an unsteady perch outside his target floor. Cruise performed the fall himself, dropping roughly forty feet from a height of 1,700 feet off the ground.

"That was probably the most nail-biting day of the show," Smrz says, adding that they only did a single take of Cruise's fall. "Somebody said, 'What if the cable breaks?' And I said, 'That's not an option.' We actually did the math, and there was enough time of free fall for him to text me on the way down, and for me to receive it!"

But Smrz also makes it clear that he would have overruled Cruise if he truly felt the star would be in danger. "If he wasn't an actor, Tom could have been a stuntman, and I would put anybody in anything if I didn't think it was safe for a stunt guy. I've got to be 99.9 percent sure it's going to be successful before we do it, whether it's a stunt person or an actor. So putting Tom into the harness was no different than a stunt guy. I expect the stunt to work, because we've already proven it over and over. "

Ethan's journey down the Burj starts with him running down the side of the building until he literally reaches the end of his rope. But he's the opposite of home free: He's still one floor above the rest of his team — William (Jeremy Renner), Benji (Simon Pegg) and Jane (Paula Patton) — and has to make a daring leap into the void to reach them. In order to gain the necessary momentum, Ethan runs in the opposite direction alongside the building and then power jumps into the air, swinging on the cable in a wide arc as he heads for the open window where William and Jane stand.

"When Tom swung on that rope around the building, Brad wanted him to go out farther," Smrz remembers. "I said, 'We'd have a problem: He has to come back, and I can't soften the impact on the glass. So the farther he goes out, the harder he's going to hit the glass, and he's already hitting it really hard.' Brad came from the world of animation where anything he wanted to do was possible, but I have a reputation for trying to keep everything real. I like to see when they hit the ground, that it hurts. But Brad was great to work with, because we'd always just sit down and talk and make sure we both were happy."

Ethan's cable swing also includes some shots that were filmed on the recreation of the Burj, including the moment where he unclips in mid-air and the moment where he flies at the window, hitting his head. But the scene where Renner clutches Cruise's leg high above Dubai was filmed on location. "We had Tom suspended on the real building, and then we dropped him," Smrz explains. "Jeremy and Paula were on cables, and they actually did dive out the window and caught Tom by his ankle. The actors did a fantastic job, especially because it was hot. We were working on glass, and it got up to 125 degrees."

The Burj Khalifa climb wasn't just a franchise-best stunt: It was also a personal best for Cruise, one that the actor has been trying to top ever since. "He wants to beat it," says Smrz, who hasn't worked on a Mission: Impossible movie since 2015's Rogue Nation , where Cruise awarded him the opportunity to choreograph the wild motorcycle chase of his dreams . "We took it to a whole other level, but it wasn't beating the building, you know what I mean? It was just a motorcycle chase. So they came up with that plane stunt . Tom's going to try to step it up to the next level in every movie, but he's also getting older: I used to tell him, 'Tom, you're going to end up walking like I do if you keep this up!'"

In that case, it's just as well that Cruise is better known for his running anyway. Asked about the actor's famously meme-friendly fleet feet , Smrz confirms he's the last person you want to be in a race with. "He can run 17-and-a-half miles an hour," he marvels. "In the scene where he's running away from the Burj, I had my stunt guys chasing him, and he was killing them. I said, 'Can you slow down a little?' And he started laughing and said, 'I'm not slowing down — tell them to speed up!' He's really fast and he has this odd style where he really lifts his legs high, and he's got the arms and legs pumping. Maybe that's his secret."

Reflecting on the Burj Khalifa climb a decade later, Smrz feels that it's increasingly rare for a studio to allow a movie star, and a stunt crew, the time and resources necessary to pull off a major setpiece on that level. "The big thing was that we really could have done that entire sequence on a stage and with visual effects. But Tom refuses to do that, because he wants climbing the Burj to be part of the thing that he does. He likes to do his own stuff, it's great for publicity and he enjoys it. It's always funny when somebody tells me, 'Tom's not going to do that — the studio's not going to allow it.' And I just say, 'He'll be doing it.'"

At the same time, with the tragedy on the set of Rust still fresh in everyone's minds , Smrz acknowledges that the industry is potentially facing widespread change in terms of how major action sequences are handled, especially when guns are involved. For his part, he believes that safety is always paramount even if it comes with a price tag. "I've been told [by studios], 'You and your guys are too expensive,'" Smrz says. "But at the end of every film, I always ask, 'Still think I'm too expensive?' and they go, 'No, we got what we paid for.' It's so busy out there right now ... and it has a lot to do with the experience of the person they hire. And right now, they're kind of hiring anybody, so it's a little scary.

"I don't think squibs and gunfire are going to go away," Smrz continues. "It's part of the job, and you have to be extra safe and unafraid to stand your ground. You have to be willing to get fired if you know that you're right and they want to push on anyway. On five occasions, I've started to walk off the set and never made it off because they realize how serious you are. You're willing to leave the movie, and that's what it takes if they expect us to keep it safe. I don't think it can get any safer: I mean, if they're going to make it so problematic that they'll just stop doing stuff, it'll all be cartoons."

Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol is currently streaming on Paramount+.

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Critic’s Notebook

What Becomes a Star Most? For Tom Cruise, It’s Control.

Sheer force of will is now part of his potent mix of athleticism and charisma. That combination goes a long way to explain why “Top Gun: Maverick” is a hit.

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By Calum Marsh

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

This is a tricky line of questioning.

Onscreen, Cruise is unmistakably our biggest movie star, as the New York Times reporter Nicole Sperling recently explained — the last true exponent of a century-old studio system that has been steadily eroded by the rising forces of franchise filmmaking and streaming. His powerful charisma and daredevil stunt work have combined, yet again, in his latest hit, “Top Gun: Maverick,” bringing it past the $1 billion mark.

