"WHO'S CRAZIER: VIACOM OR TOM CRUISE?"

Excellent column by Nikki Finke: WHO'S CRAZIER; VIACOM OR TOM CRUISE? I was just about to write, literally, the very same thing here but Finke has done it sooner than I was able and far more effectively -- I know I'd have tried to explain a bit more and be nice here and there, but Nikke Finke just says it as it lays: an excellent column.

...Meanwhile, everyone inside Paramount was diving for cover after Redstone's remarks hit the wires, referring reporters to Viacom's mealy mouthpiece Carl Folta. Studio chief Brad Grey, always the most politic mogul as well as the smallest, is now a eunuch, too, because his geriatric jerk of a boss cut off his balls to cut down Tom Terrible.

C'mon, fire the grinning actor idiot because he's lost his box office appeal, or because his first dollar gross is so disgustingly huge that no studio has a prayer any more of making money on his motion pictures, or because of any other business reason. And fire him in the usual Hollywood way: with a bland-but-dignified press release about how much these 14 years have meant to both parties, ad nauseum. But, jeez, don't fire him with this lame stuff that Sumner didn't like the way Tiny Tom behaved. If that's true, then no Hollywood studio can ever hire anyone. Drugs, sex, harrassment, mendacity, fraud: Paramount like most major studios has a rich history of horrible behavior by its work-for-hires. I could reel off for you 10 people now with rich studio deals, some at Paramount, who should be in jail or rehab or the Funny Farm but instead are well-paid miscreants.

Far be it from me to judge whether Cruise belongs in a straitjacket or not, or whether Scientology is a cult or a religion, or whether he's gay or not, or whether MI3 would have done a lot more business in theaters if another big star had been the lead. But it's absurd for Redstone to make an issue of Cruise's conduct like he has. My god, Sumner himself was openly shtupping one of his producer girlfriends on the lot for years, and his own son is suing him. And Redstone looked the other way when Les Moonves carried on a long adulterous affair with employee Julie Chen and then married her after dumping his wife in the process. Which are all violations of so many corporate codes of conduct that I don't think I can count that high. And let's not forget how the old guy's studio is still in business with Robert Evans who not only was a hopeless cocaine addict and regular client of Heidi Fleiss's prostitution call girl ring for years but pled the Fifth Amendment in connection with a murder rap no less. And let's not forget that Redstone didn't blink when Brad Grey's name surfaced in that Anthony Pellicano (the thug P.I.) mess. So lemme get this straight: Cruise's jumping around on Oprah's couch is worse?

The only edits I'd offer to Nikke Finke's column would be that the number of "10" was upped to "100" ("...I could reel off for you 10 people now with rich studio deals, some at Paramount, who should be in jail or rehab or the Funny Farm but instead are well-paid miscreants..").

It's obvious that Sumner Redstone is attempting some leverage-toward-something-vaguely-resembling-morality here in his "announcement" (severance of Tom Cruise from his first-look deal at Paramount), but the attempt falls oddly foul because of Redstone's specific, rotundly needless language used.

No, not needless, it's inappropriateness -- Sumner Redstone declaring behavior "inappropriate" sounds like a busy-busy clipper artist declaring a head of hair offensively useful: it's a matter of perspective and to people such as Redstone (and Redstone specifically), his digging of Cruise is oddly missile-like. Sever the relationship, discontinue business but the launching of terms-as-arms from Redstone bespeaks of other motive.

I wondered what the tension was when I viewed the filmclip of the Spielberg award acceptance in Chicago from earlier this summer -- Tom Cruise appeared unannounced on stage to join Spielberg and then proceeded to use the available time and stage appearance to monopolize the moment (even if he was speaking about Spielberg).

Although the moment was supposed to be about the Lifetime Achievement Award bestowed upon Steven Spielberg (who has recently relocated his filmworks relationship to Paramount) in the 42nd Chicago International Film Festival's Summer Gala 2006, the award ceremony was quickly reworked in a moment's time to one about Cruise when Tom Cruise appeared unannounced on stage to join Spielberg, and then Cruise proceeded to occupy the ceremony moment while Spielberg stood mostly silently to the side of the podium.

Spielberg displayed a rigid body language, an unusual tenseness that indicated unvocalized disapproval despite what Spielberg ebulliently said over and over again: "I can't believe you're here. I can't believe you're here..." What else could he say, to state the obvious.

If I'm wrong about this interpretation of that stage moment, then let it be, but I'm relatively adept at reading body language -- human and otherwise, and Spielberg looked unusually restrained during Cruise's monopolization and use of what should have been a Spielberg award moment. It wasn't an award appearance so much as it was a monopolization moment by Cruise and Spielberg's body language revealed that he got that -- he indicated by his body language that he had something to say other than what he was saying and that is almost always a non-verbal statement of counter-motive or counter-purpose or even opposition to whomever else is present, and/or, what they're representing.

My last comment here is that if anyone wants to lay blame for box-office failure upon anyone or anything else for the "Cruise film" (his starring role in Spielberg's rendition of), WAR OF THE WORLDS, blame Dakota Fanning's ongoing screeching throughout the film, blame the director for including it, blame the editor for allowing the director to include it, and blame the remarkable absence of worthwhile dialogue in the film by screenplay but by directorial admission of that (WAR OF THE WORLDS was among the few titles that are mentioned as to Cruise's "declining box-office appeal" by Paramount/Redstone).

However, from my perspective as audience, I am relatively pleased with Tom Cruise's work, in that film and especially in VANILLA SKY and MINORITY REPORT. Spielberg's best film work, in my view, was ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: AI.

WAR OF THE WORLDS is ruined by Dakota Fanning's frequent, shrill screaming (and shrill performance without much depth other than hysteria), the absence of any interesting and/or significant dialogue, the multitude of baseless "Jesus (this)" and "Jesus (that)" and "holy sh**s" and "God****its" in frequent measure without reference to much of anything other than absence of anything else being said of any worth, and, that the film was remade at all -- the original (THE WAR OF THE WORLDS) is far finer, save but for wondrous, more sophisticated mechanical renditions in the remake, and if there was any remake or spinoff or redo to be made, the first original film and the story by H.G. Wells from whence it was made deserve something of very great filmed substance -- the Spielberg version failed because it wasn't a good movie, lacked anything additional in the theatrical other than special effects marvel. But to blame Cruise for that film's failure to launch is unrealistic.

And about MISSION IMPOSSIBLE III, the franchise was exhausted, finished, complete with the second one -- either that or there was never anything enticing enough in the spin about the third edition that generated much box-office interest. Same thing has happened with Harrison Ford-starring films, to name just one other 'big' star and films that fail to launch. Usually the failure's due to the film itself, other aspects to and about a film, and not the star or stars involved. In fact, that's nearly always the case.

As to Paramount and Sumner Redstone, if and as they are experiencing problems, let them self examine. That's the best place to start.

Reference:

TOPIX News: Tom Cruise

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