Jerry Maguire **** (1996, Tom Cruise, Cuba Gooding Jr, Renée Zellweger, Jonathan Lipnicki, Kelly Preston, Jerry O’Connell, Jay Mohr, Bonnie Hunt, Regina King) – Classic Movie Review 612

Cameron Crowe hasn’t yet been able to top or even quite equal the enormous success of his 1996 triumph Jerry Maguire, though it is not for want of trying with classy items like Almost Famous, Elizabethtown and Vanilla Sky.

Tom Cruise landed his second Best Actor Oscar nomination (after Born on the Fourth of July) for his sparky, high-energy performance as Jerry Maguire, a ruthless sports agent (‘Show me the money!’) who loses his job when he suddenly develops a conscience.

He sets out to remake his fortune with the help of his two sole remaining supporters, company accountant Dorothy Boyd (Renée Zellweger) and football ace Rod Tidwell (Cuba Gooding Jr), who is his only surviving client.

Writer-director Crowe delivers a highly literate and intelligent feel-good movie combining sport, comedy and romance – i.e. something for everybody, which did it no harm at all at the box office. The only mistake of Crowe’s first-rate screenplay, packed full of witty dialogue, is that it rambles on a bit into overtime at 139 minutes.

Gooding is so darned good he won an Oscar Best Supporting Actor, but Cruise lost out as Best Actor to Geoffrey Rush in Shine. Cruise however did win the Golden Globe for Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture. Zellweger makes a sweet, strong impression in her first starring role and Jonathan Lipnicki is cute in his cinema feature debut as the little kid, Ray Boyd.

Kelly Preston is excellent as Avery Bishop, and Jerry O’Connell, Jay Mohr, Bonnie Hunt, Regina King are all also notable.

Also in the cast are Glenn Frey, Eric Stoltz, Jann Wenner, Alexandra Wentworth, Beau Bridges, Mark Pellington, Jared Jussim, Ingrid Beer, Todd Louiso, Jeremy Suarez, Benjamin Kimball Smith, Nada Despotovich, Aries Spears, Kelly Coffield, Alice Marie Crowe and Donal Logue.

Cruise reunited with Crowe for Vanilla Sky (2001). He won a third Oscar nomination (Best Actor in a Supporting Role) for Magnolia (1999).

RIP Kelly Preston, who died of breast cancer on 12 July 2020 in Houston, Texas, aged 57.

© Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Movie Review 612

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