Strain man: how a botched trailer reveals the true depths of Tom Cruise’s talent

It’s been called the curse of The Mummy. On Tuesday afternoon, for the briefest of moments, the Imax YouTube page accidentally hosted an unfinished trailer of Tom Cruise’s new film. Every aspect was in place — the stunts, the music, the dialogue — except for one thing: the sound effects had completely disappeared. And since the trailer for The Mummy is almost all sound effects, it made for a discombobulating watch.

When Cruise’s plane hits turbulence, all its passengers bob up and down silently. And when it dives into a tailspin, the only thing we can hear are Cruise’s disembodied grunts and screams. The windscreen smashes, and he makes a noise like he’s vomiting spaghetti. He lands on the floor with a thud, and he makes a noise like someone’s just snuck up on him. As the wings fall off and he plummets to his apparent death, Cruise screams “BLARRGH!”, twice and identically.

Copies of the trailer keep popping up online, but Universal shuts them down within minutes. This is a shame because — and I say this with no irony whatsoever — it is the best Cruise trailer in years. It’s practically a love letter to the man.

Cruise’s greatest gift is his utter commitment to every aspect of his life. Whether it’s acting or running or observing a religion or driving a car around the Top Gear test track, Cruise’s effort is always palpable. He never gives anything less than a billion per cent, and the audience can feel it. So how wonderful that this commitment remains intact even when it comes to delivering background paralanguage. Those screams aren’t meant to be heard at the top of the mix. They’re supposed to be drowned out by several layers of wind and engine roar. Everyone else understands this — the best Annabelle Wallis can muster in the trailer is a breathy sigh — but Cruise gives these moments everything. He’s grunting like his life literally depends on it.

Of course, this is to his benefit. Imagine Ryan Gosling in the same scene. Imagine James Franco. Imagine the half-hearted, slightly ironic nearly-screams they would have produced. Now compare that with the ultra-sincere jet engine that is Cruise. You’d pick Cruise for the role every time, wouldn’t you? That he’s capable of this shouldn’t be a surprise. After all, the best moment of the best Tom Cruise film in recent years — Edge of Tomorrow — was an off-screen yell. Remember it? Cruise tried to abandon his troop by rolling under a lorry, but mistimed it and got squished beneath its wheels. As this happened, he made a kind of shrill squawk, the sort of noise you’d make if you where goosed by a ghost in a haunted mansion. It was brilliant.

Just when we thought we knew Cruise, just when we thought we’d seen every possible permeation of his narrow yet effective on-screen skill set, the botched Mummy trailer has suddenly thrust him into a bold new paradigm. Turns out he’s a tremendous screamer. He’s just as good at screaming as he is at running really fast and playing characters called Jack. And he should use this.

Every new Cruise film should contain at least one scene where he screams at something, be it a baddie or an accident or a chicken in a hat. His entire back catalogue should be digitally remastered, George Lucas-style, to add a scene where he treads on Lego barefoot or goes down a waterside or accidentally chews a mouthful of tinfoil, just so we can hear his glorious yells once more. Or, now that Tom Cruise is in the monster movie business, a remake of King Kong where he plays Fay Wray. This must happen. Every day that this does not happen is an affront to mankind. At a time when his career was starting to lose a touch of steam, mired in unnecessary sequels and remakes, this half-finished trailer has reinvigorated the public’s love affair with Cruise. Universal should let it live online forever, as a Christmas gift to the world. Cruise is the only man who can save 2016.