Adventure Cruise

In the movie Interview With The Vampire, two of the most popular and sexiest actors – international superstar Tom Cruise, and A-list hunk Brad Pitt – figured in a scene where Cruise sucked the blood of Pitt. Ten years later, the two over-40 actors still ooze with sex appeal. Their movies showcase their well-toned bodies and supreme power, Pitt in the mega-hit Troy and Cruise in Last Samurai and the current Collateral.

Born Thomas Cruise Mapother IV on July 3, 1962 in Syracuse, New York, he grew up as an only son with four sisters. He moved from city to city (about 15 times while growing up) as his mother took odd jobs to singlehandedly raise her kids. He was active and loved sports, competing as a wrestler in high school until a knee injury sidelined him. That was when he tried his hand at acting.

Pilates is the exercise of choice for even certified Hollywood hunks like Tom Cruise. It is said that Cruise actually flies instructor Paige Seafert with him everywhere he goes.

He also trains with Bob Fol who, with his wife Donna, has 25 years of elite Hollywood training experience. The couple promotes the philosophy of helping people build happy and healthy lifestyles. Among their stellar clients, aside from Cruise, are Michael Keaton, Shaquille O’Neal, Sting and Nicole Kidman. As Michael Keaton endorsed, "The absolute best, most professional private trainer in Hollywood? No question, it’s Bob Fol."

Big-budget films include Fol for on-location training. He has joined the production of Mission Impossible 2, Jerry Maguire, The Firm, Blind Fury, Batman Forever and Hard Rain, among many others.

Good Even When Bad

In Collateral, directed by Michael Mann, he is Vincent, a contract killer hired by a narcotics gang to eliminate some key witnesses who are about to testify before a federal grand jury. He had a list of five to kill in one night. Max, the hapless Los Angeles cab driver, played by Jamie Foxx, became the collateral or "an expendable person in the wrong place at the wrong time." Vincent forced Max to drive him to each assigned destination through the night from 6 p.m. until around 4 a.m. As the LAPD and FBI race to intercept them, their survival becomes intertwined.

Cruise was de-glamorized in the movie. He sports steel gray hair and a salt-and-pepper stubbled face that surprisingly does not actually lessen his charm. "I don’t really concern myself with whether I look good or bad. I go in and ask ‘What do we need for this character?’ and I go for that," says Cruise.

"I wanted the character to look very different from Tom Cruise, to rough up the surface appearance and give him a certain anonymity," Mann affirms. "It was also in the wardrobe, which was very important because Vincent is in the same suit throughout the movie. It looks like very expensive custom tailoring, but not done in the United States or even Europe – like it’s the best custom tailoring money can buy in a place like Kowloon, so it has a certain foreign element to it."

In real life, Cruise is known for being casual. "I’m a T-shirt and jeans guy. Occasionally, I’ll throw a suit on and it might be from one of my movies. I grab things from (the) wardrobe if I can. But normally in the day, you’ll see me in sweatpants or jeans and sneakers. I like to take the kids to Gap," he says.

"We spent months prior to filming building Vincent into a very dynamic, very tangible character, none of which is discussed specifically within the context of the movie," reveals Mann. "But it is there in everything that Vincent does. There’s not a reaction, an attitude, or a line of dialogue that doesn’t connect back to the part of Vincent that predates tonight, when the story begins. Through various bits and pieces, we get the sense that something is going on inside of this character. There are tectonic plates shifting deep down in the core of this person."

Adventure Hunter

Cruise is certainly not risk-averse. He loves doing the stunts himself – risky action moves that producers would rather let stuntmen do. This love for risks started from his youth. Cruise explains, "I was about three or four when I got this G.I. Joe toy that when you threw it up, it would sail down with a little parachute. I just wanted to try it myself. So I tore the sheets off my bed, wrapped them around me, and jumped from the garage roof. I knocked myself out. I lay there looking at the stars."

"Years later, we were living in Canada," he adds. "It was midwinter and there was a big snow bank in front of our house. So I decided I’d do a flip right into the middle of it. I did this great flip, a perfect flip, but I missed the snow bank and came down on concrete sidewalk. That was the first time I broke my foot."

