Steven Spielberg praises Tom Cruise and Top Gun Maverick for saving Hollywood

• The Fabelmans and Top Gun: Maverick, produced by both Spielberg and Cruise, are competing for the Best Picture award.
• Maverick earned $1.48 billion, making it the fifth-highest-grossing domestic movie of all time.
• Maverick from Top Gun was a classic word-of-mouth success.

At this year’s Academy Award Nominees Luncheon, two of Hollywood’s most well-known figures reunited, with Tom Cruise and Steven Spielberg producing an emotional and exhilarating viral moment.

Spielberg lauded Cruise for protecting something else equally important—the theatre experience—after Cruise assisted in saving the entire planet in War of the Worlds. This year, The Fabelmans and Top Gun: Maverick, produced by both Spielberg and Cruise, are competing for the Best Picture award.

Spielberg and Cruise were seen hugging in a video posted on Instagram by director Kartiki Gonsalves, whose film Who Can Say No to Baby Elephants! is up for the Best Documentary Short Film award. Spielberg is heard telling Cruise that he “saved Hollywood’s ass and you might have saved theatrical distribution.” On a serious note, “Top Gun: Maverick” may have saved the entire theatre sector.

After Spider-Man: No Way Home, Maverick was the only movie released after the epidemic to gross more than $1 billion globally. Maverick earned $1.48 billion, making it the fifth-highest-grossing domestic movie of all time and the 11th-highest-grossing movie in history overall. Maverick from Top Gun was a classic word-of-mouth success.

Maverick’s accomplishment was truly unexpected and almost unheard of. It was the follow-up to a 1986 film that was at best a cult classic and was known as much for its campiness and beach volleyball scenes as it was for its aerial scenes. It was a true word-of-mouth hit, much like Titanic had been before it, and it topped the box office charts for months after its release. Repeat watching was crucial to the success of the film for its distributor, Paramount. By the fourth weekend of the movie’s run in North American theatres, 16% of the audience had gone back to watch it at least once again, with 4% watching it three or more times.

The movie was very well received by critics; it was rated one of the top ten movies of 2022 by the American Film Institute and won Best Film from the National Board of Review. The movie received a total of six Academy Award nominations, including the one for Best Picture, and it earned $1.489 billion worldwide, making it Cruise’s highest-grossing movie to date.

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