Tom Cruise may be the face of the blockbuster action roles in Hollywood, but one of his most powerful performances is tucked away in a movie many have forgotten or never seen. There are certain movies and performances that feel like someone cracked open their chest and showed you something real. This Tom Cruise movie is one of them.

Paul Thomas Anderson’s emotional ensemble drama has become a hidden gem in Cruise’s filmography. While the movie may not have made a major impact at the box office, it has earned lasting critical praise. It features a scene, largely improvised by Cruise, that remains one of the most powerful of his career. I didn’t expect watching it now, especially Cruise’s scene, would hit me like a gut punch. The movie is Magnolia, and is currently streaming on Prime Video.

Tom Cruise’s raw, unscripted breakdown in Magnolia still shakes viewers

Tom Cruise in Magnolia | Credit: New Line Cinema

Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, Magnolia is an emotional drama set over a time in the San Fernando Valley. The movie weaves together the lives of more than a dozen characters, all wrestling with grief, regrets, and the ghost of their past. Amid the chaos and coincidences, Tom Cruise‘s character Frank. T.J. Mackey stands out as a man built entirely on bravado until he crumbles.

I had seen Magnolia years ago, but I wasn’t prepared for how hard Cruise’s performance would hit. Watching it with the full weight of his action-hero legacy in mind, it felt like discovering a completely different actor. He plays Frank T.J. Mackey, a hyper-masculine, emotionally detached self-help guru whose entire public persona is built on dominance and denial.

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It’s an easy character to hate until he crumbles. In the movie’s most devastating scene, Frank visits his dying father (Jason Robards), and something inside him breaks. After the line, “I’m not going to cry for you,” Cruise was given freedom by Anderson to improvise, and what follows is nothing short of staggering.

Anderson instructed him to draw on personal experience, namely the relationship Cruise has with his own father. In the scene, he falls apart in a way that feels so personal, so unscripted, that it stops feeling like a performance altogether. He sobs, pleads, lashes out, and ultimately begs his father not to leave him, repeating, “Don’t go away, you a**hole,” through heaving breaths. The pain is raw and real.

For me, this scene changed the way I see Cruise. He’s a one-of-a-kind movie star, the last of a dying breed. But Magnolia is proof that he’s also capable of dropping the persona entirely and showing something heartbreakingly real.

Tom Cruise’s Magnolia is a real underrated gem, stands apart from his blockbuster roles

Tom Cruise in Magnolia | Credit: New Line Cinema

Most people think of Cruise today as the face of American action cinema, Mission: Impossible, Top Gun: Maverick, and countless death-defying stunts that push the limits of what a movie star can physically do. But there were times, Cruise was just as committed to emotional risk as he is now to physical ones. Magnolia is the clearest proof of that.

At the time of its release in 1999, it wasn’t a commercial success. With a budget of $37 million, it only managed to pull in around $48.5 million worldwide. It was an emotionally messy movie, filled with intersecting storylines, existential monologues one that Cruise wrote, and, yes, even a rain of frogs.

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Maybe that kind of movie didn’t appeal to the mainstream audiences at that time. And yet, the movie earned three Oscar nominations, including one for Tom Cruise as Best Supporting Actor. It may not have won the award, but the nomination alone speaks to the power of what he did on screen.

For a movie that’s often remembered for its ambition and heartbreak, Magnolia contains one of the most human moments I’ve ever seen from a major star. In a career defined by heroes who always win, this is the rare moment where Cruise lets himself lose, and in doing so, he gives us his most unforgettable work.

If you’ve only seen Cruise run, jump, and save the world, Magnolia will be a revelation. It’s streaming on Prime Video now, and I can’t recommend it enough. Just be ready, it might shake you like it did me.