Cruise's Last Stand

Rating: Null/10 (7 December 2003)

Cruise's Last Stand
Tom Cruise's performance as Captain Nathan Algren in "The Last Samurai" is one of his better roles. I especially liked the scenes where Algren drunkenly promotes new weaponry and shocks a genteel crowd with a few home truths about the butchery of war; where he finally focuses his thoughts and fights like a true samurai; and where he learns his first words in Japanese. I was also moved by the delicate, understated romance between Algren and Taka, the widow of a man he killed.
I have to admit that I didn't expect much from Cruise in "The Last Samurai".Yes, he has delivered solid performances in "Born on the Fourth of July" and "Magnolia". But he will probably forever be remembered for dancing in his underwear in "Risky Business". Like legions of moviegoers and movie critics, I plead guilty to dismissing Cruise as a pretty face, but not much of an actor.
But whatever you think of Cruise's acting ability, I think he displays courage and deserves respect for taking this role in this film at this juncture in American history. Cruise's character in "The Last Samurai" empathizes with a foreign people, the Japanese. He is sent to teach them the military techniques of the West. He ends up learning the ancient ways and fighting with them on the battlefield. He blames General Custer's arrogance and megalomania for the massacre of his troops at the Battle of Little Big Horn. He feels guilt for his government's treatment of native American Indians.
It is not difficult to see the parallels between the world of Nathan Algren and our own, in which the US government has deployed half the might of its military force and technology to impose its political will on the peoples of Afghanistan and Iraq. In "The Last Samurai", we see Tom Cruise, Edward Zwick and the Hollywood establishment's liberal-democratic response to the muscle-flexing and warmongering of the Bush administration.
You could say that Hollywood has deployed a Cruise missile of its own.