I’ve found, over the course of the past year, that I tend to enjoy films starring Tom Cruise (even if I don’t care for him as a person). This film was no exception. I think that my favorite thing about this film was the rivalry between Michael Rooker’s Rowdy Burns and Tom Cruise’s Cole Trickle. The two had phenomenal chemistry and I thought that each and every one of their scenes together was spectacular. Rooker’s Rusty Burns was, without a doubt, the best character in the film. His constant need to heckle Cruise’s Trickle and his perpetual need to beat Trickle at everything was, in a lot of ways, charming. His character was never overly pushy and he never crossed the line; however, I felt that it was his character that kept things exciting. This character reminded me very much of Rooker’s characters Yondu from the Guardians of the Galaxy films and Merle Dixon from AMC’s The Walking Dead series. It seems that Rooker has found his niche in Hollywood; the cranky, yet enjoyable, competition. NASCAR, to me, is about the most boring sport in the world. Without such an impressive cast, I feel that this film would have been a drag simply due to the fact that I don’t care for car racing. Rooker, Cruise, Nicole Kidman and Robert Duvall brought excitement to this film. While I thought that the film was well written and the story was interesting, I genuinely believe that the film wouldn’t have been half as good without this group of actors. The film was simple, but everything was well executed. I thought the camera angles were even executed especially well. The angles at which the camera was placed heightened the drama during the racing scenes, making NASCAR enjoyable. I love that Trickle and Duvall’s Harry Hogge’s relationship ran full circle from the beginning to the end of the film. The first time we see the two on screen together and one of the last times we see the two together before the final race we hear Trickle speak the words “I won’t make a fool out of you.” I liked that Tony Scott, Robert Towne and Tom Cruise brought the characters back to this line towards the end of the film (it was very poetic). The film was well done. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0099371/?ref_=nv_sr_1
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