With Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One making a respectable showing at the worldwide box office (and a second half still to come) Tom Cruise has reasserted himself as one of the most bankable stars in Hollywood today. The new spy thriller joins the many other massive hits in Cruise's celebrated acting career.
Thanks to popular hits like the Top Gun movies and well-regarded franchises like Mission: Impossible, Tom Cruise knows how to turn a film into a financial success. According to Box Office Mojo, several of his films have been particularly successful, earning incredible profits at the worldwide box office.
Updated on January 11, 2025 by Robert Vaux: Tom Cruise has been the definition of box office hits for a long time, actively contributing to the film industry not only as a formidable poster boy but also as a talented professional who's done everything in his power to bring people to the movie theaters. This list was updated to discuss a few more of his successful movies and to reflect CBR's current formatting standards.
25 Vanilla Sky Takes a Plunge into the Surreal
It May Be Cruise's Weirdest Film

Few movies in Cruise's canon are as out-there as Vanilla Sky a psychological sci-fi story based on the 1997 Spanish-language movie Open Your Eyes. The actor plays a wealthy playboy disfigured in an accident, who slowly returns to mental and physical health after a long healing process. As his journey continues, events suggest that the reality he is experiencing may not be the true one.
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The film adopts the structure of a mystery, wrapped in the circumstances of Cruise's character after the car crash, and revealing itself slowly over time. It performed reasonably well at the box office, but was met with mixed reviews. It can be a challenge working through Vanilla Sky's twists, and the ending doesn't work for everyone, but it merits attention for sheer novelty value, and for its earnest efforts to do something different.

Vanilla Sky
Thriller
Sci-Fi
- Director
- Cameron Crowe
- Release Date
- December 14, 2001
24 Jack Reacher Delivered the First Adaptation of the Character
Cruise's Two Films Appeared Before the Alan Ritchson Show

Jack Reacher is the creation of novelist Lee Child, who has written well over two dozen books chronicling the character's adventures. He's essentially a wandering do-gooder, a former military policeman with an impressive intellect and an array of combat skills who lives off the grid. He wanders from place to place, being paid in cash and using inconspicuous means of travel such as buses. It gives him both a unique perspective and a singular way of taking on criminals.
Cruise delivered a pair of big-screen adaptations alongside his collaborator Christopher McQuarrie, which helped set the stage for the hit series starring Alan Ritchson. The first was the more successful of the two, based on the novel One Shot and setting Reacher against a military sniper suspected in a mass shooting. Cruise is in fine form, and plays up the character's perceptive intelligence. It's a more grounded thriller for fans interested in something different from the more exotic adventures of the Mission: Impossible films.

Jack Reacher
PG-13
Action
Thriller
A homicide investigator digs deeper into a case involving a trained military sniper responsible for a mass shooting.
- Director
- Christopher McQuarrie
- Release Date
- December 21, 2012
23 Collateral Finds Cruise Playing a Hitman
The Actor Has Never Been More Sinister
Heroes will always be Cruise's bread and butter, thanks to the Mission: Impossible movies and similar efforts like Top Gun. His less frequent forays into villainy, however, tend to produce some of his most interesting performances, as his boyish charm turns dark, and a movie star's confidence gives way to manipulation. Most such characters in his canon are merely flawed or creepy, but his hitman Vincent from Michael Mann's thriller Collateral may be the most thoroughly evil.
The film takes place over the course of a single night, as Vincent commandeers Jamie Foxx's cabbie to drive him around Los Angeles committing a series of assassinations. Things veer off course when the reluctant driver takes things into his own hands, but Cruise's detached, clinical killer always seems to be one step ahead of him. Besides another strong performance from Cruise, it's also one of the best films in Mann's canon.

