Matt at the Movies: Tom Cruise Action Hall of Fame
Here are the Top Films (including Top Gun) from an actor who has thrilled us for over 40 years.
Editor’s note: in case you missed it, read Matt’s review of Tom Cruise’s latest Mission: Impossible offering.
“I need you to trust me. One last time…”
is said as earnestly and convincing as Tom Cruise’s iconic Ethan Hunt can muster in the trailer for Mission Impossible: The Final Reckoning.
Alright Tom, I know you are once again here to save cinema, but I’m in. The 62-years-young Cruise is setting out on a “final,” eighth installment of the franchise.
This journey began in 1996 with director Brian De Palma. and set the tone for an elevated spy/action blockbuster in the midst of a summer to remember that included The Rock, Twister, and Independence Day. Other action series have tried and failed (like the Fast and Furious franchise) to keep upping the action while also being interesting.
At the end of the day it’s not the set pieces, CGI, or new villains that bring us back… it’s Tom Cruise.
As Jerry Seinfeld once described his nemesis Newman, “He’s a mystery wrapped in a Twinkie,” and I feel the same way about Cruise.
He started out with teen dramas such as All the Right Moves, Taps and The Outsiders before making his solo lead debut with Risky Business in 1983. His real breakout came three years later as Maverick in Top Gun, and he’s been a leading man in Hollywood ever since.
The longevity of his career saw some ups and downs, particularly from 2007-13 when he was beset with negative press and a string of what studios would call flops pre-COVID, but in today’s film economy would be solid hits. He found his groove again by teaming up with longtime screenwriter-turned-director Christopher McQuarrie and fully embracing the action genre with the Mission series and Jack Reacher, as well as his monster, $1.5 billion worldwide hit Top Gun: Maverick in 2022. His films have grossed at least $12 billion at the box office, with no signs of him slowing down.
I can’t put my finger on why he is so likable onscreen. His off-screen persona — being wed to Nicole Kidman, a tumultuous marriage to Katie Holmes mixed with jumping on couches, calling Matt Lauer “glib” on the The Today Show, and his firmly entrenched status with the Church of Scientology haven’t done him much favor with the public at large.
As Jerry Seinfeld once described his nemesis Newman, “He’s a mystery wrapped in a Twinkie,” … and I feel that same way about Cruise.
On set, he is extremely focused on creating the best possible product and will hit the media circuit to promote the hell out of it. He genuinely loves making movies, and also loves being Tom Cruise (all strangeness aside). He’s one of the last true studio mega-stars, and if you told me he’s keeping the lights on at Paramount I’d believe you. When he gives that look of determination, or brandishes his trademark smile that only Julia Roberts can match, I can’t help but be locked onto his next move.
Cruise also has one of the best-ever lists of collaborators to his credits, including Francis Ford Coppola (The Outsiders), Ridley Scott (Legend), Tony Scott (Top Gun, Days of Thunder), Martin Scorcese (The Color of Money), Barry Levinson (Rain Man), Stanley Kubrick (Eyes Wide Shut), Paul Thomas Anderson (Magnolia), Michael Mann (Collateral), and Stephen Spielberg (Minority Report, War of the Worlds) just to name a few.
He played the brash young hot shot pool shark to Paul Newman’s mentor in The Color of Money, then thirty five years later returned the favor as Capt. Pete Mitchell to the young squadron on Top Gun: Maverick. He’s dived into period piece stories, sports, sci-fi, romance, political dramas — and even comedies like Tropic Thunder — but always comes home to action films.
No one — and I mean no one — can run on camera like Cruise. It must be boiler-plated into his contract before accepting scripts so he can show off his agility and quick-twitch-muscle-explosiveness. He can give all-time sprints from legal thrillers like The Firm to romantic dramas (Cocktail) alike. There is no story too big or small where a combine-style 40 yard dash can pop off within a moment's notice.
Cruise also has a knack for handling a motorcycle more gracefully than any other actor, which he can smoothly ride up to announce his presence (Days of Thunder) or ride off a cliff with no stuntmen (Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part 1). His stunts have become more grandiose in scale, and audiences have watched him scale the Burj Khalifa or hang off the wing of a Cessna plane performing aerial maneuvers. It’s not that he enjoys doing these things we have come to expect from him, but that he loves it.
To quote a guy, “You don’t have time to think up there. If you think you’re dead.”
