Tom Cruise and 'TRON: LEGACY' Director Joseph Kosinski Teamed Up For 'Oblivion'

OBLIVION: SAVING A FUTURE EARTH THAT HAS EVOLVED BEYOND RECOGNITION

In 2073, a 37 year-old former-Marine Commander Jack Harper (Tom Cruise) is one of the last few drone repairmen stationed at Earth which was nearly destroyed by an alien invasion 60 years ago. As part of a massive operation to extract the planet’s remaining vital resources, he lives in an airborne “town” floating thousands of meters above the Earth.

His mission nearly complete, Jack’s soaring existence comes crashing down when he rescues a 22 year-old female stranger from a downed spacecraft. Her arrival triggers a series of events that forces Jack to question everything he knows about the war and its aftermath. In addition, after being captured by an insurgency led by 102 year-old Malcolm Beech (Morgan Freeman), Jack is told that the society in which he lives may in fact be a police state.

TOM CRUISE (Jack)has achieved extraordinary success as an actor, producer and philanthropist in a career spanning over three decades. He is a three-time Academy Award® nominee and three-time Golden Globe Award winner whose films have earned in excess of eight billion dollars worldwide—an incomparable accomplishment.  Seventeen of Cruise’s films have grossed over $100 million in the United States alone and nineteen have grossed over $200 million globally. Mission: Impossible Ghost Protocol opened in December 2011 to critical acclaim and grossed nearly $700 million worldwide making it the biggest box office success of Cruise’s career.  The franchise has brought in over two billion dollars globally since Cruise conceived the idea for the films and began producing them at Paramount while starring as the legendary spy, Ethan Hunt.   Brad Bird directed the fourth film, which Cruise produced with J.J. Abrams. Cruise received Academy Award® nominations for Best Actor for Born on the Fourth of July and Jerry Maguire, in addition to a Best Supporting Actor nomination for Magnolia.  He also garnered two Golden Globe Awards for Best Actor for Born on the Fourth of July and Jerry Maguire, as well as Best Supporting Actor for Magnolia, and nominations for his roles in Risky Business, A Few Good Men,The Last Samuraiand  Tropic Thunder.  Cruise has also earned acting nominations and awards from BAFTA, the Screen Actors Guild, the Chicago Film Critics Association and the National Board of Review.  His list of memorable credits also includes such diverse films as Collateral, Minority Report,Interview with the Vampire, The Firm, Rain Man, The Color of Money and Top Gun.

Academy Award®-winning actor MORGAN FREEMAN (Beech) is one of the most recognizable figures in American cinema.  His works are among the most critically and commercially successful films of all time and Freeman himself ranks 10th among worldwide top-grossing actors of all time, with his films having earned more than $3 billion in cumulative ticket sales.  Whether a role requires an air of gravitas, a playful smile, a twinkle of the eye or a world-weary, yet insightful soul, Freeman’s ability to delve to the core of a character and infuse it with a quiet dignity has resulted in some of the most memorable portrayals ever recorded on film.  Freeman won an Academy Award® in 2005 for Best Supporting Actor for his role in Million Dollar Baby.  In 1990, he won a Golden Globe for Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture—Comedy/Musical for his performance in Driving Miss Daisy.  Freeman also received an Academy Award® nomination in 1987 for Best Supporting Actor for Street Smart and in 1994 for Best Actor for The Shawshank Redemption. Freeman was honored with the Cecil B. DeMille Award at the 2011 Golden Globe Awards.  That same year, Freeman received the 39th AFI Lifetime Achievement Award.  In 2000, Freeman was honored with a Hollywood Film Award for Outstanding Achievement in Acting at the Hollywood Film Festival, as well as the coveted Kennedy Center Honor for his distinguished acting career. In 2009, Freeman won the National Board of Review Award for Best Actor for his performance as Nelson Mandela in the acclaimed film Invictus.  He also received an Academy Award® nomination, a Golden Globe nomination and a Broadcast Film Critics Association Award nomination.  The picture was produced by Revelations Entertainment, the company he co-founded in 1996 with a mission to produce films that enlighten, express heart and glorify the human experience.  Other Revelations features include Levity, Under Suspicion, Mutiny, Bopha!, Along Came a Spider,Feast of Love, 10 Items or Less and Maiden Heist.

For casting one of the lead roles opposite Cruise, the producers considered five actresses: Jessica Chastain, Olivia Wilde, Brit Marling, Noomi Rapace and Olga Kurylenko, and all five auditioned on August 27, 2011.It was subsequently announced that Chastain would play one of the film’s two female leads. In January 2012 Chastain entered into talks for a part in the Kathryn Bigelow film Zero Dark Thirty and subsequently dropped out of Oblivion contention. It was later announced that the role had been given to Kurylenko.

For the other leading role, the producers initially considered Hayley Atwell, Diane Kruger and Kate Beckinsale. The three actors traveled to Pittsburgh to screen-test with Cruise, who was filming Jack Reacher.The role finally went to Andrea Riseborough. Melissa Leo was cast at a later date.

JOSEPH KOSINSKI (Directed by/Based on the Graphic Novel Original Story by/Produce by) is a director whose uncompromising visual style and dynamic approach to the filmmaking craft has quickly maded a mark in the filmmaking zeitgeist.  His feature film debut, TRON: Legacy, for Walt Disney Studios, grossed more than $400 million worldwide and was nominated for several awards, including an Academy Award® and a Grammy.

Kosinski’s work represents a diverse background in architecture, design and music.  He received his undergraduate degree in mechanical engineering at Stanford University before graduating from Columbia University with a master’s degree in architecture.

Production began on March 12, 2012 and wrapped on July 14, 2012. Filming locations included Baton Rouge and New Orleans, Louisiana. Oblivion, shot in stunning digital 4K resolution on location across the United States and Iceland,  is an upcoming 2013 science fiction film based on the Radical Comics graphic novel Oblivion by Joseph Kosinski and directed and co-produced by Kosinski.

Oblivion is a Universal Pictures presentation. It is distributed by United International Pictures through Solar Entertainment Corporation. Showing at your favorite theaters and cinemas starting this April 10.

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