For over thirty-five years, Tom Cruise has been responsible for ringing cash registers. His role as the young and rebellious jet pilot Pete Mitchell in Top Gun (1986) made him an idol. Many a teenage room was covered with his posters. The fans of that time now have teenagers of their own, but Cruise is unabatedly popular.
High hopes for Cruise
Perhaps not so much as a sex symbol, but as an action hero. Cruise has continued to attract large audiences to the cinema in recent years with his portrayal of Jack Reacher and the successful Mission Impossible series. And now there’s Top Gun: Maverick, in which his character Pete still flies jets and guides a new batch of pilots on a grueling mission.
Rink Klaassen, programmer at Kinepolis cinema chain, thinks Cruise will score well this time as well. “I expect Top Gun: Maverick to end up in the top five of 2022 in terms of visitor numbers.” The presale has already started and it shows that people are looking forward to the film. “It’s going well,” says Klaassen.
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Cruise will receive a fixed salary of $ 13 million for the film, but also a part of the proceeds, so that amount can rise considerably. Age does not matter for his salary. This is indeed the case for women, according to a research to the salaries of Hollywood stars.
Salary of actresses drops after their 34th birthday
Actresses see their salary increase until they are 34 years old. Then it goes back down quickly. While the salary of their male colleagues only peaks when they are 51 years old and then remains stable. Like with Tom Cruise.
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Cruise, who still likes to perform his own stunts, is, according to Klaassen, at ‘lonely high’ when it comes to actors over fifty who wear a film and thus get a large audience into the cinema. “It’s always a combination of factors that determines whether a movie attracts a lot of visitors. There are certainly more older actors who score well, but they are often part of a larger cast,” he explains.
Over-50s in successful film series
Like 54-year-old Vin Diesel in the Fast & Furious series. “His teammates and the chases in fast cars are at least as important as him,” says Klaassen.
The same goes for 73-year-old Samuel L. Jackson and 57-year-old Robert Downey Jr. who are high in the list of actors who earn the most money because of their roles in the Marvel films. Those superhero movies have indeed broken many records – Avengers: Endgame brought $2.8 billion on. But the audience came for the whole, not just for them.
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Other ‘old’ actors score on their own, but they are almost always men. For example, fifty-year-old Dwayne Johnson is one of the highest paid actors of the moment. According to Forbes the muscle bundle per film can ask 20 million dollars.
Then you also have Brad Pitt, Mark Wahlberg, George Clooney, Tom Hanks, Matt Damon, Will Smith and Keanu Reeves. But when it comes to actresses, the list is shorter. “The ladies do much less well, measured in terms of visitor numbers for a supporting role,” says Klaassen.
Women should be beautiful
Meryl Streep, Sandra Bullock, Jennifer Aniston and Nicole Kidman are some examples of successful over-50s, but the films they star in are not the action-packed hitchhikers that rake in the big bucks.
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“Men are often cast for tough things like fighting, shooting and racing, and that kind of action has a certain appeal,” says Klaassen. Here and there some women participate in the action, but they are generally much younger and are mainly used to be beautiful. The Bond girls in the 007 movies are the ultimate example of this.
Once the first wrinkles come, most actresses are written off. “It’s part of a bigger problem,” says Sander Heithuis, imaging editor at WOMEN Inc† “Women are less visible in the media. In films and series, but also at the table at talk shows. Only a quarter of the experts who speak there are women.”
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This underrepresentation is not the only problem. Women are also portrayed differently than men. “It’s much more about their appearance than it is a factor with men. Not only in the film world, but also in politics and on the street. It plays everywhere,” says Heithuis.
Sexist beauty ideal
So when the first wrinkles and gravity start to take its toll, that’s something for actresses to be immediately judged on. “Then women no longer meet the sexist ideal of beauty and their expiration date is approaching.”
According to Heithuis, this is because most films and series are still made from a heterosexual, male perspective. “From that perspective, women are expected to be young and sexy. Once they can no longer live up to that standard, they disappear from the picture.”
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That’s not to say there isn’t age discrimination for men. Someone like Tom Cruise also has to do his very best to stay fit, but it plays less of a role than with his female colleagues.
Breasts and buttocks in tight clothes
“That’s because with women, their appearance is much more often a function in the film. Different than with men,” explains Heithuis. In other words, women are the sexy sweeties, in tight clothes that emphasize their breasts and buttocks. But the real action is performed by men.
Still, progress is visible, says Heithuis. “If you look at what on-demand services like Netflix offer, I see that there is more and more attention to diversity and that stereotypes are being combated.”
New generation doesn’t want stereotypes
That has an effect on the new generation of viewers. “They will drop out if filmmakers portray their characters in a very stereotypical way, so the big film studios have to change and that is happening slowly.”
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Meanwhile, Tom Cruise is still smiling broadly in his jet fighter. Top Gun: Maverick will make him many millions. Klaassen is going to watch the film with his teenage sons. “They have no idea who Tom Cruise is and they don’t really care. They really want to see jets fly.”
Would the guys like to see these kinds of action movies with more women in the lead? “Yes, I certainly think so. As long as the action is ‘fat’ and the story not too predictable.”
Top Gun: Maverick hits theaters May 26.
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