Operation Valkyrie: FOX News Piles On Tom Cruise, Scientology - Page 3
It also begs the question about Cruise’s career agenda as it stands now. Beyond "Valkyrie," he’s filmed a cameo in Ben Stiller’s "Tropic Thunder" wearing a fat suit. A preview of the film received a tepid response at aintitcoolnews.com — it’s a movie within a movie, always a bad concept as inside jokes go for the general audience.
He’s also attached to a comedy called "Men" to be directed by the less-than-elegant Todd Phillips (“Old School,†“Starsky and Hutchâ€). With yet another ill-conceived Ben Stiller project festering — “The Hardy Men†— it’s clear someone has decided this is Tom Cruise’s future. It’s paralyzing to think someone may have plotted this for him.
And it’s not like Cruise will find a lot of support at Paramount for his insta-return. Sources say that while the new folks running the studio would like to revive “Mission: Impossible,†they’ve been thinking more of a new young star, or an "M:I" team the way it was originally portrayed in the TV series.
“Would I like to do Mission: Impossibleâ€? asked one Paramount exec rhetorically. “Yes, but not starring Tom Cruise.â€
It's hard to know if Tom Cruise has burned through his goodwill with the public. At the end of the day, Cruise is a really talented actor, who is versatile and passionate. He also is associated with a faith most consider a cult run by corrupt and greedy individuals, who Cruise just so happens to be BFF with. It's not so much that Cruise isn't appealing to women, he isn't appealing to free-thinking individuals. As religiously influenced as we are here in the U.S., we are also fiercely independent when it comes to having the right to decide which faith best suits us. Using one's celebrity status to promote their faith offends not only our most basic instincts, it's a violation of who we are as a culture.
Scientology and Cruise really overestimated their appeal. It's not that people are against Tom Cruise, they're against the cheerful fascism of his belief system. Let's face it, fascism isn't cheerful.
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