Paramount Pictures and Tom Cruise have parted company and it would seem the split is anything but amicable, with both sides claiming they instigated the parting. So who, if anyone, is telling the truth? Let’s have a look at the evidence.
Over the past year or so Cruise has come under fire from the media, for several reasons, most notably acting like a fool while professing his love for Katie Holmes on Oprah and being out spoken about the use of certain prescription drugs. This, Paramount have claimed, has affected his pulling power at the box office and caused them some embarrassment as well. While if can’t really be disputed that Cruise hasn’t done his public image a lot of good, just how much has if affected his star pulling power? Not a lot in my opinion. Lets remember we’re talking about Hollywood here, I don’t think a few red faces is going to put a major movie studio off, only money will do that. And in the embarrassment stakes Cruise definitely takes second place to Mel Gibson.
If you look at Paramount’s most successful films since the year 2001 that didn’t star Tom Cruise, you see an interesting pattern -
2001 Lara Croft: Tomb Raider No15
2002 The Sum Of All Fears No24
2003 How to Loose a Guy in 10 Days No29
2004 Lemony Snicket’s No18
2005 The Longest Yard No12