Without putting too much thought into it, it’s time to rank the top ten Tom Cruise action performances in his illustrious career. This includes all genres of Cruise filmography as long as it dips into action.
Godspeed, and show me the money, Tom.
Matt at the Movies’ Tom Cruise Action Rankings
10. Days of Thunder (1990)
Caught you off guard already didn’t I?
Well, we are in NASCAR country here in Charlotte, and this sleek, Tony Scott-directed film tried to bring Top Gun to the racetrack. It was also the set where Cruise met future wife Nicole Kidman, and if you lived in Lake Norman in the 90s you were certain to see a signed picture of the couple at a local restaurant they visited during this area.
Most of the action in Thunder takes place in the confines of the driver's seat, but the montage of learning to drive stock cars on the fly while Gimme Some Lovin’ blares in the back, and Robert Duvall giving Cruise tough love over the radio is three and a half minutes of pure bliss.
Rubbin’ is racing in this very unrealistic attempt (too many black flag moments to count) to capture the feel of what it’s like to whip around a track at over 200 mph. Not only do you get racing on the track but also rental cars on the beach as well as wheelchairs in the hospital!
After Cruise’s Cole Trickle — perfect NASCAR name, by the way — wins the Daytona 500 in Rowdy Burns’ borrowed vehicle, we get one of his greatest sprints ever in his long catalogue as he tries to keep pace with a fifty-nine year old Duvall.
This movie feels like an ice cold Cheerwine on a hot summer day, and at worst is snapshot in time of a North Carolina that’s now a memory.
9. Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol (2011)
It was thought with the fourth entry of the series that Jeremy Renner was being groomed to take over the helm from Cruise, but this film put to bed rumors of Ethan Hunt leaving the franchise. Yet again, Cruise goes full-on action blockbuster in this soft reboot to the M:I series.
The Impossible Mission Force (IMF) has been shut down over an incident involving the Kremlin, and Hunt (with his band of disavowed agents) must fight back to clear their names. They fight rogue agents to stop an incoming Russian nuclear strike on San Francisco as they battle their way through multiple continents in the process.
The highlight of the film is Cruise, with no stunt double, climbing outside the world’s tallest building (Burj Khalifa) in an attempt to rescue his teammates before it’s too late. This is where Mission: Impossible takes the next step from spy/action thriller to full-on Hollywood spectacle, featuring grandiose set pieces that have continuously pushed the limits of action on screen to today.
8. Minority Report (2002)
Based on the 1956 Philip K. Dick novella of the same name, we see Cruise team up with Stephen Spielberg for the first time.
Minority Report introduces us to a sci-fi world in the not-so-distant future that hits the nail on the head for where technology has come in the past twenty years. In this world, there is no murder as three psychic “precogs” can sense and warn the police about crime before it happens. This science fiction thriller plays out as a whodunit story where Cruise’s character, who heads the “Precrime” unit, is framed by the precogs as a future murderer. He goes on the run to find out the truth and clear his name in some insane action scenes.
There’s a wonderful set piece in an alley — police in jetpacks descend with futuristic, non-lethal electric batons to capture them as he races up fire escapes for evasion. We see a set of fight scenes in a robot-controlled automotive factory featuring a very young and energetic Colin Farrell. Pulse blaster guns and moving machinery create a chaotic, yet exhilarating scene.
This film has gotten better each rewatch, and once again features Cruise excelling as a man on the run.
7. The Last Samurai (2003)
I’m not sure who this movie was for at the time of its release. Riding the wave of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and the talent of Ken Wantanabe perhaps?
Cruise plays an American Army Captain whose speciality was the cruelty he inflicted on the indigenous population of the American West in the 1860’s and 70’s. Now a drunk and haunted man, he takes a mercenary gig to train soldiers in Japan who are fully adapting to western military practices during the Meiji Restoration period. Cruise is captured during battle by the last vestiges of the Samurai warrior class, and taken hostage to their remote village to spend the winter. Cruise learns the ways of the Samurai and — in typical white savior mentality — becomes one of them, albeit in a respectful way of the culture — and after getting his ass kicked many times by Shōgun’s Emmy Award-winning Hiroyuki Sanada.
There are small and large scale battles, but my particular favorite is the assassination attempt during the Kabuki play. Ninja assassins sent by the emperor’s anti-samurai advisor put a full on assault on the small village. We see the samurai soldiers (Cruise included) fighting in town squares, close quarters, and Cruise teaming with Wantanabe to take out the assailants while fighting back to back. For this particular film we get Cruise in full samurai regalia with a dead sprint across an open field as they are mowed down by multiple Gatling guns in spectacular fashion.