Collateral
R
Crime
Documentary
Drama
Thriller
A cab driver finds himself the hostage of an engaging contract killer as he makes his rounds from hit to hit during one night in Los Angeles.
- Director
- Michael Mann
- Release Date
- August 6, 2004
22 Interview with the Vampire Is a Classic Adaptation
Before the TV Series, Cruise Was a Compelling Lestat

Cruise was largely known as a leading man when he was cast as the vampire Lestat in the 1994 film adaptation of Anne Rice's classic novel Interview with the Vampire. It caused quite a controversy at the time, particularly when Rice herself opined that the casting choice was a dreadful mistake. She reversed course when she saw the film, and time has shown it for one of the strongest performances in Cruise's career. As Lestat, he's presumptuous, entitled, and almost effortlessly manipulative, but also supremely compelling.
The rest of the movie more than keeps pace. Jordan establishes a gorgeous haunted atmosphere for both New Orleans and Paris, where Brad Pitt's Louis travels in search of answers to his vampiric nature. The standout cast includes a young Antonio Banderas, Christian Slater, and Kirsten Dunst in a stunning debut as the child vampire Claudia. At the end of the day, however, the film rises and falls with Cruise's Lestat, the centerpiece of Rice's universe and a strangely perfect choice for the actor.

Interview with the Vampire
R
Drama
Horror
A vampire tells his epic life story: love, betrayal, loneliness, and hunger.
- Director
- Neil Jordan
- Release Date
- November 11, 1994
21 A Few Good Men Is a Star-Studded Courtroom Drama
Rob Reiner Directs a Cast for the Ages

Cruise is just one of the A-list cast members in Rob Reiner's A Few Good Men, a military courtroom drama based on a stage play by Aaron Sorkin. Jack Nicholson earned an Oscar nomination for his performances as a decorated Colonel suspected of interference in a murder investigation involving two troops on his base. Kevin Bacon co-stars as the prosecuting attorney, with Cruise's hustling lawyer serving as defense for the two accused soldiers. Demi Moore, Kevin Pollack and Kiefer Sutherland round out the cast, all giving career-best performances.
The drama works extremely well, combining sharp dialogue with a superb example of a courtroom thriller. Beneath lies an interesting legal dilemma about obeying immoral orders that A Few Good Men explores with tactfulness and respect. It's the kind of film that Hollywood excels at while proving that Cruise works just as well as an ensemble player as he does a leading man.

A Few Good Men
R
Crime
Documentary
Drama
Mystery
Thriller
- Director
- Rob Reiner
- Release Date
- December 11, 1992
20 Knight and Day is Tom Cruise's Own Mr. & Mrs. Smith
Though Considered a Flop, It Did Quite Well and Is Still Loads of Fun
Back in 2005, Mr. & Mrs. Smith put two unbeatable A-list actors and squeezed their onscreen sex appeal for a high dose of adrenaline. That would be Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt. Five years later, Knight and Day tried to recreate this formula with another star onscreen couple that wasn't exactly in their primes but still had the potential to entice viewers to the theaters. In the film, Cameron Diaz gets swept up into a violent mess when she falls for a spy, played by Cruise, fighting for his life as he tries to clear his name.
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Knight and Day is configured as a flop, making only $258 million of a $117 million budget, but showed both Cruise and Diaz were still in the game. While the film's comical tone didn't match the action-packed rhythm, the onscreen chemistry between the two leads prevented a complete disaster. Diaz would go on to quit acting shortly after, but for Cruise, it was the beginning of a new prime in his career.

Knight and Day
pg-13
Action
Comedy
- Director
- James Mangold
- Release Date
- June 23, 2010
19 The Firm is an Anxiety-Inducing Conspiracy Drama
The John Grisham Legal Thriller Becomes Another Hit for Cruise

Although Cruise is most commonly known as the face of the action genre, he embarked on many thought-provoking dramas throughout the 90s. One of them was The Firm, which follows Mitch, a promising young lawyer won over by the money and power offered by a mysterious firm. When he learns of the company's dark secrets, he must fight a silent battle against them in order to survive.
Despite its serious, gloomy tone and 140-minute runtime, The Firm was a critical and commercial hit and a top-grossing Tom Cruise movie. It established Cruise as an actor who could easily move between blockbusters and prestige genre films. In addition, the movie counted on other great stars of their time, such as Holly Hunter, Gene Hackman, and Wilford Brimley.

The Firm
- Director
- Sydney Pollack
- Release Date
- June 30, 1993
- Genres
- Drama, Mystery, Thriller
- Rating
- R
18 Tom Cruise is Magnetic in Jerry Maguire
The Actor Sparkles as a Sports Agent Who Finds His Conscience

Jerry Maguire is a movie that orbits entirely around Tom Cruise's star power -- no wonder it's named after his character. The character-driven story delves deep into the life that Jerry Maguire once knew, and the new life he envisions for himself. He is a sports agent awakened by a new moral compass, leaving his agency with the only athlete who supports him to start a new enterprise.
Jerry Maguire looks for the sentimental spots that define its characters and searches for humanity in places devoid of human emotion. The idea fits America's money-obsessed society, and the film uses the context of sports business as an effective setting. Jerry Maguire went on to become a critics' darling, earning six Oscar nominations, one of which was directed at Cruise's exceptional lead performance.

