Photo Credit: Tom Cruise/Facebook
Tom Cruise has been in over 50 films in his life dating back to Endless Love in ’81 with a career that seemed to have peaked at around 2005. But it took around 40 years into his career for him to have his biggest opening week with his new film Top Gun: Maverick. The sequel to his 1986 role as navy pilot Pete “Maverick” Mitchell brought in $124 million in weekend ticket sales. Worldwide that figure rises to $248 million.
Chris Aronson, Paramount’s president of domestic distribution said “These results are ridiculously, over-the-top fantastic. I’m happy for everyone. I’m happy for the company, for Tom, for the filmmakers.” Becca Monahan, commercial director of the Official Charts Company said it was “fantastic to see Tom Cruise back in the skies again after 36 years. That the original Top Gun has made history by getting to number one on the Official Film Chart and that many of those sales were digital downloads is a great achievement,” she noted.
His last big opening weekend was War of the Worlds in 2005 which brought in $64 million. It’s also the 4th biggest opening of a film in the COVID-era behind Spider-Man: No Way Home, second-placed Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and then The Batman.
Variety’s Peter Debruge described the film as a “barrier-breaking sequel.” The Independent called it “as thrilling as blockbusters get”, praising it as a “true legacy sequel.” The Telegraph called it “absurdly exciting” and “unquestionably the best studio action film in years.”
A 15 year Memorial Day viewing record was broken with this film as well as an A+ rankingo n CinemaScore and surprisingly has an older audience with 55% of those who viewed it being over 35.
Cruise is a clear example that it’s never too late or impossible to make a comeback as evidenced here with it being a mere few weeks before his 60th birthday.
