Author says Tom Cruise stands tall as Jack Reacher
The 5-foot-8 Tom Cruise has to stretch a bit to play the 6-foot-5 Jack Reacher in the movie of the same name, which opens Dec. 21.
But the thick-skinned Cruise is accustomed to absorbing criticism, and making necessary adjustments, when a character he plays from a novel is transplanted to the big screen.
Nearly two decades ago, Anne Rice complained when Cruise signed to play Lestat in the film version of her bestselling novel, Interview with the Vampire: The Vampire Chronicles. Eventually, she withdrew her objections after she previewed the film.
In the latest fuss, Cruise portrays Reacher who is the Lee Child protagonist in a bestselling, 17-book series of crime procedurals.
The series has sold more than 60 million copies in 40 languages around the world.
Some Reacher fans were skeptical that Cruise could pull off the part of a hulking former military cop who investigates crimes.
Certainly, Child (a.k.a. Jim Grant) anticipated grumbling from his incredibly loyal fan base when the casting was announced.
“I am extremely grateful my readers are so impassioned about it,” said the English author during an interview promoting Jack Reacher at a Manhattan hotel. “But I think 90 per cent of them are going to come out liking the movie.”
Based on the ninth novel in the Child series called One Shot, the film features Cruise as Reacher, who reluctantly accepts the case of an ex-military sharpshooter charged with killing five people for no apparent reason.
The pragmatic and antisocial Reacher is convinced the shooter is guilty but the defence lawyer (Rosamund Pike) persuades the hardas-nails sleuth to investigate.
As he unravels the mystery, he discovers a threat that’s a lot more dangerous than he expected.
Co-starring is Richard Jenkins, the district attorney and father of the defence lawyer, who has a few axes to grind. Robert Duvall plays Cash, a retired military man who, against his better judgment, assists Reacher. German director Werner Herzog shows up as the villain with an evil plan.
It’s a made-to-order action flick, but it still took a cautious Child seven years to get one of his books made into a movie.
Producer Don Granger finally offered the author a package he couldn’t resist; it included writerdirector Christopher McQuarrie and Cruise.
All three had collaborated on Valkyrie, the Second World War film about the failed attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler. McQuarrie had co-written and co-produced the film with Granger and Cruise had starred.
It made sense to Child that they should join forces to adapt the book into a movie; a difficult task since Reacher doesn’t have a character arc and most of his thoughts are internal.
The least of the novelist’s worries, apparently, was the difference in size between Cruise and Reacher. “It was necessary for the book,” he said, “but not necessary for the movie.”
That was the cue for McQuarrie, who won an Oscar for The Usual Suspects script, to plunge into shaping the screenplay with his friend Cruise in mind. Child was even OK with the fact that writer-director “had to shed about six-sevenths of the novel.”
McQuarrie leaned on Cruise, who is a co-producer of the project, when it came to casting. Indeed, a few studio folks were hesitant to hire Herzog as the bad guy because of his lack of acting experience, but Cruise encouraged the director to do what his instinct told him.
“Tom said, ‘It’s Werner Herzog, man, hire the guy,’” said McQuarrie who got approval after Cruise’s blessing.
The Mission: Impossible Alister also convinced the director to expand the car chase sequence in the film, which he begrudgingly agreed to do.
“Tom had a vision,” noted McQuarrie. “He said, ‘Tell me what you want to do, and we will do it.’”
That meant choreographing a much more elaborate chase sequence through the streets of Pittsburgh where they were shooting most of the movie.
With a nod to classic car chase scenes from Bullitt to The French Connection, McQuarrie said he tried to one-up those classic sequences by featuring his ace performer.
“When you have a guy who is a professional driver,” he said of Cruise, “he should be in every scene he can. We were constantly reinventing the car chase to show that (Cruise) was actually driving.”
On the acting front, Cruise is apparently just as obliging.
“Tom and I had such an easy chemistry that we didn’t have to work on it,” said Pike who plays the lawyer who doesn’t have all the answers until Reacher starts working for her.
Indeed, there’s an oppositesattract connection between them. “Reacher is the guy who walks into town and does things differently,” she said. “They are very different creatures.”
That was one of Child’s favourite aspects of the film; the Cruise and Pike bond. “It was very inspiring,” he said.
All things considered, the author is satisfied with all of the film results, and he’s hoping his fans will be happy as well.
“I always said, ‘Let’s make sure they are angry before they see the movie, not after they see it’.”