Another Tom Cruise fan service, with aspirations for more

Rating: 6/10 (2 September 2017)

"Forrest Gump" flying high: meet the man who was too dumb to settle for an ordinary life like almost everybody else. Tom Cruise's latest is based on the amazing life of Barry Seal, the daredevil pilot who worked for the CIA, the White House AND a powerful drug cartel at the same time. Also appearing: April Billingsley, Domhnall Gleeson, Caleb Landry Jones, Alejandro Edda. Directed by Doug Lima, known for a number of action movies, including Go" (1999), The Bourne Identity", and Mr. and Mrs. Smith". He's, however, much less known for serious" movies, which he also likes to do occasionally. Let's hope "American Made" will be his game-changer, because most of the personality it has owes thanks to Liman's work as director, mixing so-called period piece (the last half of 1970's and the first half of 80's) with his shaky-cam and cameras-up-close approach plus breathless editing first introduced in The Bourne Identity". It's not a style everybody likes but it manages to give the result its very own unique vibe – and it's also compatible with the whirlwind kind of life mr Seal seemed to prefer. Everything else here is less inspired. I mean, it works fine but, essentially, we are watching the same "rags to riches to rags again" type of American success story that we've served countless times over the last 30 years since Oliver Stone's Wall Street" made it popular. To be exact, the 114 minute movie is eventful, but story-wise we get only this often-copied blueprint and little else. The actors are certainly competent but there are no interesting characters to root for. Caleb Landry Jones is always cool, of course, but he has such a small role. Cruise is, of course, too much of a big star to really go into his character. He doesn't vanish in his protagonist such as, for example, Matthew McConaughey in "Gold" (another this year's movie about great adventurer which has copied "Wall Street" formula). His version of this unique man is still the same Cruise persona we've known for ages, only this time less ass-kicking and million- dollar-smile flashing because he plays a common man. Of course, Cruise still has a lot of charisma, but he turns "American Made" into just another Cruise project – based on good idea, lots of stuff going down, screenplay and characters are not intriguing. Often, this equation can work out quite well, especially in action- oriented movies. The other times, such as in American Made", I want to enjoy the result more than I actually did. Still, it's probably a better movie than this long-planned Top Gun" sequel they're still developing for Cruise.