Every day, AlloCiné recommends a film to (re)watch on TV. Tonight: a cult road movie.
After a first film appearance in An Infinite Love in the early 1980s, Tom Cruise was hired by Francis Ford Coppola among a band of promising young actors in Outsiders. If he then pierces thanks to the star role of Risky Business, the budding actor is however propelled to the rank of star thanks to Top Gun, the biggest worldwide success of the year 1986.
With this status, Tom Cruise is trying out more ambitious roles, under the direction of great filmmakers and facing respected actors. He notably plays an ace of billiards, spiritual son of Paul Newman in Martin Scorsese’s The Color of Money. But he especially impresses with his performance in Rain Man by Barry Levinson, in 1988.
Among a shortlist including Bill Murray, Tom Hanks and Robin Williams, Tom Cruise is finally chosen to lend his features to Charlie Babbit. Young and egocentric luxury car dealer, the latter discovers, following the death of his father, the existence of his brother Raymond, suffering from the syndrome of the scientist.
Become cult, in particular for having highlighted, with tenderness and humor, the subject of autism, still little discussed in the cinema, Rain Man allows Tom Cruise to evolve with confidence alongside a Dustin Hoffman at the top of his game, and therefore to reveal another facet of his game, far from the image of the playboy that stuck to his skin.
In a few years, the actor became an essential headliner in Hollywood, able to alternate dramatic roles (Born on the 4th of July, Interview with the Vampire, Jerry Maguire…) and sensational blockbusters (Mission: Impossible, War of the Worlds , Jack Reacher…).
With 6.4 million admissions in France, Rain Man is Tom Cruise’s greatest success in our territory. Its solid average spectator rating of 4.3/5 on AlloCiné testifies to this affection on the part of the public.
Rain Man by Barry Levinson with Dustin Hoffman, Tom Cruise, Valeria Golino…
Tonight on Arte at 9 p.m.