Last week, Internet rumors from former blog writer Jeff Sneider said Tom Cruise hoped to find a role in Quentin Tarantino’s upcoming and supposed final film, “The Movie Critic.” The casting was apparently not final, and if it did happen, it may have to be a minor role or small cameo, as Cruise would be busy with his next “Mission Impossible” film for most of the year. And apparently, that is the aim.
The casting intention is apparently confirmed in a new, very meaty Variety article about Warner Bros—spending $200 million on Todd Phillips’ “The Joker” and more—the studio that Cruise has aligned himself with now.
Warner Bros. Motion Picture Group chiefs Michael De Luca and Pam Abdy met with Cruise in January to discuss their nonexclusive “strategic partnership,” and one of the projects that came up as a possibility was Tarantino’s “The Movie Critic.” The rub there is that “The Movie Critic” is currently not set up with a distributor, and all the studios, including Warner Bros., are dying to have it.
I.e., everyone will be bidding a high price on it, and WB may not get it. In fact, one might assume that Sony Pictures is in the pole position because they distributed Tarantino’s last film, “Once Upon A Time In Hollywood,” and knocked it out of the park with their marketing campaign, taking the period piece film to #377.6 million worldwide—the second highest ever grossing film of Tarantino’s career globally (and Variety confirms Sony has the edge).
This wouldn’t be the first time Cruise and Tarantino have wanted to work together; Cruise was in the mix of “Once Upon A Time In Hollywood,” presumably interested in the role that eventually went to Brad Pitt (Tarantino confirmed it here).
Meanwhile, another possibility that has come up is a long-awaited sequel to Doug Liman’s sci-fi film “Edge of Tomorrow” co-starring Emily Blunt (who was just talking about it last week).
But there’s a big “if” in the Tarantino film. As mentioned, it won’t come cheap or easy if Warner Bros. tries to get it, but maybe they’ll make it happen if Tarantino wants Cruise badly enough.
An additional wrinkle, Tarantino scored a copyright ownership deal with “Once Upon A Time In Hollywood”—the rights of the film revert to him after X amount of years, probably two decades plus and following Ryan Coogler receiving the same kind of deal on his upcoming vampire movie with Michael B. Jordan, Tarantino will likely want that same deal again; something studios are super reluctant to do.
But here’s an eye-opening quote about WB’s strategy and the fact they’re ok with overspending:
But sources who have done recent business with the studio say the mandate to spare no expense to land big talent comes via Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav.
“The strategy at Warner Bros. right now and the reason they made some of these big star deals is they’re basically playing with other people’s money,” says one insider. “They’re shopping for Quentin or Cruise with the notion they can use it as a shiny object that is going to be additive when Zaslav sells the company.”
Zaslav looking to sell WB is a whole other can of beans we can’t even imagine right now, but it could be on the horizon.
At 61, Cruise remains a big action star still. Still, the Variety article says sources tell them that the actor’s intentions also include hoping to reteam with auteurs like Paul Thomas Anderson, whom Cruise worked with on 1999’s “Magnolia”—the last time the actor ever earned an Oscar nomination for acting (he was one of the producers on 2023’s Best Picture nominated “Top Gun: Maverick,” however).
Here’s Variety’s excerpt on the matter:
But Cruise wants more than action stardom — he’d like to return to working with auteurs like Paul Thomas Anderson. In fact, he hasn’t earned an Oscar nomination for acting since he appeared in Anderson’s 1999 drama “Magnolia.” Earlier in his career, Cruise benefited from being directed by heavyweights like Spielberg, Scorsese and Kubrick, but then he moved into a “Mission: Impossible”-oriented phase where he routinely defies the laws of time and gravity.
Moreover, the aforementioned WB co-chief, Mike De Luca, was one of the original producers of PTA’s “Magnolia” and apparently convinced him to appear in it in the first place. Could a PTA/Cruise reteam be in the works? This certainly all sets a good precedent for it, especially as PTA had been yearning to work with Leonardo DiCaprio finally and essentially made it happen with his upcoming untitled Warner Bros film (how did they make that happen? Spending wildly; the budget on PTA’s new film is north of $100 million with DiCaprio getting paid; $20 million plus).
So, today’s takeaway? Tom Cruise could star in Tarantino’s next film, an “Edge Of Tomorrow” sequel, and he wants back in directors like PTA. This industry may be falling apart, but if this all happens, we may be eating well, at least at the cinema.