Offscreen, Cruise is elusive. He is the frequent public mouthpiece for a cryptic, controversial religion that seems harder to understand the more he talks about it . He is intensely secretive about the details of his private life. Even when he makes the occasional effort to seem like an ordinary, relatable guy, he winds up sounding like an A.I. approximation of one. Asked by Moviebill magazine to describe his most memorable filmgoing experience, Cruise couldn’t name one . (“I love movies,” he said, very normally.) When asked which team he was rooting for at a Giants-Dodgers game he attended last fall , he replied, “I’m a fan of baseball.”

It can be hard to reconcile these disparate sides. So it is worth considering the question: Who is Tom Cruise?

Much of his early success as an actor, through the ’80s and ’90s, was predicated on a certain down-to-earth charm. The sexed-up, troublemaking young Cruise of “Risky Business”; the guileless, endearingly naïve Cruise of “Cocktail”; and the tenacious, morally principled Cruise of “Jerry Maguire” each relied on his ability to convincingly embody the American Everyman, the sympathetic heartthrob the audience could desire or root for. Around the turn of the century, he complicated that image by appearing in more challenging, less accessible films, like “Eyes Wide Shut” and “Magnolia.” Auteurs like Stanley Kubrick and Paul Thomas Anderson helped showcase Cruise as a serious actor, capable of delivering subtle, nuanced performances.

He has moved away from romance, drama and the independent art house. Over the last decade-plus, he has become more firmly entrenched in the action-adventure genre, perfecting the summer tentpole blockbuster. His performances tend to emphasize his easy charisma and powerful athleticism, but Cruise still brings to these roles a touch of the same delicate charm and actorly nuance of his dramatic fare. You see it in the breezy, naturalistic chemistry he shares with Jennifer Connelly in “Maverick,” and in the jaded, world-weary intensity he has carried through the last couple of “Mission: Impossible” sequels. My favorite recent Cruise performance was from the underrated “Edge of Tomorrow” (2014), in which he plays a cowardly, sniveling politician forced to relive the same deadly battle over and over again — a playful sci-fi take on “Groundhog Day” that found the actor playing against type to delightful effect.

But that’s just part of the story. One of the defining features of the last decade of his career is a level of quality control for which he himself is chiefly responsible. It’s not that he is incapable of making a bad movie: “The Mummy” (2017), Universal’s failed attempt to kick off an entire “Dark Universe” of big-budget creature features, made that clear. But recent Cruise films have in common a degree of ambition and enthusiasm that is rare in today’s blockbuster landscape, and when everything works, that effort pays off enormously. You will not see Cruise phoning in a performance. You get the sense that he treats every movie he does these days as if it were the most important one he has ever done.

The results of this commitment have a way of feeling almost miraculous. How could anyone have expected “Top Gun: Maverick,” a sequel to a 35-year-old action movie with a rather cool critical reputation, to be not only far superior to the original film, but also one of the finest action films in many years? But then you 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 threw up. Some of Cruise’s co-stars over the years have characterized his obsessiveness as extreme to the point of what sounds like cinematic despotism, and it’s true that it would probably be easier, and cheaper, to do much of this in front of a green screen. But that’s not Cruise. When it comes to this stuff, he cares too much.

“Mission: Impossible” was a slick espionage film, directed by Brian De Palma, based on a TV series from the 1960s. How is it possible that it yielded five sequels, and how is it conceivable that the sequels keep getting better, culminating in “Mission: Impossible — Fallout” (2018), which is pretty much an unqualified masterpiece? (The final two installments, “Dead Reckoning Part One” and “Dead Reckoning Part Two,” are due in 2023 and 2024.) Again, the credit should go mainly to Cruise, who, for the sake of our entertainment, will happily climb the world’s tallest building , hold his breath for six and a half minutes , or jump out of an airplane with the cameraman .

But Cruise’s devotion to the movies runs deeper, if that’s possible. It’s a devotion to the Movies with a capital M. As A-list talent flocks to deep-pocketed streamers with blockbuster ambitions, Cruise has remained adamant that he will not make a movie for the likes of Netflix or Amazon Prime Video, refusing to negotiate on the possibility of a V.O.D. premiere for “Maverick” earlier in the pandemic. (“I make movies for the big screen,” he explained.) His interest in preserving that traditional cinematic experience shines through in the colossal scale of the productions themselves, so that when Cruise is looming over you in immense, Imax dimensions, he feels every bit as big as the image. It’s a reminder that so much of what we watch is tailored to the streaming era — a mass of “content” designed to play as well on a phone as on the big screen. For those of us who still care deeply about the cinema and fear for its future, Cruise’s efforts feel invaluable.

It’s also a reminder of why we go to the theater to see Tom Cruise movies — to see Tom Cruise himself. We can still be tempted to the cinema by the names on the marquee, but as franchises have become the dominant force in the business, the persuasive power of those names has declined. The supremacy of proven, bankable intellectual property today over the traditional star system has meant that we are more likely to seek out Spider-Man, Thor and Captain America than Tom Holland, Chris Hemsworth and Chris Evans; the actor in the cape is more interchangeable than ever. With Cruise movies, that relationship is inverted. Does anyone particularly care about the adventures of Ethan Hunt? (That’s the name of his character in “Mission: Impossible,” in case you forgot.) Hunt is just another name for the man we really care about: Cruise, plain and simple.

Cruise has all of the qualities you want in a movie star and none of the qualities you expect of a human being. As a screen presence, he is singular; as a person, he is inscrutable. But it’s his inscrutability that has allowed him to achieve a sort of clarified, immaculate superstardom, one that exists almost entirely in the movies, uncontaminated by mundane concerns. Cruise the star burns as bright as any of his contemporaries, and far brighter than any who have come up since, in part because he continues to throw more and more of himself into his work and give up less and less of himself everywhere else. Who is he? You have to look to the movies to find out.

