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American Made

• Barry Seal (Tom Cruise) shirt

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Description

An original costume created for the production of American Made, the 2017 action comedy starring Tom Cruise under the direction of Doug Liman.

This shirt was custom made for the production for use by Tom Cruise as Barry Seal. The bespoke made garment features shoulder and pocket details with mother of pearl effect press stud fastenings and retains an original wardrobe tag which is hand inscribed '259 BATON ROUGE APT', to the interior the shirt features built in sweat pads to the arms.

The shirt remains in excellent condition, extremely fine.

A fine example of original wardrobe from this well received picture.

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American Made: Tom Cruises Shirts

• July 27, 2023

Films are great for style inspiration. Films like The Gentleman, The Talented Mr Ripley and of course – Bond! We discuss how Cruise manages to look hot whilst still looking cool…

Last week I  watched American Made with Tom Cruise (Very good if you’ve not seen it yet)

He wore some really cool short sleeved shirts in subtle yet interesting colours and made from linen.

So that even when he was piling his millions into the back garden and navigating drug bandits, he still looked cool. 

Here are the ones I rated. 

Linen has been the fabric of the Summer. Gone are the days of linen which made you look like a crumpled heap.

With a clever blend of cotton and linen, they make for a versatile, cool summer shirt.

When we are inspired by designs like this, we find the fabrics and create a modern version for you.  All of these fabrics, we have available.

We may even help you look like Cruise too 😉

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• Cast & crew
• User reviews

American Made

The story of Barry Seal, an American pilot who became a drug-runner for the CIA in the 1980s in a clandestine operation that would be exposed as the Iran-Contra Affair. The story of Barry Seal, an American pilot who became a drug-runner for the CIA in the 1980s in a clandestine operation that would be exposed as the Iran-Contra Affair. The story of Barry Seal, an American pilot who became a drug-runner for the CIA in the 1980s in a clandestine operation that would be exposed as the Iran-Contra Affair.

• Gary Spinelli
• Domhnall Gleeson
• Sarah Wright
• 388 User reviews
• 293 Critic reviews
• 65 Metascore
• 3 nominations

• Monty 'Schafer'

• Sheriff Downing

• Judy Downing

• Dana Sibota

• Jorge Ochoa

• James Rangel

• Agent Craig McCall

• Louis Finkle

• Carlos Lehder
• (as Fredy Yate Escobar)

• Pablo Escobar

• Oliver North

• Manuel Noriega
• Adolfo Calero
• All cast & crew
• Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

More like this

Did you know

• Trivia Tom Cruise is a qualified pilot. He did all of his own flying scenes during filming.
• Goofs Barry Seal did not quit his job at TWA. In July of 1972 he was fired for taking fraudulent medical leave in order to participate in an explosives smuggling operation.

Barry Seal : I'm the gringo who always delivers.

• Crazy credits At the very end of the credits, tucked among the copyright disclaimers is the sentence, "And yes, we know that's not El Salvador." This is a reference to a joke in the film about mistaking El Salvador for Nicaragua on the map. In fact, the country on the map was neither El Salvador nor Nicaragua, it was Honduras.
• Connections Featured in Half in the Bag: The Mummy (2017)
• Soundtracks A Fifth of Beethoven Written & Performed by Walter Murphy Courtesy of BMG Rights Management

User reviews 388

• Dec 5, 2017
• How long is American Made? Powered by Alexa
• What are the rumours surrounding Barry Seal and how much truth is there in them?
• September 29, 2017 (United States)
• United States
• Ball Ground, Georgia, USA (Mena, Arkansas)
• Cross Creek Pictures
• Imagine Entertainment
• Quadrant Pictures
• See more company credits at IMDbPro
• $50,000,000 (estimated)
• $51,342,000
• $16,776,390
• Oct 1, 2017
• $134,866,593

Technical specs

• Runtime 1 hour 55 minutes
• Dolby Digital
• Dolby Surround 7.1
• Dolby Atmos

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Tom Cruise has bulked up and rediscovered the power of (very) fitted polo shirts

By Zak Maoui

In Top Gun: Maverick , which is currently sitting at the top of box offices across the world, Hollywood man of the moment Tom Cruise reprises the role of Lieutenant Pete “Maverick” Mitchell from the original 1986 blockbuster Top Gun , and to ensure he looked the part adopted a protein-fuelled diet and put his body through intense weight training and cardio exercises.