Jerry Maguire
- Director
- Cameron Crowe
- Release Date
- December 13, 1996
- Genres
- Drama, Romance, Comedy, Sport
- Rating
- R
17 Oblivion is an Underrated Sci-Fi Adventure
A Dark Future Is More than It Appears to Be

Eleven years after Steven Spielberg's Minority Report, Cruise returned to the sci-fi genre with Oblivion. The film marked his first collaboration with Top Gun: Maverick director Joseph Kosinski and followed Cruise as Jack Harper, a lone drone repairman stationed on Earth, now a planet reduced to debris from an extraterrestrial war. His uneventful routine is plagued by dreams of a woman, Julia, whom he suddenly encounters on a mission.
This Vertigo-like narrative took advantage of a dystopian sci-fi setting to innovate, yet it was met with mixed reactions from both the critics and the public audience. The box office results were meager for a blockbuster but satisfying for an original sci-fi epic, with the international box office making up for the weak domestic gross. Today, Oblivion joins movies like Duncan Jones' Moon and Cloud Atlas as underrated sci-fi adventures that turned out to be ahead of their time, receiving the love it failed to acquire one decade ago.

Oblivion
PG-13
Sci-Fi
Action
- Director
- Joseph Kosinski
- Release Date
- April 19, 2013
16 Austin Powers in Goldmember is a Brilliant Self-Parody
Cruise Has a Cameo in the Mike Myers Spy Caper

The Austin Powers power franchise might not be exactly the first thing that comes to mind when the subject is Tom Cruise, but the actor makes a memorable cameo in Austin Powers in Goldmember, surprisingly one of Cruise's highest-grossing movies. The film, which follows Austin Powers traveling back in time to save his father and beat Dr. Evil once again, opens with a self-parody section of a movie within a movie, "Austinpussy", featuring Cruise playing Austin Powers.
Austin Powers in Goldmember is the third movie in a franchise known for its self-deprecating humor and satirical tone, making $296 million of a $63 million budget. The Tom Cruise cameo sets up the absurd tone of the movie, which proved to be as successful as its previous installments. Unfortunately, even though Austin Powers in Goldmember was a hit, Austin Powers 4 is far from having a concrete plan, especially following the loss of Verne Troyer, who played Mini-Me.

Austin Powers in Goldmember
- Director
- Jay Roach
- Release Date
- July 26, 2002
15 Top Gun is an '80s Classic
The Fighter Plane Actioner Helped Define the Decade
Top Gun stars Cruise as Lieutenant Pete "Maverick" Mitchell, a Navy pilot who trains at the United States Navy's Fighter Weapons School. As Maverick competes to be top in the class, usually competing against Iceman (Val Kilmer), he strikes up a relationship with one of his instructors, Charlie Blackwood (Kelly McGillis).
Top Gun is one of Cruise's most iconic roles in his filmography and continued the impressive run that he had in the 1980s. It also had a re-release in 2021 in anticipation of Top Gun: Maverick. The film ended up being a hit and won an Academy Award for Best Original Song. In the film, Cruise uttered one of the most famous lines in movie history: "I feel the need, the need for speed!"

7
10
Top Gun
PG
Drama
Action
As students at the United States Navy's elite fighter weapons school compete to be best in the class, one daring young pilot learns a few things from a civilian instructor that are not taught in the classroom.
- Release Date
- May 16, 1986
- Director
- Tony Scott
14 Minority Report Takes Advantage of a Unique Concept
Steven Spielberg Delivers One of His Best

In Minority Report, Cruise plays Precrime Chief John Anderton in a future world where police can stop crimes before they take place. Anderton is then framed for murder and must go on the run to prove his innocence with the help of a pre-cog, Agatha (Samantha Morton). Mixing dystopian sci-fi with neo-noir conventions, the film delivers plenty of twists in a narrative that is all about the predictable future.
Directed by Steven Spielberg, the film grossed $358.3 million on a $102 million budget, which provided Cruise with another hit on his hands. While the film was successful and left audiences wanting more, no sequel ever came to be. A television series based on the film was released in 2015 with no involvement from Cruise and was canceled after just 10 episodes.

