The Flickering Myth writing team trade opinions on the first trailer for Jack Reacher…
Although 2011 ended on a high for Tom Cruise with the release of the blockbuster action sequel Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, so far this year hasn’t been too kind to the Hollywood star. Aside from his marital troubles, Cruise’s most recent offering Rock of Ages met with a decidedly mixed response from critics and failed to recoup its $75m production budget at the global box office. However, Cruise will be hoping to put that behind him and replicate the holiday cheer afforded to Ghost Protocol as he returns to cinemas this December for the lead in Jack Reacher, an adaptation of the Lee Child novel One Shot from writer-director Christopher McQuarrie (The Way of the Gun).
Earlier this month, the first trailer for Jack Reacher was released, prompting a discussion within the Flickering Myth writing team about Cruise’s latest role…
Luke Graham: I won’t be the first person on the internet to point out the peculiarly good timing of releasing a “kewl” action trailer for a Tom Cruise vehicle, the same week his marriage breaks down in the most dramatic way possible. Cruise must certainly have a good agent and PR team.
More seriously, the trailer looks good. BUT, I kind of wish Tom Cruise would stick to doing either serious dramatic acting, which he’s great at (look at The Last Samurai and Valkyrie) or self-deprecating comedy, which he’s also good at (Tropic Thunder), instead of these vanity projects which try to convince the audience that this tiny 50 year old man is some kind of ultimate bad-ass. He can get away with it in Mission: Impossible, because that was an established franchise.
Rohan Morbey: Just a point on the timing of the trailer; it was always attached to The Amazing Spider-Man on the US, so its appearance online at the time of his marriage breakdown is pure coincidence.
Gary Collinson: I’ve never really been a fan of Tom Cruise, but I thought this trailer started off great – I liked the voiceovers, the music, the revving of the engine and the driving stuff, even the montage of action shots following the ‘Tom Cruise’ title card. Sadly though, I couldn’t hold my suspension of disbelief for the last twenty or thirty seconds where he squares up to those five thugs. I will say this for him, he’s in good shape for fifty, but I couldn’t buy him as some kind of fighting machine fifteen years back, never mind now.
Rohan Morbey: Outrageous claims.
Kirsty Capes: Tom Cruise has always made my skin crawl. Probably something to do with the whole Scientology thing. Also, how do people expect him to pass for an action hero? I agree with Luke – Cruise should stick to comedy and cameos now. Action movies just make him look old and slightly camp. Better off casting someone like Gerard Butler.
Scott Davis: The trailer is ridiculous, totally barmy. But in a good way…. Still a huge fan of Cruise and will still see what he does, but this looks a little too much like Ethan Hunt “off the grid”, disavowed and pissed right off to 11. The McQuarrie / Cruise combo could be gold, and the scene at the end of the trailer looks bad-ass.
Liam Trim: This trailer is surprisingly classy to begin with. The engine revving and then ticking over in the background as we hear a little about the character of Jack Reacher is a really nice touch. However, the moment ‘Tom Cruise’ appears on screen things dip in quality. The action sequences and stunts look enjoyable enough, but I agree with Gary that the fight sequence at the end just looks like an implausible ego boost for an aging star.
Chris Cooper: A quick wiki read up on Reacher shows that Cruise really shouldn’t be playing him. 6’5, upwards of 210 lbs and, with blue eyes and blonde hair. Couldn’t be more different. But, I enjoyed the trailer, loved the revving engine, and look forward to seeing more. Regarding Cruise himself. I care little for his personal life and what goes on in it (he is rich enough to afford to be a wacko, but they are his beliefs so he is welcome to them). What I do care about are films, and he has made plenty that I have enjoyed a lot. Plenty I don’t like like too, but we can’t like everything now can we.
Simon Moore: You know how McDonald’s burgers don’t age or decay because they’re not really made of organic matter? I don’t know, I just think of them when I look at Tom Cruise. What I don’t think of is a hardened veteran supercop badass.
We bought the idea of cops-without-mercy like Dirty Harry because Clint Eastwood is a mean looking guy. I mean really, really mean looking. If ever you accidentally stand up whilst watching him mid-glare, your knees tend to quiver and buckle beneath you. I don’t get that vibe from Tom Cruise. Nobody does. Whatever other merits this film might have, a badly miscast lead will be hard to come back from.
Matt Smith: Hmm… agree with the classy beginning and the negative comparisons to Clint Eastwood. I find it easier to imagine Tom Cruise as a cop who sticks to the rules as opposed to the ultimate badass. And I know it’s unfortunate, but it just seems a bit too familiar. I can’t imagine sitting there and feeling any deep links to the character or emotion as to how things turn out. It reminded me of Knight and Day. Decent, but forgettable.
Rohan Morbey: The problem here is people’s perceptions of TC vs ‘the facts’. I don’t blame the misinformed if they now have an anti-TC stance because of the media’s perception of him, but I wonder if these comments on his latest film would have been made if we were commenting on a new trailer in 2004, on a film called Collateral. I cannot image anyone saying they don’t buy TC as as a hitman because he’s a Scientologist or not 6’0 or because he’s never done that kind of role before. Go back to 1989, would we have said he’s the wrong man to play war veteran Ron Kovic because of the same reasons? The simple fact is you shouldn’t dislike someone for pure speculation of their personal life when the facts are that not one person has ever spoken out against him. Not one. He is, by all accounts, one of the most dedicated actors in Hollywood today and one of the few who could land a role like this ‘against type’ purely because everyone involved from director to producer to studio to the novelist Lee Childs, who created the Jack Reacher franchise, believes he is the best man for the role to elevate this film from so-so crowd pleaser to a genuinely good thriller, different from anything else in 2012.
As for the trailer itself, I do not think it is the best it could have been. It starts out well but feels rushed on order to be a teaser rather than a full-length theatrical; more story is needed to win over the people who don’t know who Jack Reacher is, or show those that the film will deliver just what fans of the novel One Shot (originally the film’s title) expect. I see nothing wrong with what Cruise does in the trailer but agree it’s nothing out of the ordinary, especially after the set pieces which helped promote Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol and sold the viewer on the spectacle that was to come. However, with Cruise as leading man, you can always expect 100% – just ask (insert name of nearly any director you care to mention).
So to summarise, apart from an impassioned defense of the star from Rohan Morbey, there doesn’t appear to be much love for Tom ‘Action Star’ Cruise among the Flickering Myth writing team, despite the fact that most agreed the trailer for Jack Reacher actually looked pretty good… until Tom started kicking ass, that is.
Jack Reacher is released on December 21st in the US and December 28th in the UK.