6. Top Gun / Top Gun: Maverick (1986 & 2022)
Both of his roles as Captain Pete Mitchell are iconic to the lore of Tom Cruise. In the first entry we have wonderful interactions with Val Kilmer on the volleyball court, briefing rooms, and even showers (intentionally or not, playful homoeroticism abounds).
The best action is during training sequences against call sign “Jester” (Michael Ironsides), where each team of the squadron try their hardest to best the grizzled vet during their war games simulation. As Goose shouts from the rear cockpit seat, “We’re going ballistic Mav, go get em!” we see Tony Scott’s fighter planes intercut with Kenny Loggins 80’s guitar rock that reeks of pure nostalgia. In an intense aerial dance Maverick goes below the 10,000 foot hard deck breaking all the rules to capture the kill even after Jester signaled “no joy.”
Top Gun: Maverick is one of my favorite moviegoing experiences in the past five years. As Maverick has been essentially moved to retirement, he must teach a young hot shot group of Top Gun graduates to carry out a dangerous mission with zero margin for error. Maverick goes rogue, as Maverick does, taking the cockpit over to show these green baby faced squad members how an old master still has the juice with all the zen master zestiness sprinkled in for free.
My wife and I were in 4DX chairs being rocked, shook, hit with air blasters, and engulfed with incredible sound to the Maverick ripping through canyons at 10G speeds. If this scene isn’t on the action set piece Mount Rushmore then I don’t know what should be.
5. Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part 1 (2023)
The penultimate Mission: Impossible brings us on a fast paced tour of the world.
As Ethan and his team hunt down a key that will take down a world altering A.I. system set on taking over the world, we travel from the Arctic Ocean to Washington D.C. to Abu Dhabi to Rome, with a quick stop in Venice before heading to Paris and finally finishing in the Alps. The quick-changing sets and locations mixed with excellent action make up for a subpar, schlocky plot.
There are excellent action sequences, from an ultra-stylish green gas bomb boardroom takeover in D.C., to small alleyway hand to hand combat in Venice, to Cruise driving a dirt bike off a mountaintop (he did his own stunt), which allows him to parachute onto a moving train.
My personal favorite was the car chase scene in Rome, where Cruise is handcuffed to co-star Hayley Atwell and the two must maneuver their tiny Fiat 500 through the nooks and crannies of ancient cobblestone streets. It’s absurd, thrilling, and extremely funny to watch these two work together, one hand apiece, and escape several tailing henchmen while driving a clown car.
4. Edge of Tomorrow (2014)
Tom was having some lows during the late 00’s and early 10’s. He took some roles including Lions for Lambs (2007), Knight and Day (2010), and Rock of Ages (2012) that weren’t entertaining. To rebound, he teamed up with writer Christopher McQuarrie for the third time, as well as up-and-comer Emily Blunt, to star in the sci-fi action flick Edge of Tomorrow, based on the Japanese novel All You Need is Kill.
An alien race called “mimics” has descended upon mainland Europe and killed millions. Cruise plays a public relations officer who is forced to take part in a D-Day-style assault wearing mechanical suits that enhance each soldier's physical and weapons capabilities. Completely over his head, Cruise takes out a higher end alpha mimic right by luck on the battlefield and the creature's blood oozes into his bloodstream before he himself dies. Seconds later, Cruise finds himself back in time twenty-four hours earlier and the creature has given him new abilities to time loop with no repercussions of death while maintaining his memories from the battle every time.
Watching Cruise die in every conceivable way makes for a wonderful montage, but the best part of this film is his chemistry with the bad-ass soldier Rita Vrataski (Emily Blunt), known as the “Angel of Verdun.” She too once had his special ability, and the two of them live, die, and repeat together just as the movie tagline suggests.
Watching the two characters treat the war-torn beaches as a video game ballet of moves to try and stop the mimics from taking over makes it one of the best sci-fi movies of the past fifteen years. There is nothing Cruise enjoys more than learning a skill whether it's slinging drinks (Cocktail), billiards (The Color of Money), or ancient feudal Japanese swordplay (The Last Samurai) to name a few. His character becoming a grizzled war vet with every trick in the book had your rooting for him to live, rather than dying again.
3. Mission: Impossible (1996)
Is it the best of the Mission:Impossible series? No, we’ll get to the high-water mark in the franchise soon enough.