And it paid off. Cruise is as ripped as he was when he stripped down to his tighty whities in 1983 teen comedy flick Risky Business , while his upper arms are as thick and toned as they were when he first threw on Ethan Hunt's ultra-tight black tee in 1996's Mission Impossible . 

Naturally, as anyone would, Cruise has been showing off the efforts of his hard work and while he was promoting Top Gun: Maverick over in South Korea this week he slipped into a series of ultra-tight polo shirts that did the job nicely. 

Traditional polo shirts, which were first designed for tennis players by René Lacoste, come with elasticated cuffs on the arms to ensure they don't flap about during game play. For Cruise these have acted as an easy way to show off and enhance his bulging biceps.

First Cruise was photographed arriving at Seoul's Gimpo International Airport in a pair of Ralph Lauren RRL selvedge denim jeans and a rice paper-hued polo shirt that was cut sheathlike at the arms. Following that he attended the Top Gun press conference at the Lotte Hotel in Seoul, for which he slipped into a navy polo that again was cut to cling tight to his muscular frame. 

This isn't the first time Cruise has made the case for form-fitting polo shirts that look as though they might burst at the seams. Throughout his early career when he was in equally as excellent shape he'd wear super tight navy polo shirts, while in the aforementioned Risky Business gym-honed Cruise wore a slim-fitting red and white striped polo in order to brandish his bicep game. 

Fancy showing off your own gym efforts? Below are the best polo shirts you can buy right now to flex your dumbbell game. 

Burberry polo shirt

Saint Laurent polo shirt

Matches Fashion

Arket polo shirt

Tom Cruise makes a case for the old school tux at the Top Gun: Maverick premiere

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Tom Cruise's Tailoring Always Made A Statement

This week's Style Archive remembers the Hollywood stalwart's reign as the prince of pattern

Style Archive: a series in which we celebrate the stars of the past that made menswear what it is today. This week: the experimental tailoring of Tom Cruise.

Before Tom Cruise's sofa-hurdling declaration of love, before he became a recipient of the Scientology Freedom Medal of Valor, and before he made it a contractual obligation that films he appears in feature 155 minutes of green screen minimum , Tom Cruise was the king of cool.

But while much has been made of the early promise of his acting career - appearing in the likes of Top Gun, Risky Business and The Colour of Money in quick succession - less attention has been paid to his sartorial selections at the time.

Admittedly wearing a suit to a smart occasion is not reinventing the wheel, but a glance at Cruise's outfit archives show the actor experimenting with pattern and colour, eschewing drab monochrome suiting in a way that's stood the test of time.

At the 1985 wedding of Sean Penn and Madonna — held at a clifftop mansion in Malibu, naturally — Cruise teamed a boxy, charcoal suit with a yellow and gold medallion-print shirt, and the black aviators he'd made his signature look in Top Gun .

Sure, grainy photographs of thirty years ago always look cooler than filtered selfies, but Harry Dean Stanton rocked up to the same nuptials in a multicoloured tie, while Christopher Walken sported a three-inch quiff. This is about more than huffing the nostalgia pipe.

The following year, at the New York premiere of The Colour of Money, Cruise wore a blue patterned two-piece suit, a pop of decoration which stood out against Paul Newman and Martin Scorsese's muted grey tailoring.

Cruise was hitting his stride in Hollywood in '86, a devilishly handsome 24-year-old making smart choices about which films to be part of, and his fashion choices at the time have aged just as well.

Whether it's the aforementioned sunglasses, a belt with silver fastenings to break up a patterned suit, or a Western bolo tie to add some personality to a pinstripe two-piece, the accents on the outfit help him dress with personality without descending into fancy dress.

As such, a dinner with his first wife Mimi Rogers and Madonna saw Cruise rock up in a white linen suit jacket - more likely an indication of his own taste than something he was instructed to throw on. This show of personal style is is exceedingly rare nowadays, when most celebrities carefully curate their every outfit to bolster their public image.

Looking at photos of Cruise during his ascendence to stardom offers a nice time capsule, the fun years before the glow of the media got a little too bright. His penchant for spicy suits tailed off somewhere in the mid-Nineties, opting instead for more classic tailoring on the red carpet. Still, we'll always have that blue suit.