Minority Report
- Director
- Steven Spielberg
- Release Date
- June 21, 2002
- Rating
- PG-13
- Genres
- Mystery, Sci-Fi, Thriller, Action, Crime
13 Edge Of Tomorrow Brings the Time-Loop Trope to the Action Genre
The Sleeper Hit Has Stood the Test of Time

Edge of Tomorrow follows Major William Cage (Cruise), a soldier who relives the same day over and over again while fighting aliens who have invaded Earth. As Cage relives each day, his skills get better and better as he looks for a way to defeat the invaders. The movie offers a refreshing take on the time-loop trope, previously explored in movies such as Groundhog Day and Source Code.
The film grossed an impressive $370.5 million worldwide but had a hefty budget of $178 million, which hurt its returns. A sequel has languished in development hell ever since, but Cruise recently signed an overall deal with Warner Brothers to develop franchise films, and it is rumored that a sequel to Edge of Tomorrow could be one of those films.

Edge of Tomorrow
PG-13
Edge of Tomorrow is a science fiction action film where an untrained public relations officer finds himself reliving the same day after being killed by alien invaders. With each cycle, he gains valuable combat skills and forms an alliance with a seasoned soldier to defeat the extraterrestrial threat. The relentless repetition of the time loop becomes their strategic advantage in a desperate fight for humanity's survival.
- Director
- Doug Liman
- Release Date
- June 6, 2014
12 Mission: Impossible III is the Lowest-Grossing Movie in the Franchise
J.J. Abrams Helmed the Franchise at a Crossroads

Mission: Impossible III continued the adventures of Agent Ethan Hunt, Cruise's signature role. Hunt must return to duty after retiring from IMF fieldwork and goes up against a sadistic arms dealer in Owen Davian (Philip Seymour Hoffman). The film introduced fan-favorite characters such as Simon Pegg's Benji and Michelle Monaghan's Julia.
Mission: Impossible III currently stands as the lowest-grossing film in the Mission: Impossible series, only grossing $398.4 million at the box office. Despite this, it was still considered a great summer blockbuster movie that only proved that Cruise had a box office star quality to get viewers into seats at movie theaters.

Mission: Impossible III
pg-13
Action
Adventure
IMF agent Ethan Hunt comes into conflict with a dangerous and sadistic arms dealer who threatens his life and his fiancée in response.
- Release Date
- May 5, 2006
- Director
- J.J. Abrams
11 Rain Man is a Moving Family Drama
The Film Won The Oscar for Best Picture

Rain Man is a 1988 film following Tom Cruise's Charlie Babbit, the supposed heir to his father's fortune until he discovers his long-lost brother Raymond (Dustin Hoffman), who has savant syndrome. After discovering that Raymond is set to inherit their father's money, Charlie does his best to get legal custody of his brother--and thereby possession of his newfound fortune.
Against a moderate budget estimated to be around $25 million, Rain Man made over $350 million at the worldwide box office, becoming a phenomenal success. The film went on to win four Academy Awards, including Best Picture, and has since become a staple of American cinema.

Rain Man
R
Drama
After a selfish L.A. yuppie learns his estranged father left a fortune to an autistic-savant brother in Ohio that he didn't know existed, he absconds with his brother and sets out across the country, hoping to gain a larger inheritance.
- Release Date
- December 16, 1988
- Director
- Barry Levinson
10 The Mummy Fails As A Remake
Universal's Attempt at a Horror Franchise Imploded on Launch
The Mummy is a disappointing action movie remake based on the Brendan Fraser franchise of the same name, and the Boris Karloff movie from the Golden Age of Universal Monsters. Starring Tom Cruise as a grave robber who accidentally awakens an ancient spirit, The Mummy was intended to kick off an entire cinematic universe revolving around Universal Studios' monster characters.
Although The Mummy is among Tom Cruise's highest-earning films, its worldwide total of just over $400 million was far from enough to justify its massive budget. As such, The Mummy became a one-and-done film, leaving any sequel ideas on the table and bringing an end to Universal's Dark Universe before it had even really begun.

