At his best, Cameron Crowe makes wanting to behave better seem funny, awkward and worth the effort. We value his warmth, especially in Jerry Maguire, but his writing can keep explaining what the actors have already made clear.
Fi1m perspective
Tom Cruise lets Jerry’s need to be liked become embarrassing in Jerry Maguire (1996), and Cameron Crowe has the sense to leave it that way. His sports agent wants to behave better in a business that offers little encouragement, but Crowe does not make him instantly admirable. We were touched by Jerry’s early doubts about his work because Cruise makes his uncertainty awkward and unpractised. That is the director we most enjoy: attentive to the difficulty of trying, and willing to find it funny.
The interest in romance and character was there in his directorial debut, Say Anything... (1989). Music matters just as much: in Singles (1992), songs help establish the mood, while Almost Famous (2000) draws on his own music-journalism experience. These films suit a director interested in people trying to remain hopeful about love or work. Vanilla Sky (2001), which reunited him with Cruise, took that partnership into a psychological story about identity and reality.
Jerry Maguire remains our clearest reason to recommend him, though its crowded script could do with less explanation. Cruise and Renée Zellweger make the romance persuasive, while Cuba Gooding Jr.’s Rod Tidwell gives the film energy whenever Jerry risks spending too long considering himself. Regina King’s Marcee is brisk enough to interrupt the sentiment. Crowe’s attention to the people around his leading man makes the film generous, even when it helps it run too long.
Janusz Kamiński’s warm cinematography helps that earnestness feel natural. Production designer Stephen J. Lineweaver makes Jerry’s working life look comfortable enough for us to understand the attraction of staying put. Nancy Wilson’s music supports the romance, although Cruise and Zellweger scarcely need the encouragement once they have our attention. Crowe benefits from their restraint whenever his writing starts to explain too much.
In the later Elizabethtown (2005), the storytelling grows loose; Aloha (2015) leans too hard on sentiment and familiar plotting. His optimism becomes tiring when the storytelling is too predictable to put it under much pressure. We prefer the uncertainty Cruise brings to Jerry, which keeps Crowe’s hopefulness believable. Start with Jerry Maguire, and allow for a writer who sometimes needs to be told we understand.
Biography
Cameron Crowe is an American filmmaker and journalist. He wrote, directed and produced the 1996 film Jerry Maguire.
Crowe began his career as a contributing editor at Rolling Stone magazine. His other films as writer and director include Say Anything... (1989), Singles (1992), Almost Famous (2000), for which he won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay, Vanilla Sky (2001) and Elizabethtown (2005).
He has also directed the documentaries Pearl Jam Twenty (2011) and created the television series Roadies (2016).
