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Tom Cruise pleasantly surprised the entire film industry in the summer of 2023 when he promoted Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, the latter’s magnum opus that would derail Cruise’s own Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One the very next weekend. This rivalry extended to reserving all the premium IMAX screens for Nolan’s film, a move some might equate with the life-threatening stunts the Ethan Hunt actor is famous for. However, assuming the persona of a true movie star, the Top Gun actor has long been an advocate for films beyond his own, predating his endorsement of the Cillian Murphy–Robert Downey Jr. starrer.
The incident ties back to Cruise’s consistent efforts to fill theater seats and save the cinema industry post-COVID-19, a dedication publicly acknowledged by Jurassic Park director Steven Spielberg, who credited Cruise for “saving the theatrical distribution system” with Top Gun: Maverick. Cruise’s support wasn’t limited to the Oppenheimer; he also wished success to Margot Robbie’s Barbie and Harrison Ford’s Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. Many cite these actions as instrumental in sparking the “Barbenheimer” double-feature phenomenon that dominated pop-culture conversations and social media memes.
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Interestingly, Cruise’s advocacy for theatrical releases dates back at least to the peak of the pandemic in the summer of 2020. Assuming a mask, Cruise wandered around in the streets of London for his first theater visit in months, and the movie happened to be Nolan’s sci-fi actioner Tenet, starring John David Washington, Robert Pattinson, and Kenneth Branagh. While the actor did not refer to the mind-bending film directly, in the clip posted on social media, the big screen and part of the credits can be seen as Cruise professes his admiration, quoting, “I loved it.”
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Unfortunately, the coronavirus outbreak and subsequent lockdowns all over the world meant even Cruise and Nolan’s combined methods were not adequate to save the movie industry as Tenet could only accumulate $365 million worldwide, a figure that fell short compared to any other Nolan film since 2006’s The Prestige. Cruise’s attempts to bolster the industry did not stop at Tenet. In the spring of 2023, he praised another Warner Bros. Pictures project, DCEU’s The Flash, following test screenings.
While The Flash couldn’t be saved either, attributing multiple other reasons beyond Cruise’s reach, it did lay the foundation for the shortly followed collaboration between the Edge of Tomorrow star and Warner Bros. Pictures. The first project under this deal, tentatively titled Judy, will witness Cruise joining hands with the Birdman director Alejandro González Iñárritu for what is being described as another dark, tragicomic drama from the latter’s caliber.
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