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Tom Cruise Is Back in American Made ! Let’s Enjoy It While It Lasts

By Taylor Antrim

Once upon a time, the only thing that calmed my mother down was a Tom Cruise movie . She kept a set in a drawer by the TV— Risky Business , Top Gun , The Color of Money , A Few Good Men , The Firm , Days of Thunder . Cruise’s lifeguard smile and cocky heroics acted on her like a narcotic.

Then the Cruise movies went south. Valkyrie , Knight and Day , Rock of Ages , the Jack Reacher s. . . . My mother and stepfather dutifully took themselves to nearly all, but none were added to the home collection. The empty violence of the Reacher movies especially depressed mom, and 2013’s Oblivion left her mystified: “I have no idea what that was about,” she wrote me, plaintively, on the way home from the multiplex.

She skipped The Mummy altogether. Which is a kind of requiem. One among many, it turns out. There’s been plenty of writing about Cruise’s diminishing box office. His narcissistic role choices. His weird insistence on doing his own stunts, even at 55. His weirdness period. America loves a curiosity and Cruise has become Hollywood royalty as sideshow exhibit. The Ageless Hero.

But lo and behold, I’ve just seen a great Tom Cruise movie. Near great. Very, very good. American Made , which opens Friday, is a winningly agile film about a real-life late-1970s TWA pilot turned CIA recruit turned drug smuggler named Barry Seal. Directed with ragtag brio by Doug Liman, it is brisk and fun and modest in a way that Tom Cruise films almost never are.

And it is a Tom Cruise film. He’s in nearly every scene, and there is no costar with the wattage to upstage him. Cruise even narrates the goings on, Narcos -style. And yet there is a lived-in humility to his performance that Cruise aficionados haven’t seen since the opening scenes of Jerry Maguire . Seal is a lucky loser who knows how to fly planes but who otherwise stumbles his way into criminality and riches via venial US government agencies and Colombian drug cartels. Shaggy-haired, sweaty, and, for a long stretch, gap-toothed, Cruise-as-Seal is clearly having the time of his life, slumming between big-budget franchises ( M:I 6 and the Top Gun sequel, God help us, are on the horizon). To watch American Made is to recall his loose charm from films past—and to think, a little mischievously, that this is one megastar who is very good at playing stupid.

By Emma Specter

By Lisa Wong Macabasco

By Liam Hess

So: Cruise is back, probably not for long. Which is fine. It’s late 2017, after all, and the all-American white male hero worship he so easily inspires is more than a little passé. Still, it’s nice to have him. I’m calling Mom.

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PERSONALIZED SUNGLASSES FOR MOM | SHOP GIFTS

Tom Cruise's Sunglasses from American Made

Tom Cruise has been influencing our choice in sunglasses for decades, ever since the iconic films Risky Business and Top Gun hit the scene in the 1980’s. And now, in the new movie American Made , Tom Cruise’s impresses audiences yet again, this time in none other than Randolph Aviators in Bright Chrome .

Take a closer look here .

Get Tom Cruise’s Sunglasses from movie ‘American Made’

Look great in these stunning Aviators!

How Tom Cruise Wears Randolph Sunglasses:

Cruise’s adventurous character and dare-devil ariel stunts require premium well-built shades with clear optics. Randolph’s classic Aviator Sunglases are built to military spec (meaning to the highest possible standards) and have been uniform standard issue to military pilots since 1982, making them the perfect glasses for this high spirited version of Tom Cruise!

Extraordinary lives call for extraordinary glasses. And we think Tom Cruise looks great in them .

“Good enough for fighter pilots, good enough for us.”

RANDOLPH AVIATOR

On September 29th, 2017, mega star Tom Cruise returns to the big screen in American Made as a hyper-competent routine TWA pilot who shifts gears into a CIA-backed-fly-boy, who helps counter the emerging communist threat in Central America.

Tom Cruise plays a fictionalized version of Barry Seal (a real person who the CIA backed to run guns, money and drugs between the USA and Latin America in the ’80s). We watch Cruise leap into this role, that was literally ‘designed’ for him, and find ourselves lost in his dare-devil aeriel adventures as a little slice of the old Tom in Top Gun peeks through!

Own the sunglasses worn by Tom Cruise in American Made movie with these Randolph Engineering Sunglasses: Gray Glass Aviators with Bright Chrome Frames $160.00

American Made Movie Sunglasses

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• SkyTec™ Premium lenses, minimizes lens scratches
• Made by hand in Massachusetts, USA
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See Randolph Sunglasses in American Made!

