Tom Cruise Saved Guy Ritchie's Cult Movie By Starting a Bidding
The actor not only saved Hollywood, but Guy Ritchie as well.
When it comes to crime comedies with a unique style, everyone remembers one director – Guy Ritchie. His first feature film debut was Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels.
He did not have to prove his talent to others for a long time: the movie became an international hit, grossing decent $25 million in the UK and winning 12 international awards, securing Guy Ritchie's status as one of the most promising directors of his time.
The director's career might not have been so successful, however, had it not been for Tom Cruise's literal rescue of Ritchie's first movie.
For some time, the fate of Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels was in jeopardy. In a 2016 interview with BBC Radio 4, the producer, Matthew Vaughn, admitted that the movie was struggling to find a distributor.
But the turning point came during a special screening in the US.
Faced with the prospect of ending his film career before it had even begun, Vaughn contacted one of the film's investors, Trudie Styler.
He asked her to find Tom Cruise, whom she knew, and invite him to buyers's screening in the US. And that's exactly what Tom Cruise did. He went to a small theater and watched a movie.
If Cruise hadn't done what he did, there wouldn't have been a theatrical release in the US, let alone a premiere.
"At the end, Tom got up in front of everyone and said 'this is the best movie I've seen in years, you guys would be fools not to make it.'"
And then a fierce bidding war began, which ended with the the movie being released in theaters.
Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels is Guy Ritchie's first feature film, which grew out of the little-known short movie The Hard Case and largely determined the aesthetic of the director's future work in the field of crime films.
The adventures of con men and the gangsters who hunt them down, entangled in an intricate tangle of scenarios, is a through-line of most of Ritchie's most popular and successful movies.
Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels is a pure example of an entertaining movie that does not pretend to be thoughtful, but at the same time does not look stupid or awkward, and on the contrary is made with great script wit and directing skill.
The storylines are intertwined and twisted in the most dashing way, the number of genre events deserves respect, and the gallery of inhabitants of the London criminal world is striking in its diversity and originality.
Source: BBC Radio 4