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“Iron Man 4”: Tom Cruise stuns as Tony Stark in jaw-dropping “first look” trailer

By michael patterson | jul 20, 2023.

MCU fans have been discussing the possibility of Tom Cruise playing an Iron Man variant in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. This amazing video highlights why fans would love to see it.

In 2021, the movie world was abuzz with rumors all about Spider-Man: No Way Home . Almost all of those rumors had something to do with one character appearing or a Marvel veteran returning (or, sometimes, it was both).

The subsequent arrival and release of that movie did not end those rumors (they never do with Marvel movies), because like the ever-growing beast that the Marvel Cinematic Universe is, those rumors have continued to grow, resulting in even greater excitement for both the present and the future of the MCU.

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness  came next, premiering in movie theaters last year. To say there were even more rumors about that would be an understatement. And one of those rumors in question suggested that Tom Cruise might don  that familiar Iron armor as the Superior Iron Man instead of the one and only Robert Downey Jr.

That ultimately did not happen in the movie, but a lot of fans haven’t been able to get enough of the idea of the  Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning star playing an alternate version of Tony Stark, especially since the MCU’s Multiverse Saga is now in full flow.

This fan video has given us an idea of what that could look like.

Tom Cruise becomes Iron Man in stunning fan trailer video

YouTube user Stryder HD certainly knows about creating epic fan videos that utilize Deepfake technology to capture an actor’s likeness and place it over another’s. We have seen this technique applied to a number of the creator’s amazing videos (including an awesome imagining of Liam Hemsworth replacing Henry Cavill in The Witcher ). And this jaw-dropping video is just another example of that.

Using footage from Iron Man , the video acts as a concept teaser for a fictional Iron Man 4 and it places Tom Cruise’s face over Robert Downey Jr., imagining what the Hollywood star could look like if he were to play a variant of Tony Stark in an MCU movie.

It’s an incredibly convincing video that suggests Cruise would be able to nail the charm that RDJ’s Tony is known for (even though we all know RDJ is irreplaceable).

Is Tom Cruise playing an Iron Man variant in the MCU?

Tom Cruise was only rumored to appear in  Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness as reports of  Doctor Strange reshoots has been making their way around the internet, with some fans wondering if this would result in even more cameos in the film. It ultimately turned out to be just that: A rumor.

Even though he didn’t appear in the multiversal film, those rumors have persisted as fans have wondered if we could see him cameo in a future MCU film. Nothing has been confirmed or even suggested by Marvel, but given that the multiverse will continue to play a role throughout Phase Four, Five, and Six (a.k.a. The Multiverse Saga), there is quite the possibility that we could see alternate versions of many classic MCU heroes. Could Cruise’s Iron Man be one of them?

If this were to happen, it would be a nod to the fact that Cruise was among the early possibilities to play the role in 2008’s  Iron Man before RDJ was cast.

Will more variants pop up in the MCU in Phase 5?

There are more opportunities for an Iron Man variant to surface in the MCU than ever before. As Kevin Feige confirmed at San Diego Comic-Con in 2022, the franchise’s fourth, fifth , and sixth phases are all considered part of “The Multiverse Saga”, meaning that what we’ve seen so far is only beginning of what’s coming.

Loki and  Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness opened the door for other variants of beloved Marvel characters to surface, and now it’s just a matter of time until they do. And this would allow for a lot of fan-service and nods along the way. With  Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania kicking off Phase 5 and  Loki season 2 set to continue the multiverse shenanigans in October, anything is possible.

With all of that in mind, don’t be surprised if we really do see Tom Cruise’s Iron Man variant appear at some point or another throughout The Multiverse Saga.

Next. All 32 MCU films ranked from worst to best. dark

Would you like to see Tom Cruise could show up as the Superior Iron Man/Tony Stark variant in a future MCU project? Would you prefer to see Robert Downey Jr. back in the iconic role?

Actor Tom Cruise is the star of several box-office hits, including Risky Business , A Few Good Men , The Firm , Jerry Maguire , and the Mission: Impossible franchise.

Who Is Tom Cruise?

Thomas Cruise Mapother IV, better known as Tom Cruise, was born on July 3, 1962, in Syracuse, New York, to Mary and Thomas Mapother. Cruise's mother was an amateur actress and schoolteacher, and his father was an electrical engineer. His family moved around a great deal when Cruise was a child to accommodate his father's career.

Cruise's parents divorced when he was 11, and the children moved with their mother to Louisville, Kentucky, and then to Glen Ridge, New Jersey, after she remarried. Like his mother and three sisters, Cruise suffered from dyslexia, which made academic success difficult for him. He excelled in athletics, however, and considered pursuing a career in professional wrestling until a knee injury sidelined him during high school.

At age 14, Cruise enrolled in a Franciscan seminary with thoughts of becoming a priest, but he left after a year. When he was 16, a teacher encouraged him to participate in the school's production of the musical Guys and Dolls . After Cruise won the lead of Nathan Detroit, he found himself surprisingly at home on the stage, and a career was born.

'Taps,' 'The Outsiders'

Cruise set a 10-year deadline for himself in which to build an acting career. He left school and moved to New York City, struggling through audition after audition before landing an appearance in 1981's Endless Love , starring Brooke Shields. Around this same time, he snagged a small role in the military school drama Taps (1981), co-starring Sean Penn .

His role in Taps was upgraded after director Harold Becker saw Cruise's potential, and his performance caught the attention of a number of critics and filmmakers. In 1983, Cruise appeared in Francis Ford Coppola 's The Outsiders , which also starred Emilio Estevez , Matt Dillon and Rob Lowe —all prominent members of a group of young actors the entertainment press dubbed the "Brat Pack." The film was not well received, but it allowed Cruise to work with an acclaimed director on a high-profile project.

