Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning was not a good movie — but I don’t know if even polarizing stunt-junkie Tom Cruise deserved the amount of shade thrown his way earlier this week. The man went zero g on a biplane!
On Tuesday, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the organization behind the Academy Awards, announced the recipients of its annual honorary Oscars. Issued as an actual Oscar statuette but voted on by the organization’s Board of Governors instead of the full voting body like the traditional awards, the Honorary Oscar is meant to “honor extraordinary distinction in lifetime achievement, exceptional contributions to the state of motion picture arts and sciences in any discipline.”
Emphasis on “lifetime achievement.” Most of the recipients of the Honorary Oscar are actors, directors, creatives, and craftspeople whose work has gone overlooked by the Academy Awards over the years, and who are in the twilight years of their careers, thus unlikely to score an actual Oscar anytime soon. This year’s recipients: Debbie Allen (age 75, kicked off a long career with Fame); Wynn Thomas (age unknown, but Spike Lee’s longtime production designer); Dolly Parton (age 79, superstar and two-time Best Song nominee); and… Tom Cruise (age 62, star of Ridley Scott’s Legend).
In the best light, honoring Cruise among his fellow industry vets could be seen as a long time coming. The actor has been nominated three times for performances (Born on the Fourth of July, Jerry Maguire, and Magnolia) but has never won. In 2023, he was nominated as a producer for Top Gun: Maverick, which nabbed a coveted Best Picture slot — and many were miffed that Cruise didn’t score an acting nomination for a movie that soared his movie-star presence. If Steven Spielberg is out there saying Tom Cruise saved the movie industry in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and shutdown, then yeah, Tom Cruise deserves an Honorary Oscar for being what the Board of Governors calls “a committed advocate of the theatrical experience.” True.
But dang, an Honorary Oscar has big “A for effort” energy in the wake of Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning, the supposed pièce de résistance of his 30-year franchise run, a movie that eked out an 80% on Rotten Tomatoes that looks a lot less well received under a microscope, and isn’t quite doing the numbers it needed to based on reportedly being one of the most expensive movies ever made. Cruise is getting a make-up statue that has gone to the likes of genuine masters like Mel Brooks (90), Elaine May (93), and Cicely Tyson (deceased), suggesting his time is over, that The Final Reckoning was a nail in the coffin for what he does and it’s time to honor that before he departs this mortal plane. If anything, there’s hope that the next great era of Cruise movies has just begun.
Many people can’t stomach Cruise for his behind-the-scenes persona, from his religious activity to his militant dedication to “the movies.” That’s understandable — I find it hard to really know what’s he done and where to draw that line, so as long as an industry of people employ him, I will see and try to enjoy the movies. As a diehard Mission: Impossible fan, I was eager to see the star bring it home with The Final Reckoning… and massively disappointed by the results. And yet I am clinging to hope that what Cruise does next is a complete swerve that could actually put him back in the legit Oscar races of the future. On the docket: an untitled film from Alejandro G. Iñárritu (Birdman) that sounds like it directly grapples with Cruise’s savior complex. That could work!
Who’s to say if a Top Gun 3 or the movie Cruise wants to shoot in actual space could sway jaded Oscar voters who might want to confine his work to the future Best Stunts category. Probably not. So maybe the Honorary Oscar is the only way to give Cruise the gold he deserves for a life dedicated to the big screen. But the announcement has the air of breaking up with someone over text. That’s it? It’s over? We’re done here?
Or maybe the Academy is just pretty sure he’s going to die doing the next stunt….
Source：https://www.polygon.com/opinion/607639/tom-cruise-honorary-oscar-mission-impossible-ultimate-bad-review