However, the original Brian De Palma film is easily the most fun for me. The story includes spycraft, Bond-esque technology, double crossing, and mostly-realistic action sequences that keep us wondering who is the mole behind the takedown of Ethan Hunt.
A NOC (non-official cover) list of all undercover IMF agents in Europe is stolen during a botched mission and Hunt’s team is killed, leaving him as a man on the run against the CIA. He must work off the grid with a new team to recover the list, find the original mole, and clear his name.
Cruise plays Hunt from the beginning as an extremely (over?) confident agent. He has the charm and brains to work through situations covertly, or use force when the occasion arises. We don’t know much about his background, but we do know that he values loyalty above all. When that tie is severed, he exhibits doubt and trust issues that have played out over the rest of the series.
The best scene is the iconic infiltration of CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia that features a wire balancing heist to steal the original NOC list. The sound- and temperature-controlled room is within a fortress, and the tension that builds throughout is the highlight of the entire Mission:Impossible series to me.
2. Collateral (2004)
Tom Cruise plays “Vincent,” a contract hitman hired by drug cartels, in Michael Mann’s 2004 film Collateral.
To me, it is the best character he’s ever played that doesn’t fit into the traditional “Tom Cruise” mold. Vincent is a calculated and methodical stone-cold killer who knows every angle of any situation. His charm is menacingly icy, befitting of a hitman trope. Watching him switch gears to take on this role was jarring on the first watch, but more impressive after each viewing. An Oscar snub from this film is that his co-star Jamie Foxx (who drives Vincent around the city to his various hits) was nominated for Best Supporting Actor (Foxx won Best Actor this same year with Ray), and Cruise was shut out for one of his finer performances.
As we work through the streets of L.A., Vincent has already made one kill on his list, and zip tied Foxx to the steering wheel in an alley as he takes care of the next victim. A group of sleazy criminals spot the cab and the handcuffed Foxx, then proceed to steal Vincent’s briefcase from the vehicle. As they walk away with their loot we hear Vincent from afar shout, “Hey homie! Is that my briefcase?!”
One of the men confronts Vincent and pulls a gun, which Cruise disarms, fires five shots, and puts down two men with absolute precision. It has been referenced that the smooth, quick nature of this scene is used as an example of how to properly draw your weapon during tactical weapons training. The blare of the gunshots in the alley gave me Heat flashbacks.
1. Mission Impossible: Fallout (2018)
Fallout is the apex of the Mission Impossible series and Tom Cruise is at the zenith of his powers.
The film brings together an incomparable ensemble cast featuring Henry Cavill, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg, Rebecca Ferguson, Sean Harris, Angela Bassett, Vanessa Kirby, Michelle Monaghan, and Alec Baldwin. In this film, there is an underworld shadow terrorist for hire organization called The Apostles who want to upend the world order by setting off multiple nuclear bombs creating havoc around the globe. Ethan Hunt and his team capture — then lose — the plutonium cores, setting off the events of the film.
For this story, Hunt’s IMF team also will be working with both CIA and MI6 operatives to retrieve the stolen cores. This film features a wrinkle of Ethan’s past as his now ex-wife Julia (Michelle Monaghan) and her new husband’s non-profit to help the sick on the Kashmir border are brought in as pawns to exact revenge on Hunt. We don’t often get an emotional and desperate version of this character, but it helps bring the movie to new levels of storytelling that others have lacked.
The action features an amazing car chase scene through the streets of Paris, tunnel shootouts, helicopter aerial gymnastics, and a thrilling fight on the top of a cliff on the Himalayan mountains. Earlier in the film Hunt and CIA agent August Walker (Henry Cavill) perform a high altitude (HALO) jump to land on top of a Parisian exclusive nightclub to chase down the terrorist known as Lark, which will allow them to purchase one of the nuclear cores from arms dealers.
They make their way to the bathroom to confront Lark and steal his facial identity. The fight that ensues is as brutal and it is funny, watching Hunt and Walker getting brutally beaten time after time until they finally subdue Lark. This film brings the charm, intensity, and earnestness that we have loved from Tom Cruise over the past forty years. The action and storyline enhance the film to the M:I series’ greatest heights, which made it an easy choice for number one in the Tom Cruise Action Hall of Fame list.
Closing Credits
Stay tuned until next week and thanks for reading Matt at the Movies and Y’all Weekly!
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