'Risky Business'

His next film, Risky Business (1983), grossed $65 million. It also made Cruise a highly recognizable actor — thanks in no small part to a memorable scene of the young star dancing in his underwear.

In 1986, after a two-year hiatus, the budding actor released the big-budget fantasy film Legend , which did poorly at the box office. That same year, however, Cruise's A-list status was confirmed with the release of Top Gun , which co-starred Kelly McGillis, Anthony Edwards and Meg Ryan . The testosterone-fueled action-romance, set against the backdrop of an elite naval flight school, became the highest-grossing film of 1986.

'The Color of Money,' 'Rain Man' and 'Born on the Fourth of July'

Cruise followed the tremendous success of Top Gun with a string of both critically acclaimed and commercially successful films. He first starred in The Color of Money (1986) with co-star Paul Newman , and then went on to work with Dustin Hoffman on Rain Man (1988). Cruise's next role, as Vietnam veteran Ron Kovic in the biopic Born on the Fourth of July (1989), earned him an Academy Award nomination and a Golden Globe for Best Actor.

'A Few Good Men,' 'The Firm' and 'Interview with a Vampire'

In 1992, Cruise proved once more that he could hold his own opposite a screen legend when he co-starred with Jack Nicholson in the military courtroom drama A Few Good Men . The film grossed more than $15 million its first weekend and earned Cruise a Golden Globe nomination. He continued to demonstrate his success as a leading man with The Firm (1993) and Interview with a Vampire (1994), which co-starred Brad Pitt.

'Mission: Impossible,' 'Jerry McGuire'

Next, Cruise hit the big screen with two huge hits—the $64 million blockbuster Mission: Impossible (1996), which the star also produced, and the highly acclaimed Jerry McGuire (1996), directed by Cameron Crowe. For the latter, Cruise earned a second Academy Award nomination and Golden Globe for Best Actor.

'Eyes Wide Shut,' 'Magnolia'

Cruise and then-wife Kidman spent much of 1997 and 1998 in England shooting Eyes Wide Shut , an erotic thriller that would be director Stanley Kubrick 's final film. The movie came out in the summer of 1999 to mixed reviews, but that year Cruise enjoyed greater success with the release of Magnolia . His performance as a self-confident sex guru in the ensemble film earned him another Golden Globe Award and an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor.

'Vanilla Sky,' 'The Last Samurai'

Cruise then starred in the long-awaited smash hit Mission: Impossible 2 in 2000, alongside Anthony Hopkins , Thandie Newton and Ving Rhames. In 2002, he starred in Vanilla Sky , his second collaboration with Crowe, as well as Steven Spielberg 's Minority Report . The following year, Cruise traveled to Australia to shoot the $100 million war epic The Last Samurai, which earned him another Golden Globe nomination.

'War of the Worlds'

Cruise proved he remained a top draw by starring in the Spielberg-directed remake of the science-fiction classic War of the Worlds (2005), which grossed more than $230 million at the box office.

His next effort, Mission: Impossible 3 (2006), also scored well with audiences. However, Cruise was faced with a professional setback in August when Paramount Pictures ended its 14-year relationship with the actor. The company's chairman cited Cruise's erratic behavior and controversial views as the reason for the split, though industry experts noted that Paramount more likely ended the partnership over Cruise's high earnings from the Mission: Impossible franchise.

Cruise quickly rebounded and on November 2, 2006, he announced his new partnership with film executive Paula Wagner and the United Artists film studio. Their first production as a team, the political drama Lions for Lambs (2007), proved a commercial disappointment despite a strong cast that included Meryl Streep and Robert Redford .

'Tropic Thunder'

Taking a break from weighty material, Cruise delighted audiences with his performance in the comedy Tropic Thunder (2008). Despite his relatively small role in a movie that featured Robert Downey Jr. and Ben Stiller , Cruise stood out by obscuring his trademark good looks to play a balding, obese movie studio executive.

'Valkyrie,' 'Rock of Ages'

In December 2008, Cruise released his second project through United Artists. The film, Valkyrie , was a World War II drama about a plot to assassinate German leader Adolf Hitler . Cruise starred as a German army officer who became involved in the conspiracy.

Cruise returned to one of his most popular franchises in 2011 with Mission: Impossible—Ghost Protocol . Breaking into new territory, he then starred in the 2012 musical Rock of Ages . Although Cruise received some positive reviews for his performance as a rock star, the movie failed to attract much of an audience.

'Jack Reacher,' 'Edge of Tomorrow'

Returning to his mainstream action roots, Cruise starred in the 2012 crime drama Jack Reacher , based on a book by Lee Child. He then headlined a pair of science-fiction adventures, Oblivion (2013) and Edge of Tomorrow (2014). Showing no signs of slowing down, the veteran actor in 2015 delivered his usual high-energy performance for the fifth installment of his blockbuster franchise, Mission: Impossible—Rogue Nation .

Latest Movies and Familiar Franchises

In 2016, Cruise reprised the role of Jack Reacher for Never Go Back . He then headlined a reboot of The Mummy (2017), which performed respectably at the box office but was savaged by critics, before earning better reviews later that year for the crime thriller American Made .

2018 brought a return to familiar territory for Cruise, who starred in Mission Impossible —Fallout that summer. Prior to its release, he tweeted a photo to mark day 1 of production on the long-awaited sequel Top Gun: Maverick , scheduled for a June 2020 release.

Scientology and Personal Life

Cruise married actress Mimi Rogers in 1987. It was through Rogers that the actor became a student of Scientology, the religion founded by writer L. Ron Hubbard. Cruise credited the church with curing his dyslexia, and he soon became one of its leading proponents. However, while his spiritual life flourished, his marriage to Rogers ended in 1990. That same year, Cruise made the racecar drama Days of Thunder alongside Kidman. Though the movie was unpopular among critics and fans alike, the two lead actors had real chemistry. On Christmas Eve 1990, after a brief courtship, Cruise and Kidman married in Telluride, Colorado.