Photos: David James/Universal

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How to Dress Like Tom Cruise in ‘Mission Impossible’

IMF agent Ethan Hunt may play it fast and loose on missions, but his clothing is always on point.

The key to being a good movie spy is fitting in no matter the surroundings, so it makes sense that the key to good movie spy style is looking good no matter the sartorial situation. The ability to look good in a variety of outfits is a big part of what makes movie spies like Ethan Hunt, Tom Cruise ‘s character in the Mission Impossible films, fashion icons.

Over 22 years and six films, including the soon-to-be-released Mission Impossible: Fallout , Cruise has rocked suits, tactical gear, tuxedos, and plenty of leather jackets while playing Hunt. As one of the best-dressed characters in one of the most successful franchises in movie history, Hunt’s style should inspire all guys who want to look their best. The fact that Cruise is 56 with three kids means that dads in particular should take notice.

Here are some of our favorite pieces from the recent Mission Impossible films that can up any dad’s style game.

The Hooded Leather Jacket from Ghost Protocol

Hunt’s hooded silhouette has become a recurring image over the past few Mission Impossible films, and this jacket is a sterling example. The hood, which helped keep the Impossible Mission Force’s leader incognito as he slipped in and out of dangerous situations, will also help keep you warm and dry on late night diaper runs.

Buy Now $135

The Persol Sunglasses from Ghost Protocol

These classic Persol shades worn by Tom Cruise in Ghost Protocol kept the sun (and sand) out of his eyes when he was sprinting around Dubai. But their classic silhouette works well during any moment. These, after all, come from the brand who gave Steve McQueen his effortless cool.

Buy Now $280

The Tudor Heritage Chrono Watch from Ghost Protocol

A great watch is one of the most versatile pieces you can own. Cruise rocks this one with white pants and a dark button down, but it would look just as great with a suit or tuxedo. At nearly five grand, it’s definitely an investment, but if you’re in the market for a quality timepiece you could do a lot worse for a lot more money.

The Tacky Shirt from Rogue Nation

The costume designer made this shirt Cruise wears from fabric she found in east London, so unfortunately you won’t be able to wear the exact shirt. Nevertheless, the lesson is clear: if worn with confidence (and a great pair of dark pants), nicely patterned floral shirt can do wonders. We dig this one from H&M.

Buy Now $12

The Grey Suit from Rogue Nation

The suit, worn by Cruise as he clings to that airplane in the beginning of Rogue One, was custom-made with reinforced seams that could withstand such intense wind. This Armani suit is a close copy. Just know that it will likely rip if you spend time hanging from a fuselage.

The Leather Jacket from Rogue Nation

This jacket, which Cruise wears for the majority of Rogue Nation , is all about the texture. Purposely textured to appear as though it has wrinkles, the jacket, made by Barney’s has a well-worn, timeless feel.

Buy Now $999

Every product on Fatherly is independently selected by our editors, writers, and experts. If you click a link on our site and buy something, we may earn an affiliate commission.

• Entertainment
• The True Story Behind the Movie <em>American Made</em>

The True Story Behind the Movie American Made

American Made , the new Tom Cruise crime drama out Sept. 29, has all the makings of a romp: drug running and arms smuggling. An FBI sting. Enough cold, hard cash to make the phenomenon of raining money a plausible ecological scenario. And a sex scene in the cockpit of a plane. That’s flying through the air. With one participant being the pilot. Did we mention it’s Tom Cruise?

If it sounds like an exercise in screenwriting excess, it’s not entirely — the film takes as its inspiration the true story of Adler Berriman “Barry” Seal, a TWA pilot who became a drug smuggler for the Medellín Cartel and, later, an informant for the DEA. It’s an ideal vehicle for Cruise, a.k.a. Maverick , whose mischievous swagger is accented here (literally) with a Louisiana drawl.

The movie hardly purports to be a documentary — director Doug Liman, who reteams with Cruise after Edge of Tomorrow , has referred to it as “a fun lie based on a true story.” And perhaps its looseness with the facts is for the best, as conflicting accounts make it difficult to get a clear picture on certain aspects of Seal’s seemingly made-for-the-movies life. It’s a thorny story that takes place against the backdrop of the Reagan-era War on Drugs and the notorious Iran-Contra affair , with Seal never hesitating to do business with opposing sides, so long as the payout was prodigious.

Here’s what we know about Seal — and what’s still up for debate.

