You shouldn’t wait till the Edge of Tomorrow to see this film. See it on the brink of today.
And let’s discontinue the Scientology jokes, shall we?
Tom Cruise not only chooses again and again self-deprecating characters (think his rotund balding exec from Tropic Thunder to the frightened military officer in this film), but delivers each performance with sincerity.
As for his public persona, Tom Cruise has learned not to jump on couches declaring his love for a woman or proselytize his patriarchal views as he did with Today Show’s Matt Lauer years ago. He’s left the ring as media’s punching bag. If anything, his silence almost admits that he either is: a. is what people have said, a bit of a controlling religious zealot or b. that he has taken Polonius’s advice in ‘to thine own self be true’ and be darned with the rest of ya.
Emily Blunt’s been great in everything, from wonderfully wounded in Her Sister’s Sister, to glowing scarecrow in the corn of Salmon Fishing in Yemen to a believable Linda Hamiltonesque action hero in Edge of Tomorrow.
Edge’s story is the perfect metaphor for life; that we wake each morn to die another day. That we take our punches and become smarter and stronger . We battle rejection, cancer, divorce. We keep on trying until the demons have been slayed. That we learn to keep our mouths shut on opinions and simply lead our lives using our own genuine compass.
The best gift films give us is the empowerment that lingers well after you leave the theater. After Edge of Tomorrow, my grip on the steering wheel was more confident, the turns and traffic feeling like an alien easily conquered. And I’ll wake up tomorrow knowing I can face another work week.