Divorce from Kidman

For much of the 1990s, Cruise and Kidman found themselves fiercely defending the happiness and legitimacy of their marriage. They filed two different lawsuits against tabloid publications for stories they considered libelous. In each case, the couple received a published retraction and apology, along with a large monetary settlement which they donated to charity. The couple has two children, Isabella and Connor.

On February 5, 2001, Cruise and Kidman announced their separation after 11 years of marriage. The couple cited the difficulties involved with two acting careers and the amount of time spent apart while working. Following the divorce, Cruise briefly dated his Vanilla Sky co-star Penelope Cruz , followed by a much-publicized relationship with actress Katie Holmes. A month after his ties to Holmes became public, Cruise professed his love for the actress in a now-famous appearance on The Oprah Winfrey Show, during which he jumped on Winfrey's sofa, shouting "Yes!"

Marriage to Katie Holmes

In June 2005, after a two-month courtship, Cruise proposed to Holmes in a restaurant at the top of the Eiffel tower. In October, they announced that they were expecting their first child together. The hasty proposal and surprise pregnancy quickly became tabloid gossip. But Cruise made even bigger headlines that year as an outspoken advocate for Scientology. He openly criticized former co-star Brooke Shields for using anti-depressants during her recovery from postpartum depression. He also denounced psychiatry and modern medicine, claiming Scientology held the key to true healing. Cruise's statements led to a heated argument with news anchor Matt Lauer on The Today Show in June 2005, for which Cruise later apologized.

In 2006, Cruise and Holmes welcomed daughter Suri into the world. That year, they were married in an Italian castle, with celebrities Will Smith , Jada Pinkett Smith , Jennifer Lopez and Victoria and David Beckham among those in attendance. However, the storybook romance wouldn't last, and in June 2012, the couple announced their separation.

QUICK FACTS

• Birth Year: 1962
• Birth date: July 3, 1962
• Birth State: New York
• Birth City: Syracuse
• Birth Country: United States
• Gender: Male
• Best Known For: Actor Tom Cruise is the star of several box-office hits, including 'Risky Business,' 'A Few Good Men,' 'The Firm,' 'Jerry Maguire' and the 'Mission: Impossible' franchise.
• Astrological Sign: Cancer

We strive for accuracy and fairness.If you see something that doesn't look right, contact us !

CITATION INFORMATION

• Article Title: Tom Cruise Biography
• Author: Biography.com Editors
• Website Name: The Biography.com website
• Url: https://www.biography.com/actors/tom-cruise
• Access Date:
• Publisher: A&E; Television Networks
• Last Updated: March 26, 2021
• Original Published Date: April 3, 2014

The Biography.com staff is a team of people-obsessed and news-hungry editors with decades of collective experience. We have worked as daily newspaper reporters, major national magazine editors, and as editors-in-chief of regional media publications. Among our ranks are book authors and award-winning journalists. Our staff also works with freelance writers, researchers, and other contributors to produce the smart, compelling profiles and articles you see on our site. To meet the team, visit our About Us page: https://www.biography.com/about/a43602329/about-us

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Tom Cruise Has A Weirdly Cruel Way Of Keeping Pigeons From Interrupting Filming

• Tom Cruise creatively handles pigeon problem on set with birds of prey to ensure smooth filming of Mission: Impossible 8 in Trafalgar Square.
• Delays in Mission: Impossible 8 release announced due to SAG-AFTRA strike impact, pushing premiere from June 2024 to May 2025.
• Cruise's dedication to delivering high-stake stunts himself in the Mission: Impossible franchise sets it apart, making him a box office draw.

Tom Cruise is back on set as filming for Mission: Impossible 8 has commenced. Though it appears the crew was faced with an unusual problem, Cruise apparently had a creative solution albeit slightly cruel.

Tom Cruise Has A Strict Rule Regarding His Look During Public Events

Why tom cruise invited birds of prey to set.

Apparently, pigeons have been getting in the way of filming at London’s Trafalgar Square, where Cruise’s onscreen character Ethan Hunt must deal with a riot, and not the avian kind. Apparently, Cruise encouraged production to invite handlers with birds of prey to set to keep the pigeons at bay.

It was a clever move and meant the scenes were filmed without a hitch, a source told The Sun.

A variety of birds of prey, including hawks and falcons, have been used on set to combat the pigeon problem. And this certainly isn’t the first time large birds have been used to keep away smaller ones, in the entertainment industry and otherwise.

Though filming has just started on the new Mission: Impossible movie, it won’t release until next summer.

Why Toms New Mission: Impossible Movie Was Delayed

Though filming is underway, Mission: Impossible 8 was already delayed, with the news disappointing fans last October. Paramount Pictures pushed back the release of the film by almost a full year. Originally slated for June 28, 2024, the film's premiere was rescheduled to May 23, 2025.

The delay came as a result of the SAG-AFTRA strike, which caused production on many shows and films to halt. Cruise's involvement in the Mission: Impossible movies has been nothing short of iconic, making it one of the most successful and well-known action movie franchises globally.

As the face of the series, Cruise has played the role of IMF agent Ethan Hunt since its inception. His dedication to performing jaw-dropping stunts himself has become a trademark of the franchise, setting it apart in the action genre.

'Mission Impossible': The Cast Ranked From Richest To Poorest

Since its debut in 1996 with the simply titled Mission: Impossible, the franchise has grossed over $3.5 billion globally , making it one of the highest-grossing film series of all time.

With a net worth of at least $600 million , Cruise makes a substantial pay check for each film, reportedly commanding around $70-100 million per movie , showcasing his value as a box office draw.