MORE: Review: American Made Lets a Smug Tom Cruise Just Be Tom Cruise

Fact: Seal was an unusually talented young pilot.

According to Smuggler’s End: The Life and Death of Barry Seal — written by retired FBI agent Del Hahn, who worked on the task force that went after Seal in the ’80s — Seal obtained his student pilot license at 15 and became fully licensed at 16. His instructor was so impressed by his natural talent that he allowed him to fly solo after only eight hours of training. After serving in the National Guard and Army Reserve, he became a pilot with TWA, among the youngest command pilots to operate a Boeing 707.

Fact: He had a colorful personality.

As Cruise plays him, Seal was a blend of balls and braggadocio, fond of stunts and rarely registering the possibilities of danger or failure. According to Hahn, Seal’s high school yearbook photo was accompanied by the inscription, “Full of fun, full of folly.” His flight instructor described him as wild and fearless and generally unconcerned with the consequences of his actions. In an interview with Vice , Hahn says Seal was personable but “not as smart and clever as he thought he was.”

Partly Fiction: He was married to a woman named Lucy and they had three kids.

Sarah Wright plays Seal’s delightfully foul-mouthed wife in the movie, alternately exasperated by his schemes and enthralled by the riches they bring. In reality, Seal was married three times and had five children. He had a son and daughter with first wife Barbara Bottoms, whom he married in 1963 and subsequently divorced. He then married Linda McGarrh Ross in 1971, divorcing a year later, before marrying Deborah Ann DuBois, with whom he would go on to have three children, in 1974.

Fiction: The government first took notice of his smuggling when he was transporting Cuban cigars.

While the film depicts Seal’s foray into smuggling as beginning with Cuban cigars, his first documented run-in with the law for a smuggling offense took place in 1972 when he was one of eight people arrested for a plot to smuggle explosives out of the U.S. Though he wasn’t convicted, he lost his job with TWA. By 1976, according to Hahn, he had moved onto marijuana, and within a couple of years graduated to cocaine, which was less bulky, less sniffable by dogs and generally more profitable.

Fact: He smuggled drugs in through the Louisiana coast.

Seal and the pilots he recruited — including one he met in jail and his first wife’s brother — trafficked drugs over the border of his home state. As in the movie, he sometimes delivered them by pushing packed duffel bags out of his plane and into the Atchafalaya basin, to be retrieved by partners on the ground.

Mostly Fiction: Seal was chummy with the leaders of Colombia’s Medellín Cartel, including Pablo Escobar and the Ochoa brothers.

In the movie, Seal meets the cartel big wigs early on. In reality, Hahn writes, he did not deal with them directly, and they referred to him only as “El Gordo,” or “The Fat Man.” He finally met with them in April 1984 when he was working with the DEA on a sting operation intended to lead to their capture. (That operation would go awry when Seal’s status as an informant was revealed in a Washington Times cover story months later.)

Fact: Seal offered to cooperate with the DEA to stay out of prison.

The DEA was onto Seal for a long time before securing an indictment against him in March 1983 on several counts, including conspiracy to distribute methaqualone and possession with intent to distribute Quaaludes. As the movie suggests, there was some confusion among government agencies intent on taking him down.

His initial attempt to make a deal with a U.S. attorney, offering information on the Ochoa family, was rejected. But in March 1984, he traveled to Washington to the office of the Vice President’s Drug Task Force and cut a deal on the strength of his intel on and connections to the cartel.

Contested: He worked for many years alongside the CIA.

The film has Seal’s involvement with the CIA beginning in the late 1970s, relatively early on in his smuggling career. Under the handling of an agent played by Domhnall Gleeson, Cruise’s Seal gathers intelligence by flying low over Guatemala and Nicaragua and snapping photos from his plane. Later, the CIA turns a blind eye to his drug smuggling in exchange for his delivery of arms to the Contras in Nicaragua, who the U.S. government was attempting to mobilize against the leftist Sandinistas, who controlled the government. The movie even suggests that the CIA helped set Seal up with his very own airport in the small town of Mena, Ark.

