3. Jerry Maguire- It wasn't just a hit but it was a phenomenon, spinning off a Top 40 single for Bruce Springsteen, five Academy Awards nominations for the cast and crew, and Renee Zellweger's entire career.
As the sports agent who loses his high-paying job and finds himself in the process, Tom Cruise brought his million-dollar charisma to its logical conclusion.
It was a terrific entertainment.
4. A Few Good Men- Released in 1992 A Few Good Men allowed Cruise to flex his dramatic muscle. In this movie, Cruise plays a hotshot J.A.G. attorney named Daniel Kaffee.
Kaffee is paired with the overzealous investigator JoAnne Galloway (Demi Moore) to defend two Marines accused of murdering a fellow Corpsman, one who had apparently been prepared to blow the whistle on an international incident at Guantanamo Bay.
Pulling the strings of the increasingly dark conspiracy behind the killing is the virulent Colonel Nathan Jessup (Nicholson).Elements of Cruise's usual leading man persona were still in full force with this role.
5. Rain Man- Two years after sharing the screen with Paul Newman, Cruise lined up alongside another acting legend when he shared top billing with Dustin Hoffman in Barry Levinson's Rain Man.
Though the character of Charlie Babbitt sent Cruise on a by-now familiar path, the whole thing is pulled together with such perfectly lovely old-school filmmaking flair that audiences were powerless to resist.
6. Collateral- After so many years of playing good guys with great smiles, Tom Cruise started to get a little restless in the late '90s, taking risks by playing against type in films both well-received in Magnolia and Vanilla Sky.
It was Michael Mann's Collateral, though, that presented perhaps the most intriguing new facet of all: Cruise as unrepentant villain.
Collateral's power comes from Mann throwing Cruise together with Jamie Foxx and framing them against some of the most beautifully filmed nighttime shots of Los Angeles ever seen.