While Cruise will clearly be busy overseas for the next few months as he completes the movie, there continue to be rumors around his personal life, as his youngest daughter, Suri, is turning 18. Reports claim the actor hopes to make contact with the teen now that she’s a legal adult, though there have rumblings that Suri and her mother Katie Holmes aren’t interested in communicating.

There have also been rumors about Tom’s connection to Scientology. While it was speculated last year he may be distancing himself from the Church, his appearance at Scientology HQs in London in November seemed to dispel the rumors.

Here's How Tall Tom Cruise Really Is

In 2011, Tom Cruise was embroiled in a casting controversy when it was revealed he'd be playing Jack Reacher (via Deadline ). Fans of the character, created by Lee Childs, were quick to point out that the former US Army major is described as standing at 6 foot 5 inches and about 250 pounds in the book, both of which Cruise isn't. The actor is pretty synonymous with his shorter height, with rumors often circulating that he wears heels or shoe lifts when starring opposite taller actors, per  BuzzFeed . 

But, as Childs noted at the time, "Reacher's size in the books is a metaphor for an unstoppable force, which Cruise portrays in his own way." The author also pointed out to BBC News that it's "completely impossible to literally transfer the page to screen," and that while people think someone "that looks more like Reacher is described in the books" should have been cast, there were none Childs was happy with.

Cruise also stated that he was "very sensitive" to the criticism of his height in an interview with Empire, adding that the author told him "the reason he wrote [Reacher] that size is because that was just one element to his character, and that opened the door to me playing him."

So exactly how tall is Tom Cruise, and why did it cause so much drama when he was cast as Jack Reacher?

It's rumoured that Tom Cruise uses heels to elevate his height

While Tom Cruise is often cited as standing at 5 foot 7 inches tall (via Your Next Shoes ), it's actually pretty hard to pinpoint the actor's height. As The Delite notes, there's "a lot of speculation" about his height, noting that there's even a Pinterest board that's collated the times Cruise as allegedly worn heeled boots or shoe lifts to elevate his height.

Sometimes, it seems that his co-stars have to wear flatter shoes to compensate for his height as Nicole Kidman noted speaking about her experience filming "Days of Thunder" with Cruise (via Your Next Shoes). "They had me in really flat shoes, but you could still see I was taller than him," Kidman explained, who happens to be 5 foot 10 inches (via The Sun ). "I'd prefer to be smaller, but I don't mind," she continued. "I like the fact that he's one of the most famous actors in the world and can work with anybody — but he doesn't mind working with an actress who's taller."

NEWS... BUT NOT AS YOU KNOW IT

‘I thought I had been cast in a Tom Cruise film – until I was asked to touch myself on camera’

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On an otherwise unremarkable day in 2019, jobbing actor John Taylor* received an email that would change his life forever.

He did not initially recognise the sender’s name but a quick Google search revealed Doug Liman was a huge Hollywood director, behind blockbusters including The Bourne Identity.

Doug said he was looking for undiscovered talent for his latest movie set in space starring Tom Cruise and John had been recommended by a producer he had previously worked with.

‘It was surreal, exciting, and weird,’ John recalled after receiving the offer; global superstardom, it seemed, was now in touching distance.

But first John needed to get in shape for the physically intense role and was instructed by Doug, and Donna Langley, the chairperson of the film’s producer Universal, to undergo martial arts training.

He was asked to pay $800 (£638) upfront for the teaching which, at the time, ‘didn’t seem like a huge deal’ to John, who had been paying for acting classes. It was another skill to add to his arsenal.

Doug would also call him multiple times a day, for hours on end, and ask him to watch dozens of films back-to-back, from dusk until dawn, and write analyses of the characters.

Eager to impress, John recalled to the makers of the Apple TV Plus documentary Hollywood Con Queen : ‘The whole time I was waiting for my phone to ring to do whatever they needed.’

But then John’s prescribed preparation took a horrific turn.

He was told Donna wanted to make sure he could perform a specific scene in the film and was made to jump on a Skype call. Her camera was switched off.

Donna asked him to act out chatting up and then kissing a ‘beautiful’ woman. John did as instructed but her feedback was not positive. She said she didn’t feel that he ‘believed’ it.

‘She was right,’ John recalled. ‘It was incredibly awkward and I didn’t believe it and it was uncomfortable and I didn’t want to do it.’

After an hours-long break for John to ‘loosen up’, they reconvened on Skype and Donna asked him to reenact the scene with his trousers off.

John said he obliged as he was wearing underpants and his waist downwards was not visible on the camera.

But then he was asked to touch himself.

‘And then I snapped,’ John said. ‘I was like, “No, this is ridiculous. This is not OK what you’re doing.”

‘It was the strongest combination of anger and of feeling upset I’ve ever felt – to the point where I was literally shaking. I was completely disrespected.’

When Doug apologised to John for Donna’s behaviour, only to ask for more money minutes later, it dawned on John he had been scammed.

A con artist had been impersonating the Hollywood power players and swindled $5,000 (£3,989) out of him.

After the realisation, John said: ‘[I thought] this is a really horrible person who uses people for sport.’

Donna and Doug had been impersonated by one man, Hargobind Punjabi Tahilramani, also known as the Hollywood Con Queen, whose crimes have been explored in the Apple three-part series.

Tahilramani had pretended to be multiple Hollywood executives to dupe more than 300 victims out for more than $1m (£797,999) by offering them non-existent film work in Indonesia between 2013 and 2020.

With the help of The Hollywood Reporter’s Scott Johnson, who first broke the story, filmmaker Chris Smith, who also directed the Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened, has turned the extraordinary case into a gripping documentary.

For the three-part docuseries, Tiger King executive producer Chris even spoke to Tahilramani, who was born in Indonesia but had been living in the UK, via Zoom, as he recounted to Metro.co.uk ahead of its release.

