From Canoe:
Tom Cruise brings his razor-sharp focus to epic film role
By BRUCE KIRKLAND — Toronto Sun

HOLLYWOOD — Tom Cruise, arguably the world’s biggest movie star, defied conventional wisdom by doing most of his own stunts, as usual, on The Last Samurai.

“Obviously, you could have an accident,” Cruise says.

“But it’s fun, it’s fun. It adds to the movie, that level of realism. It was part of the challenge for me to be able to do it. And I was trained … and I got through it.”

The Last Samurai is an action-adventure epic set in 1875-76 during the Samurai Rebellion against the Emperor of Japan. Cruise plays an American mercenary hired to train the Emperor’s troops.

Cruise emerged unscathed despite nearly having his head lopped off by a Samurai sword wielded by co-star Hiroyuki Sanada in a scene for the Fog Battle.

That incident — reported in The Toronto Sun Nov. 18 — occurred when an animatronic horse failed to operate properly. It was supposed to pull Cruise’s head back when Sanada swung through that space seconds later. Cruise’s head didn’t move on one take. As the crew gasped and screamed, Sanada’s blade stopped an inch from Cruise’s exposed neck, arrested only by the master swordsman’s discipline and strength. Sanada started sweating. Cruise did not even blink. “You know, I was so scared,” Sanada said. “If I hit him, I cannot live any more.”

“A miracle!” Cruise says of avoiding injury. He actually sloughs off the near beheading, denying at first that it even happened. “Oh that!” he says when reminded by The Sun of the specific incident. “Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I trusted him. It was an inch. It wasn’t in my neck.”

Cruise says he was “more concerned about not hurting someone else” during the battle scenes, especially when wielding his sword on horseback — on real horses. “They weren’t razor sharp,” he says of the aluminum swords involved in the shoot, “but they could cut your finger off at the speeds that we were traveling. I just have to say, the guys that I was working with were excellent.”

That is also typical — that Cruise would minimize the danger to self and praise his co-stars and teams of stuntmen. Words such as irrepressible, joyous and boundlessly enthusiastic crop up when insiders talk about this 41-year-old superstar and his devotion to his work, to his family and to his life.

His approach is so all-consuming that cynics think it must be an act. He is an actor, after all, one with three Oscar nominations. Trouble is, at least for the cynics, it is impossible to find the lie, expose the man as a charlatan. Today, in a 61-minute press conference to promote The Last Samurai, the beaming Cruise maintains his public face without a moment’s lapse.

He even talks about “the inner peace” that has overtaken his life, despite his tumultuous divorce from Nicole Kidman, despite the hordes of paparazzi who dog his footsteps in his new love relationship with Spanish actress Penelope Cruz.

“It helps in all areas of my life,” Cruise says of the concept of inner peace, “as an actor, with my kids, with Penelope, with Nic, with my job. In all areas! When you’re happy, life is easier to deal with and it’s not less interesting. It’s definitely challenging and exciting. It is not just the success of a film that is the basis of my happiness, you know. It really is pleasure in my life, pleasure in my work, pleasure to do with my kids, with Penelope. It’s wonderful.”

What may make some people extremely uncomfortable is the source of the inner peace he describes. “I mean,” says Cruise, “it’s well known that I’m a Scientologist and that has helped me to find that inner peace in my life and it is something that has given me great stability and tools that I use. It is also something that has enabled me to help others in a way that I’ve always wanted to — (with) something substantial.”

In July, Cruise admitted openly he was “a functional illiterate” during his school years and he finally learned to read as an adult through an approach called study technology, which was developed by L. Ron Hubbard, founder of the Church of Scientology. Cruise was honoured this summer for his work with H.E.L.P., the Hollywood Education and Literacy Project.

That, too, is controversial because it is connected to, although not directly run by, the Church of Scientology. Cruise, however, never wavers about Scientology, defending what it has done for him, enthusing about what it has done to fight illiteracy and to help kids get off drugs.

Cruise never tackles anything in life without that gush of enthusiasm, so it is no surprise that he applies it equally to The Last Samurai. The Ed Zwick film, which was shot in Japan, New Zealand and California, is a fictional saga that takes place during a true historical event, the Samurai Rebellion of the 1870s.

The film is steeped in authentic detail and boasts a meticulous attention to cultural rituals and ancient traditions.

“I’ve been absolutely fascinated and in awe of Japanese culture,” Cruise says of his own approach. “It is an amazing culture and I’ve always been fascinated by it. One of the great things about being an actor, and what I do, is that I get to travel to all these places. I get to learn about the people and that is the most enjoyable thing for me, to learn the history of other people and how they live in their daily lives.

“Also, you find a common ground, even though the language is different and their culture is different. You find that common ground of joy, happiness, pain. It’s humanity. It really gives you the sense: ‘Oh, we’re all in this thing together here. We’ve got to help each other out.’ And I really enjoy that.”

Cruise spent a year intensely researching the world of The Last Samurai, including reading dozens of books on Japan as well as personal diaries of American soldiers who fought in the U.S. Civil War as well as the U.S. Indian Wars. His character in the film, Cpt. Nathan Algren, is a Civil War hero who is later disillusioned when the Indian Wars turn into a slaughter, a racist genocide. When Algren is first glimpsed in The Last Samurai, he is a drunken lout with a death wish. As the film progresses, Algren learns how to live an honourable life from the Samurai who hold him captive after the Fog Battle.

In addition to the extensive research, Cruise also learned to speak passable Japanese and bulked up his lean, five-foot-seven physique with 25 pounds of new muscle he has since shed. The time and effort was necessary, Cruise says.

“I put a lot of time into everything I do, interestingly enough,” Cruise says. “Rain Man and Born On The Fourth Of July were years in preparation. (But) this film is different in that it took me almost a year to physically be able to make this picture. If I do something, it’s going to be all the way. I didn’t know if I could do it, honestly, if I could find that kind of physical elegance and movement that the Samurai have.

“If I look at Hiro (Hiroyuki Sanada) and Ken (his mesmerizing, scene-stealing co-star Ken Watanabe), there’s a natural grace. It was a year of preparing, not only physically but developing the character because of the transition the character makes. It took that amount of time to prepare and I don’t make a film unless I feel I have that amount of time. Every film I do, there’s a lot of preparation, this one in particular.”

The Last Samurai also marks a departure of sorts for Cruise.

“I haven’t really found or made an epic film,” Cruise says of his past work (although Steven Spielberg might give him an argument on the epic scope of Minority Report). “And I knew what Ed (Zwick) was going for with the script and it was very ambitious on many levels. I loved working with Ed Zwick. He is a bright, sensitive artist.”

Cruise was pleased with Zwick’s “meticulous dedication to that history,” especially in depicting the Samurai and their famous Bushido code, which emphasizes honesty, justice, courtesy, courage, honour, compassion, sincerity, duty and loyalty.

“Those values are very important to me,” Cruise says.

“I look at the Samurai because they were the artists of their time. They were educated to be leaders, to actually help people. One of the things that struck me when I read the Bushido was compassion: ‘If there is no one there to help, then go out and find someone to help.’ That hit me because I try to lead my life like that. I think it’s important.”

Those values course like a river through The Last Samurai.

“This movie is going to take you to a different place at a different time,” Cruise says, “and it is authentic, even though the story is fiction. The time in which it takes place and the humanity of the picture is real. This is a romantic adventure and yet it does have content!”