According to Hahn’s book, rumors of Seal’s involvement with the CIA anytime before 1984 were just that — rumors. The only confirmed connection between Seal and the CIA turned up by Hahn’s research was in 1984, after Seal had begun working as an informant for the DEA. The CIA placed a hidden camera in a cargo plane Seal flew to pick up a cocaine shipment in Colombia. He and his copilot were able to obtain photographs that proved a link between the Sandinistas and the cartel, key intelligence for the Reagan administration in its plans to help overthrow the Sandinistas’ regime. But the final piece of the operation — a celebration of the successful cocaine transport, at which the Ochoas and Escobar were to be arrested all at once — never happened because of the revelation of Seal’s status as an informant.

Fact: Seal was assassinated in 1986.

Jorge Ochoa reportedly ordered a hit on Seal early in 1986. At the time, Seal was living in a Baton Rouge Salvation Army facility. Charges against him had not been fully erased as a result of his cooperation with the government, and he was sentenced to probation and six months residing at the treatment center. On the evening of Feb. 19, just after he parked his Cadillac, he was killed by two Colombian hitmen armed with machine guns.

Thanks in part to several witnesses, both men and four additional men who conspired in the killing were arrested within two days. Seal would go down as a legendary criminal, one of the most important witnesses in DEA history and — in Hollywood’s estimation, at least — a classic American story fit for only our most American onscreen hero.

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‘American Made’ - The True Story Behind the Tom Cruise Film

• Tom Cruise's dedication to his craft is best known, often risking his own life for stunning action sequences, much like the characters he portrays.
• American Made is based on the life of Barry Seal, a real American pilot involved in smuggling activities and recruited by the CIA for top-secret missions.
• While the film includes elements from Seal's life, certain segments were sensationalized for entertainment purposes, making it a "fun lie based on a true story."

Between Ethan Hunt, Jack Reacher, and Jerry Maguire, Tom Cruise has played more than a few wild characters whose lives are completely ridiculous. Cruise’s dedication to his craft is perhaps his best-known attribute, as he has often risked his own life for the sake of creating a stunning action sequence. Perhaps Cruise looks for roles that say something about his own personality; his characters often have the same cocky charm and unflinching bravery that he does. It only made sense that Cruise would play the real American pilot Barry Seal in American Made , as Seal was just as much of a character in real life. Although the 2017 biopic included many of Seal’s real adventures, the film only scratches the surface of what really happened.

American Made

The story of Barry Seal, an American pilot who became a drug-runner for the CIA in the 1980s in a clandestine operation that would be exposed as the Iran-Contra Affair.

Release Date September 29, 2017

Director Doug Liman

Cast Caleb Landry Jones, Tom Cruise, Domhnall Gleeson, Sarah Wright, Jesse Plemons

Runtime 115 minutes

Main Genre Action

Genres Comedy, Action, Crime

Studio Universal Pictures

What Is ‘American Made’ About?

American Made explores how the Louisiana commercial TWA pilot Barry Seal was recruited by the enigmatic CIA case officer Monty Schafer ( Domhnall Gleeson ), who discovered Seal’s illegal practice of smuggling Cuban cigars to Canada. While Seal claims that this is a common practice among commercial pilots, he realizes that any evidence of criminal activity on his part could cost him his job. To Seal’s surprise, Schafer isn’t there to catch Seal in action, but to recruit him for a top-secret mission. The CIA had taken note of Seal’s abilities; his adept flying skills make him virtually undetectable , and have made him into one of the most lucrative smugglers in the air. To waste Seal’s skills would be a disservice; Schafer wants Seal to help the CIA perform a series of top-secret reconnaissance missions in Central America as they observe the ongoing cartel war.

Seal agrees, and begins using the CIA’s retrofitted twin-engine Piper Smith Aerostar 600 to fly throughout Central America, taking photos of the ongoing conflict. Although Seal initially tells his wife Lucy ( Sarah Wright ) that his trips are nothing more than a series of routine flights for TWA, she quickly realizes that the cash that he is bringing home is not befitting of a standard commercial pilot. Seal has a knack for adventure, and doesn’t mind taking a few risky missions if it’s on the government’s watch. However, he begins to take on more dangerous assignments once Schafer asks him to serve as a commissary between the United States intelligence services and General Manuel Noriega, the authoritarian dictator that ruled Panama with an iron fist. While a standard CIA officer may have had trouble connecting with Noriega, Seal’s unofficial status made the Central American leaders less suspicious . Seal finds that he is in somewhat of a middle ground between the two parties; he isn’t technically a spy or a criminal.