On his first impression of Tahilramani, Chris said: ‘He was very in control of the way that he presented himself and the way that he revealed information.

‘I think he was attempting to manipulate and control our dialogue and communication.

‘But what makes him so masterful is that it felt very genuine and real. I sympathise with the victims.’

Chris also said that during the making of the Hollywood Con Queen, he had concerns he had been sucked into Tahilramani’s web of manipulation.

He added: ‘By the end of the series, we found ourselves in Indonesia exploring all these things that he wanted us to explore.

‘We realised that maybe we had fallen prey to the same sort of manipulation that his victims have fallen prey to.

‘It was hard to understand always what was real, and there’s part of him that feels very relatable and genuine.

‘But it was trying to disentangle what was real, and what was not real, that was the constant push and pull of the process of trying to make this series.’

What also emerges from the Hollywood Con Queen is that Tahilramani’s motivation was not purely financial.

‘It’s hard to say [what his main aim was],’ Chris, who worked on the documentary for four years, explained.

‘He was living a good life in London and had nice clothes and went to nice restaurants. I don’t think the money was immaterial.

‘But from our perspective, it felt like it wasn’t the primary motivation, it felt like it was more about something else. It was about psychological manipulation, and destroying people’s dreams.

‘I don’t think we can ever fully know.’

Tahilramani was arrested following an FBI investigation on November 25, 2020 in a £60-a-night Aparthotel in  Manchester .

On June 6, 2023 a British judge ruled that he be extradited to the US to face trial for his crimes.

Tahilramani remains in the UK and is fighting extradition.

*Names have been changed.

Hollywood Con Queen is available to stream on Apple TV Plus from May 8.

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Nicole Kidman's 4 Children: All About Bella, Connor, Sunday and Faith

Nicole Kidman shares two children, Bella and Connor, with ex Tom Cruise, and two daughters, Sunday and Faith, with husband Keith Urban

Nicole Kidman is the proud mother of four kids.

The Big Little Lies star shares two children, Bella and Connor, with ex-husband Tom Cruise . She also has two daughters, Sunday Rose and Faith Margaret, with her longtime love Keith Urban , to whom she's been married for nearly two decades.

Kidman became a first-time mother in 1993, when she and her then-husband Cruise adopted their daughter, Bella. A few years later, the pair welcomed son Connor into their family. Though Kidman and Cruise split in 2001, she told Elle in 2008 that the former couple's kids were raised "amidst a lot of love."

"They are generous, kind and hardworking," Kidman later said of her two older children. "And these are traits that I love to see in my children ."

After splitting from Cruise, the Being the Ricardos actress went on to marry Urban on June 25, 2006. Two years later, they welcomed their first daughter, Sunday Rose, followed by her younger sister, Faith Margaret, in 2010.

Kidman, who has been open about her fertility struggles, told Marie Claire Australia in 2021 that she always wanted a big family. "I would've loved 10 kids," she said. "I love mothering, I love kids: They're quirky, funny and unfiltered. And then you get to see them grow and send them on their way."

Kidman said that her daughters are part of her support system while talking to PEOPLE for the magazine's 50th anniversary in April 2024.

"I have my sister, mother, nieces, nephews, daughters. I'm raising a soon-to-be 16-year-old and a 13-year-old, who are divine. They're just lovely people ," she said.

From everything she's said about being a mother to her sweetest moments with her children, here's what to know about Nicole Kidman 's four kids: Bella, Connor, Sunday and Faith.

Bella Kidman Cruise , 31

Kidman and Cruise adopted daughter Isabella Jane shortly after her birth in Miami on Dec. 22, 1992.

"From the minute Tom and I were married, I wanted to have babies ," Kidman told Vanity Fair in 2007. "And we lost a baby early on, so that was really very traumatic. And that's when we would adopt [our daughter] Bella."

Though she grew up with her father in Beverly Hills, Isabella – who goes by the nickname Bella – has stayed mostly out of the spotlight. She graduated from West London's Delmar Academy of Make-up and Hair, before transitioning to a career in fashion.

The burgeoning designer got her start working for Holmes and Yang, the fashion line of Cruise's ex-wife, Katie Holmes . She started her own line , BKC (a.k.a Bella Kidman Cruise), in 2018, selling t-shirts adorned with her own drawings.

"Bella has been an artist her entire life. Her go-to medium is marker on paper with her inspiration for her artwork drawn largely from friends, fashion, and music," a statement on her line's site reads .

In 2015, she married British I.T. consultant Max Parker , and though neither of her famous parents attended the nuptials, Cruise reportedly helped pay for the event, while a Kidman source told PEOPLE that she was " very happy for Bella ."

While Bella tends to keep a low profile, she does maintain an active Instagram presence , regularly posting photos of her art along with the occasional selfie. In March 2023, she even debuted a new hairstyle on the app, showing off her newly dark brunette shag haircut and bangs.

In December 2023, former NFL player Derrick Brooks shared a photo on Instagram of himself posing with Bella, Connor and Cruise at a Tampa Bay Lightning hockey game — the actor's first public outing with his two older children in nearly 15 years.

"Good Evening, Wow, look who stopped by my office before our @tblightning game tonight! @tomcruise. I was a little star struck but played it cool and He said he was too!" Brooks wrote in his caption.

Connor Cruise , 29

Kidman and Cruise adopted their second child, son Connor, just after his birth in Florida on Jan. 17, 1995. Though her marriage to Cruise ended six years later, the actress has expressed her gratitude for the relationship, as it brought her her two older children.

"I got married really fast and really young," Kidman said in 2012. "But I don't regret that because it got me Bella and Connor and I did have a fantastic marriage for a long period."