Now that he is a dad, he had to accept that his son is of the same spirit. He says, "I watch him and remember what I did. I understand what he’s going for, but I say, ‘Connor, that jump was really good. But I do stunts in my movies and I’m going to show you how to do it safely.’ I just try to have the same patience that my mother had with me. She never made me afraid of life. Whatever tree I was climbing, Mom never said, ‘Oh my God, be careful, you’re going to die.’"

Cruise has had his share of nearly fatal stunts. While filming Last Samurai in New Zealand, only one inch separated his neck from a fatal samurai sword. The mechanical horse Cruise was on didn’t swerve as rehearsed, so co-star Hiroyuki Sanada almost struck the neck of this $25-million-per-movie superstar.

Never leaving anything to chance and always giving more than 100 percent of himself, Cruise prepared for a year for his Last Samurai role. "I put on 25 pounds. The sword, the greatest sword ever forged in the world, is a real workout. The thing that takes the strength is the balance. I was determined that I would be at ease enough that it wouldn’t look rehearsed," enthuses Cruise.

Sanada says of Cruise, "He was a quick learner. He improved every day, and he never stopped. He had already been training for eight months when I began working with him, but he still had a few moves that looked Western. I worked with him on that. If my sword had gone an inch further, it would, yes, have been fatal. The samurai sword is not particularly sharp, but its power is in the great speed with which it is wielded. I was scared, I don’t mind telling you. He didn’t seem to be, but he’s that type person. He wouldn’t show it. He’s a perfectionist. He’ll insist on up to 27 takes to get it right."

"I don’t know how to go about anything 50 percent or 90 percent of the way," he says. "It has to be 100 percent. I’m tough on myself. I know that, but I still have the spirit of play. I still remember when I had no money and I thought each job would be my last. I still feel that way, today, but I know, at least, that I have a next job. That’s a good feeling. I’m having a blast."

He was already filming Collateral when Samurai hit the big screen. Cruise went through intense training for Samurai. He confessed that before filming Samurai, "I couldn’t touch my toes when I started working out. I couldn’t get my hands past my knees." From a fitness level unworthy of a Samurai warrior, Cruise worked out hard to bulk up.

He says, "You think 50 pounds of armor, it doesn’t seem much. But when you start lowering your center of gravity and bending your knees, it’s a tremendous amount of pressure on the knees, the groin, and the hamstrings."

Cruise fell in love with Japanese craftsmanship, especially the Samurai sword. "I think when you study the sword, that is the greatest sword ever made in the history of this world. The art of it. It is both a powerful weapon, yet it’s aesthetically superb. The balance, the engineering. They didn’t have thermodynamics then, so when they were forging it, they’d hold (the sword) up to the rising sun or the setting sun, for temperature. And they knew at that point that it was ready to pound, and they’d fold it over and over and over again."

He also found inspiration in the Bushido, the Code of the Samurai. "I look at the Samurai, they were the artists of their time. They were educated. They were educated to be leaders and to actually help people. One of the things that struck me when I read Bushido was compassion, that to go out and if you can’t find someone to help, if there’s no one there to help, go out and find someone to help. That, that hit me because I try to lead my life like that. I think it’s important. Helping someone and seeing them do better in life is the most gratifying thing in the world."

Cruise normally arrived on the set two hours in advance of the other cast and crew to hone his physical skills. His dedication paid off. He got to perform all of his own stunts. Cruise’s appetite for adventure was fully satiated in this film. He had several nights of double-sword fighting against multiple opponents, five days and one night of fending off murderous Ninja intruders, weeks of martial arts drills opposite his Japanese co-stars and finally two months of relentless battle sequences.

It is very clear why Tom Cruise is still a top gun in Hollywood even when there are so many younger, taller and more good-looking stars around. Cruise is fired by his passion for his craft – if he can’t give 100 percent of himself, he’d rather not do the job at all. The same can be said about his fitness philosophy. Ask.Men listed as its favorite quote from the actor one that summarizes the life philosophy and work ethics of Tom Cruise: "I’m going to work my ass off and do whatever it takes – blood, sweat and tears."

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