The 10 Most Underrated Tom Cruise Movies, Ranked

Seal soon learns that playing both sides can be even more lucrative than his initial assignment. After returning from a surveillance mission, the Medellin Cartel recruits Seal to smuggle cocaine back into the United States. Instead of landing in official airports where he could be intercepted by U.S. officials, Seal chooses to dump his cargo outside in the Louisiana countryside. While the CIA begins to turn a blind eye to Seal’s activities due to their previous agreement, the DEA does not have any patience for him . Seal is tracked down by DEA and FBI agents as he continues to serve as an emissary for various cartel leaders. The situation grows dangerous when Seal becomes caught within the warring factions he represents. His eccentric brother-in-law JB ( Caleb Landry Jones ) is killed by a carb bomb planted by the Medellin Cartel after his reckless spending gains the attention of the FBI.

While Seal is initially caught by the FBI, he’s able to use his connections with central intelligence to broker a deal with The White House. Seal knows too many secrets about the country’s overseas activities and intervention in the drug war that he holds a surprising amount of leverage. However, Seal ended up paying the price for JB’s recklessness. After photos of Seal are released by the White House as propaganda, the CIA shuts down their convert program and ends up leaving Seal out to dry. Seal is convicted and sentenced for his crimes, but only ends up doing community service. Ironically, jail may have actually protected him, a s Seal lives his last few days on the run . He continues moving from motel to motel as he avoids detection by the CIA and cartel. A car bomb kills Seal, but the CIA declines to make any official comments about his actions; Schafer actually ends up getting a promotion for the initial pitch he had made to Seal.

How Much of ‘American Made’ Is True?

While the events of American Made are based on Seal’s actual life, certain segments of the story were sensationalized for the sake of making an entertaining film. Director Doug Liman , who previously helmed Cruise in the 2014 science fiction film Edge of Tomorrow , admitted that the film is “a fun lie based on a true story.” American Made may have been one of Cruise’s best films in recent years, but it is not intended (or pretending to be) an entirely factual account of what actually happened to Seal.

Certain elements of the film are true; the real Seal did obtain his pilot’s license by the time that he was a teenager, and used his connections to the cartels and CIA to help negotiate his way out of a prison sentence with the DEA . Seal’s exact deal with the CIA is largely contested, as many details surrounding his actual assignments remain classified. Seal’s assassination in 1968 by two Columbian hitmen was observed by many witnesses. While reports indicate that Seal’s personality was indeed as colorful as Cruise made it out to be, the film’s notion that he was friendly with the Central American drug lords is largely fictional. Similarly, the real Seal did marry a woman named Lucy, but most elements of their relationship were dramatized for the sake of the film.

American Made is one of Cruise’s stronger efforts in recent years. While it’s great to see him reprise his role as Ethan Hunt and continue his legacy as the greatest action star of the generation, Cruise is often a much better actor than he is given credit for. It’s easy to forget that one of his breakthrough roles was in Oliver Stone ’s biopic Born on the Fourth of July . It’s interesting to see Cruise strip away his persona to play a real person, but any notion that American Made is a “realistic” depiction of Seal’s life is entirely preposterous.

American Made is now available to rent or buy on Prime Video.

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American Made: All Locations Where The Tom Cruise Starrer Was Filmed

Known for his action-packed thrillers with serious character development, ‘ American Made ’ sees visionary auteur Doug Liman team up with Tom Cruise following their collaboration in ‘ Edge of Tomorrow .’ The action-comedy drama film provides a fictionalized account of true political events of the late 1970s and 80s, especially the Iran-Contra scandal. It follows the story of Barry Seal, an enigmatic personality who was central to the affair, and the consequences of actions this adventurous spirit couldn’t handle.

Starting off as a playful pilot, Seal has a family he needs to care for while being away all the time to work for the CIA. Cruise is joined by Domhnall Gleeson, Jesse Plemons, Sarah Wright, and Jayma Mays in this adventure to depict Seal’s lifestyle. The film provides an adrenalin rush on land and in the air, where there are plenty of scenic moments, which were performed by Cruise himself as a licensed pilot. Since the movie is based in different parts of the country, it naturally raises questions about where it was taped.

American Made Filming Locations

‘American Made’ was filmed in several locations in Georgia, Colombia, and Louisiana, specifically in Atlanta, Medellin, and New Orleans. While principal photography commenced on May 18, 2015, in Georgia, it took significant time to film different parts of the movie in plenty of specific locations. With the Georgia locations wrapped up by July 12, 2015, the team moved its filming to Colombia, where Tom Cruise and Liman decided to be adventurous and explored the jungles to scout locations ideal for the shoot.