The Mummy
PG-13
Fantasy
Adventure
An ancient Egyptian princess is awakened from her crypt beneath the desert, bringing with her malevolence grown over millennia and terrors that defy human comprehension.
- Release Date
- June 9, 2017
- Director
- Alex Kurtzman
9 Tom Cruise is Devoted to the Samurai Way in The Last Samurai
The Movie Was Heralded as a Prestigious Drama

The Last Samurai follows Tom Cruise's Nathan Algren, a Civil War veteran who has become disillusioned with his country after experiencing the horrors of war. After being sent to Japan as a mercenary, Algren is captured by a village run by samurai. The samurai train him in their ways and eventually accept him as one of their own.
Despite the controversies around the film, The Last Samurai has generally been considered to be one of Tom Cruise's best films. Accordingly, the movie is also one of his most successful, earning over $450 million worldwide, an impressive number even unadjusted for inflation. At the time, The Last Samurai was Cruise's highest-grossing project outside of the Mission: Impossible movies, helping the actor expand his reach beyond a single franchise.

The Last Samurai
R
Action
Drama
- Release Date
- December 5, 2003
- Director
- Edward Zwick
8 Mission: Impossible Kicks Off A Profitable Franchise
Brian De Palma Turned a TV Reboot into a Blockbuster

Tom Cruise's first outing as Ethan Hunt happened almost thirty years ago in 1996's Mission: Impossible. The film is set in the same continuity as the television series of the same name. The movie follows a cast of mostly new characters, several of whom became mainstays in the incredibly successful franchise that followed.
Mission: Impossible was an unmitigated financial success, earning over $450 million at the worldwide box office despite mixed critical reviews. The film's high gross led to the development of a sequel, leading to one of the most celebrated spy thriller franchises of all time. Although legendary filmmaker Brian De Palma never returned to make another Mission: Impossible movie, his legacy is still felt in a succession of movies that challenge the conventional espionage formula.

Mission: Impossible
PG-13
Action
Adventure
Thriller
A veteran Green Beret is forced by a cruel Sheriff and his deputies to flee into the mountains and wage an escalating one-man war against his pursuers.
- Release Date
- May 20, 1996
- Director
- Brian De Palma
7 Mission: Impossible II Experiments with a New Action Formula
John Woo Takes Over from Brian De Palma
Four years after the original film became a hit, Mission: Impossible II saw the return of Tom Cruise's IMF agent for yet another high-stakes mission. This time, Ethan Hunt is recruited to locate and defeat a rogue IMF agent, Sean Ambrose (Dougray Scott), before he unleashes a deadly virus into the world. Veteran Hong Kong director John Woo takes over behind the camera, and gives the film a fresh look.
Despite generally worse reviews, Mission: Impossible II earned almost $100 million more than its predecessor. The sequel's success helped solidify Tom Cruise's place as a bankable action star. This also led to the production of yet another installment of the Mission: Impossible franchise, which was quickly proving to be immensely popular.

Mission: Impossible II
PG-13
Action
Adventure
Thriller
IMF agent Ethan Hunt is sent to Sydney to find and destroy a genetically modified disease called "Chimera".
- Release Date
- May 24, 2000
- Director
- John Woo
6 Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One Faced Several Production Issues
The First Half of a Larger Story Opened Strong Before Fading

Mission: Impossible- Dead Reckoning Part One follows Ethan Hunt as he and his team work to track down the Entity, a powerful AI, before it falls into the wrong hands. Hunt's mission proves to be his most dangerous yet, and has some surprising ties to his past. This entry grossed $567.5 million at the box office, and while many films would dream of those kinds of numbers, it proved to be a letdown for the franchise.
The previous three entries all grossed over $680 million, and it did not help that the film's budget was a whopping $219 million. The movie was faced with multiple production setbacks caused by the pandemic, drastically surpassing budget expectations. To make things worse, the decision to release Mission: Impossible- Dead Reckoning Part One during the summer of 2023 was also hurt by the "Barbenheimer" cultural phenomenon, with both Barbie and Oppenheimer grossing $1.4 billion and $955 million at the box office, respectively.

Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning
PG-13
Action
Adventure
Crime
- Release Date
- July 12, 2023
- Director
- Christopher McQuarrie