Connor grew up in Los Angeles, and got his first real taste of the spotlight in 2008, when he acted alongside Will Smith in the drama Seven Pounds . Though he also had a role in the 2012 action film Red Dawn , he switched to music as a teen, releasing his debut single in 2013 and landing DJ gigs around the country.

Connor is also an avid deep-sea fisherman, a passion he attributes to his travels with his parents growing up. "We used to go fishing a lot when I was a little kid," he told PEOPLE in 2016. "I was blessed to travel the world as a young kid and now I'm traveling the world working."

The 29-year-old now resides in Florida and dedicates much of his time to fishing, as a source told PEOPLE in 2018. " Connor has a pretty simple life in Clearwater ," the insider said. "He lives in his own home in a Scientology community. His life is deep-sea fishing. He has a lot of friends and seems very well-liked."

In addition to his personal Instagram account — where he occasionally posts snaps of his impressive catches — he also runs a separate account dedicated to his barbecuing business, Connor's Meatshack .

Most recently, Connor shared a photo from a golf outing in April 2023. In the snap , he can be seen giving a thumbs up to the camera as he hits the course with a friend. "🏌️‍♂️⛳️," he captioned the image.

Sunday Rose Kidman Urban , 15

Emma McIntyre/Getty

Kidman and Urban welcomed daughter Sunday Rose on July 7, 2008, in Nashville. According to PEOPLE, Kidman's father first suggested the name Sunday in honor of the Australian patron of the arts, Sunday Reed. The couple, who claim Sunday as their "favorite day," were clearly on board.

When Sunday was young, the family relocated to Tennessee. In addition to picking up her parents' Australian lingo, Sunday adopted a bit of a Southern accent.

"My daughters are Nashvillians! They have a southern drawl," Kidman told PEOPLE in 2016. "They have some Aussie. They have an unusual mix. They're hybrids."

Her Aussie accent isn't the only way she's following in her mom and dad's footsteps — Sunday has had a passion for music since she was a little girl.

"She sings incessantly," Kidman said in 2010 of her then-2-year-old-daughter. "She has a repertoire of about 30 songs: 'The ABC Song,' 'Twinkle, Twinkle, Traffic Light,' 'So Long, Farewell.' "

It also seems like Sunday wants to follow her mother into the filmmaking industry. In a 2018 interview for TIME 100, Kidman shared that Sunday was already thinking of pursuing a career in the entertainment industry.

"I'm raising a little girl that's showing an interest in directing right now, " she said. "I want her to have a path for that."

At the 2017 Palm Springs International Film Festival, Kidman told E! News that Sunday also does some acting: "My daughter just got cast in her school play," she said. "So, that's been the main priority, learning lines with her."

Sunday and Faith made their red carpet debut in April 2024 at the AFI Life Achievement Award Gala, where their mom was the evening's honoree. "They're very, very supportive and incredibly loving ," Kidman told PEOPLE at the star-studded Los Angeles event.

Faith Margaret Kidman Urban , 13

Kidman and Urban surprised fans when they announced that they had welcomed daughter Faith Margaret via gestational surrogate on Dec. 28, 2010, in Nashville.

Like her sister, Faith's name has a sweet meaning. Despite their fertility struggles, Kidman and Urban " never gave up faith they'd have another child together," a friend of the couple told PEOPLE after her birth. As for her middle name, "Margaret" comes from Kidman's grandmother.

Juggling two young daughters with Kidman and Urban's busy careers isn't easy, though the actress told PEOPLE in 2019 that their family always comes first.

"At this stage in our lives, it's what works for the family and what works for our own joy," she said of avoiding jobs that mean too much time away from their daughters.

Kidman and Urban have done their best to keep their daughters' lives private, though both Faith and Sunday have occasionally made public appearances over the years. They were extras in their mom's HBO show Big Little Lies , and voiced baby birds in the film Angry Birds 2 . The girls even became close with the children of Kidman's Big Little Lies costars, as she explained to PEOPLE.

"They've grown up with those kids because I had them on-set around Monterey, and I'm like, 'Playdates, playdates!' " she said.

The pandemic brought on new challenges for Kidman's two younger children. Speaking to Glamour U.K. in November 2020, she explained that Faith and Sunday were " working through the emotions " of social distancing.

"One of the hardest things is just watching them pine and yearn for their friends," she added.

Earlier that year, Kidman spoke to Marie Claire Australia about how her husband was outnumbered and had to retreat from the "female-heavy" house on occasion.

" We're definitely female-heavy ! But as the girls say, 'The dog's a boy!' " she joked, adding that her husband finds solace in one of his shared hobbies with Faith.

"Oh, and he Googles cars — I'll know when he's stressed 'cause he's Googling cars," she said. "I couldn't care less what car I'm driving; you can pick me up in any old thing. But Keith and Faith love cars."

Though Kidman rarely posts her children on social media, she did share a sweet tribute for Faith's 11th birthday in December 2021. "Happy birthday our darling Faith. You are loved beyond measure," she captioned a photo of her daughter's birthday cake.

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Tom Cruise Movies List

1. Endless Love

3. The Outsiders

4. Losin' It

5. All the Right Moves

6. Risky Business

9. The Color of Money

10. Cocktail

11. Rain Man

12. Born on the Fourth of July

13. Days of Thunder

14. A Few Good Men

15. The Firm

16. Interview with the Vampire: The Vampire Chronicles

17. Mission: Impossible

18. Jerry Maguire

19. Eyes Wide Shut

20. Magnolia

21. Mission: Impossible II

22. Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures

23. Vanilla Sky

24. Space Station 3D

25. Minority Report

26. Austin Powers in Goldmember

27. The Last Samurai

28. Collateral

29. War of the Worlds

30. Mission: Impossible III

31. Lions for Lambs

32. Valkyrie

33. Tropic Thunder

34. Knight and Day

36. Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol

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