Samurai...Secret Agent...Teenage Pimp...Handicapped German Colonel...Vampire...Navy Lawyer...Tomcat Pilot...Sports Agent...Crippled Marine...Race Car Driver...Bartender...oooohhh the list goes on and on. Mr. Tom Cruise is one hell of an actor; he has been about everything anyone could want to be and lots no one would want to be....on screen. Too bad he can't be a good husband and father...or maybe he can but just can't pick women who can adjust to his brand of "good husband and father"....
You know what else he can't be? Six-feet-five-inches tall. I mean, it isn't his fault that he is 5'7" tall (and I personally think that is fudging it a bit). He is fifty years old, is in remarkably great shape, and is a really great actor...but he isn't 6'5". Period. And it is probably not his fault that he keeps getting roles where his size requires a tweak or two with camera angles. He is not the first vertically challenged guy to be a popular movie star. Alan Ladd did kissing scenes standing on a box to hide his 5'8" stature. Mark Wahlberg at 5'8" was cast as Bob Lee Swagger, a tall, lanky, country boy who was a crack Marine Sniper. Sly Stallone at 5'9" is one of the most prolific hero-types in Hollywood. Jason Strahan is 5'9". Robert Conrad ( James West, Pappy Boyington, Tom Lopaka on Hawaiian Eye) is 5'9".
What happened? We used to have heroes we could look up to, really had to look up to....John Wayne at 6'4"...James Arness was 6'7"...The first Clint hero, Clint Walker was 6'6"...and the second Clint, Mr. Eastwood, is 6'2". There are still a few guys around Hollywood big enough to fill the roles of characters who have size as one of their foremost identifiers: Liam Neesom is 6'4"...David Morse is 6'4". Though a little long in the tooth nowdays, Tom Selleck is still 6'3"...and I am sure that there are lots of talented lesser-known actors in Hollywood who would do a great job of playing characters who are supposed to be TALL.
I know, size isn't the only Hollywood mis-match. When they decided to make a movie featuring the meanest, deadliest, government assassin ever, Hollywood turned Matt Helm into a comic buffoon. The sad part was that Dean Martin was a great match for the character if they had played it straight...sigh...Rod Taylor as Travis McGee...
Okay, I'll step down off the soapbox now...I am sure that short people who read this will be offended...but probably not as offended as Lee Child must be to find that Hollywood is bringing his 6'5", 250-pound free-spirit, ex-MP Major, wandering trouble- magnet Jack Reacher to the screen portrayed by none other than Tom Cruise. It will probably be a great action movie (I've read all of Child's Reacher stories) because that is the nature of the beast...both the Cruise beast and the Reacher beast. I'll go see it and pretend Tom is taller...the camera angles will help...maybe I'll sit 'way over to the side of the theater so everything will look tall and skinny.....
BFD