“If he ever tires of wowing the world with action”: Here’s what Kenneth Branagh had to say about Tom Cruise’s versatility outside action genre

May Tom Cruise keep aging like a fine wine and giving us his top-notch performances in the days to come. For many, it's either Ethan Hunt from the Mission: Impossible films or Pete "Maverick" Mitchell from the two Top Gun movies, but there's more to his acting, and veteran actor Kenneth Branagh, whom 90s kids know as the fraudulent celebrity author Gilderoy Lockhart from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, believes this.

He was recently having a chat with The Times of London, where he made the following comment:

"If he ever tires of wowing the world with action, he’s going to surprise those who view him as only a movie star. What he’s done with Mission and Top Gun is unique — cinematic entertainment with a serious intent to give you a wonderful time at the movies. But he’s an underestimated actor — for whom a golden age of performance beckons."

Kenneth Branagh and Tom Cruise have worked together in 2008's Bryan Singer-directed film, Valkyrie where the former played the energetic Major General Henning von Tresckow and the latter, the humanist Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg. Cruise's portrayal of the character is just unparalleled.

What are some of the best Tom Cruise performances?

We will not take into account Mission: Impossible and Top Gun films; moviegoers should take a break from Cruise's characters in them. He has appeared in 40+ films to date, including Minority Report (2002), Edge of Tomorrow (2014), American Made (2017), and more.

Magnolia, the 1999 Oscar-nominated film which he appeared in a supporting role as Frank T.J. Mackey, should be here as that remains the last time his performance made it to the Academy's stage, though there's a lot to go, and we hope to see him up there again sometime.

Guns, militaries, and spies go hand in hand, and Tom Cruise is perfect in any of these themes; he is more into action sequences when doing these films. But when he played Lt. Daniel Kaffee in A Few Good Men (1992) opposite Jack Nicholson, he didn't hang on to planes or run as fast as he could.

It was more of a military court drama, and he may not handle the truth, but he was exceptional, better than Mission: Impossible or Top Gun. We can go on and on about this (we just pretend there isn't a reboot of The Mummy), and it may turn out to be a book, so we will avoid it.

This one performance of Tom Cruise is better than anything he has portrayed in films

"First, take a big step back... and literally, F*CK YOUR OWN FACE! I don't know what kind of pan-pacific bullsh*t power play you're trying to pull here, but Asia Jack is my territory. So whatever you're thinking, you'd better think again! Otherwise I'm gonna have to head down there and I will rain down an un-Godly f*cking firestorm upon you! You're gonna have to call the f*cking United Nations and get a f*cking binding resolution to keep me from f*cking destroying you. I'm talking scorched earth, motherf*cker! I will massacre you! I WILL F*CK YOU UP!"

That's gross, and that's Les Grossman, a character Tom Cruise played in the 2008 satirical action comedy, Tropic Thunder, starring Ben Stiller, Matthew McConaughey, Robert Downey Jr., Jack Black, and more. You should look at the expressions of those terrorists on whom he rains these wisdomful flowers.

Whoever's watching that film for the first time is surely going to rub their eyes and confirm, 'Did they just see Tom Cruise?' And when they realize that it's really him, that hairy bald guy will give them the laughs of their lives every time they think about it.

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Also Read: Tom Cruise's Mission: Impossible movies in order

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