“Top Gun: Maverick” is the biggest global blockbuster of Tom Cruise’s already blockbustery career. Perhaps you’ve been compelled to rewatch the original “Top Gun” from 1986 — or, depending on your generation, watch it for the first time. But me? I went back to revisit another movie Cruise made with director Tony Scott and producers Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer: 1990′s “Days of Thunder.” It’s more or less the same movie as “Top Gun” — speed, testosterone, soaring guitars — but with race cars instead of warplanes, which on its face makes it better. Way better.
Cruise plays Cole Trickle, a novice stock car driver with something to prove. He’s recruited by a fledgling NASCAR team owner (Randy Quaid as an ambitious car dealer looking to make his mark) and trained by grizzled crew chief Harry Hogge (Robert Duvall as the seasoned good ol’ boy whose instincts are as sharp and tangy as his one-liners). The neurologist who treats Cole after a bad crash (Nicole Kidman in maybe the one American movie where she uses her native Australian accent) becomes his love interest and the only person who bothers asking if it’s all worth it when the stakes are possibly getting smashed to pieces or dying a fiery death.
Everyone else has their eyes on the prize: Winning Daytona.
