Sometimes, you just need a relaxing film to take your mind off things – Knight and Day has you covered. Starring Cameron Diaz and Tom Cruise, this film focuses on a young woman whose interest in rare car parts has brought her to Kansas, where she has just concluded a purchase. When she bumps into a man in the airport, she is targeted by the CIA as a potential ally of the man they are after, Roy Miller (Tom Cruise). Boy, how wrong they are.
Tom Cruise is known to bounce between serious films and more comedic efforts, with Knight and Day falling squarely into the latter. Action comedies, by their very nature, are “out there.” Regarding the action set pieces, they take the cake for pushing the boundaries of reality for comedic effect. But that doesn’t stop them from having deeply serious moments. At the core of the film, Roy Miller later revealed to be Matthew Knight, has unwittingly drawn June Havens (Cameron Diaz) into his world of espionage and international terrorist threats when he attempted to use her as an unassuming mule for what he stole. All he needed was for her to get it through security while unaware that she was carrying something of value. As previously mentioned, this makes the CIA believe she is actively working with him. We haven’t seen this level of incompetence from the CIA since the Bourne series, but alas…
When June ends up on her original flight, which Roy went through the extreme effort to purchase every seat for, they find themselves on a sparsely populated flight heading for Boston. This is where things pick up because every other passenger is a CIA operative there to capture or eliminate the two. When June heads to the bathroom, thinking that she and Roy are just flirting, he dispatches the operatives and then drugs June before warning her that people will be coming for her – and dropping her off at home. That he essentially left her as bait is clear, but he’s already caught feelings. It’s… touch and go, if you ask me, how creeped out one should feel about all of this. Luckily, Knight and Day isn’t a Lifetime movie.
As June settles back into her regular routine, preparing for her sister April’s wedding (Maggie Grace), we learn that April plans to sell their father’s vintage Pontiac. The only problem? June has been planning on restoring it as a wedding gift. In the middle of this, she is drawn into Roy’s web when Fitzgerald (Peter Sarsgaard) and some of his fellow agents track her down to question her. This only serves to bring Roy back into her life and see him incapacitate her ex-boyfriend Rodney (Marc Blucas), making it appear as if he is holding her hostage. Tom Cruise was having a hell of a good time.
This sets off the rest of the film. June is thrown into a crazy adventure of Roy’s making, trying to survive while she pieces together everything happening. The McGuffin (Zephyr) is a perpetual energy batter that Roy was assigned to protect the inventor of – only for Fitzgerald to attempt to steal the battery while simultaneously framing Roy for everything. Part of what makes all of this hilarious is that Roy continues to tranquilize June, allowing the film to move from location to location in the blink of an eye – while also leaving June confused and annoyed.
Fitzgerald plays the “good guy” throughout the film, successfully characterizing Roy Miller as an unhinged traitor. It doesn’t help Roy’s case that he appears unhinged from an outside perspective. June slowly begins to realize what is happening and pieces together the kind of person that Roy actually is. When she discovers the truth about his past as Matthew Knight, she fears that she has made the wrong choice. But throughout their adventure, Roy has given June the tools that she needs to make it to the end of this adventure. Fitzgerald, for his part, soon finds that he has played his hand much too quickly.
Viola Davis plays the CIA Director, Isabel George, who has come to deal with the situation personally. At the same time, Gal Gadot appears as Naomi, the henchwoman to Antonio Quintana (Jordi Mollà), who has been after Zephyr the entire film. Paul Dano even takes a turn in the film as Simon Feck, the inventor of the Zephyr. Then, there’s Bernhard (Falk Hentschel), an assassin sent by Quintana to hunt June and Roy down midway through the film. What I love about this list of supporting players is, aside from Jordi Mollà, they’re all prominent in the DC films and television circuit now – in wildly similar roles for some of them.
Knight and Day is a fun time, at least in my experience. It doesn’t take itself too seriously, but it is more than willing to delve deep into the kind of insanity that it throws June into. By the time she is an eager, active participant, she has gone through numerous life-threatening scenarios. Yet, she doesn’t lose the core of who she is. Her character developed without having to change, something that most writers struggle to achieve at the best times. At the same time, Roy Miller’s mysterious past paints him as a tragic figure whose eccentricities are a cover for having to leave behind his life. He finds life thrilling, and so he lives it as such. As the second film that the two have worked on, Diaz and Cruise have a history they can build on, which we see in their chemistry. For all the insanity that Roy Miller lobs her way, June Havens takes it in stride, even when it grates on her every last nerve.
Knight and Day takes you on a wild roller coaster of a ride – poking fun at the kind of movies that Tom Cruise usually makes – but is nevertheless an enjoyable experience. Watching June and Roy fall in love within this hectic tale is actually fun. Would it be different if the guy weren’t Tom Cruise? I don’t know. All I can say is I can see why somebody would go on a crazy conspiracy-filled adventure with him.
Lloydd Marshall Books 