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After a decision was made, the part of the filming in Colombia began on August 26, 2015, and concluded on September 11, 2015, coinciding with a real-life tragedy where two people were killed in a plane crash when the crew members of the production team were returning to Medellin. After this incident, the filming resumed much later on February 3, 2016, in Louisiana and wrapped up just a few days later by February 11, 2016. The filming process post mostly involved reshoots back in Georgia in 2017 from January to February. Let’s learn more about the specific locations where the film was taped.

Cherokee County, Georgia

Most of the filming for ‘American Made’ took place in Georgia, with a very crucial part shot in Ball Ground in Cherokee County. In the movie, the Seal family had to flee their house in Louisiana for a safer home in Mena, Arkansas. The filming for all the scenes set in Mena was actually done in Ball Ground, at Gilmer Ferry Road, where the set for the ranch house was prepared.

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The set decoration team progressed in its efficiency along with the plot, adding plenty of renovations and additions to the set to depict the result of Seal’s financial success from his dealings with the cartel. Even the streets of the area were modified slightly to provide the feel of the 80s era, including the installation of plenty of payphones that Seal had to keep using. Even the Nicaraguan airstrip, from where Seal conducts his operations, was shot at the Cherooke airport, located at 1350 Bishop Rd, Ball Ground, GA 30107.

Atlanta, Georgia

Many other scenes for the film were shot in and around Atlanta, the capital city of Georgia. A lot of scenes show Seal on a plane, especially in Atlanta, which were shot at Atlanta Media Campus at 6305 Crescent Drive in Norcross. Close to Atlanta, the scene where the CIA operative gives Seal a private aircraft to fly at a hangar is shot in Candler Field, Williamson. Another training facility was prepared within two days just north of Atlanta in Roswell, where an empty field was chosen as the filming spot.

Interestingly, the scenes set in Louisiana’s Baton Rouge, where the Seal family initially lives, were actually shot in Roswell, too, on the first day of filming. These were exactly taped at 640 Brickleberry Court. Plenty of other scenes and sets had to be located in different parts of Atlanta and some surrounding areas that were chosen within Georgia, such as Clayton, DeKalb, Fulton, and Gwinnett. Other locations that were a part of the film were Morgan, Madison, and Pickens within Georgia. The sets like the CIA office and even offices for George Bush and Olive North had to be built from scratch.

Medellin, Colombia

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Since a friendship between Seal and Pablo Escobar’s Medellin Cartel is depicted in the film, some scenes were also shot in Colombia, especially in Medellin. However, due to the unfortunate incident with the production crew, the shooting was wrapped up in a few days. Some parts were also filmed in Santa Marta in Colombia, where the scenic locations proved to be ideal, especially for the flying scenes. A few scenes were likely lensed at Aeroparque Juan Pablo II, a famous waterpark at Cra. 70 #16, Guayabal in Medellín. Nonetheless, all the shooting in these areas was wrapped up within a couple of days before resuming the reshoots in Georgia.

New Orleans, Louisiana

The initial part of ‘American Made’ is based in Baton Rouge, which is a few miles away from New Orleans in Louisiana. This part depicts the time in the lives of the Seal family before they shifted to Arkansas. It showcases the members residing in their suburban home when Seal is still a commercial pilot. As per reports, the shooting period in Louisiana was very brief, with a few aerial shots over Bayou State and one scene in the film at the airport where a vintage New Orleans poster is visible.

Read More: American Made Review: Tom Cruise Delivers

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Screen Rant

Sam wilson's new captain america costume gets best look yet in official brave new world image.

Sam Wilson's new superhero costume for Captain America: Brave New World gets its best look yet, and The Leader's role in the MCU movie is revealed.

• Anthony Mackie will lead in Captain America: Brave New World with a classic dark blue superhero suit.
• The suit is similar to Steve Rogers' stealth suit from The Winter Soldier but retains unique elements.
• Sam Wilson stands between the government and The Leader in the MCU film's grounded storyline.

A new Captain America: Brave New World image shows a great look at Sam Wilson's dark blue superhero suit. Anthony Mackie will be back as Sam Wilson in the Marvel Cinematic Universe next year. After The Falcon and the Winter Soldier , Mackie will get the chance to lead Captain America: Brave New World 's ambitious story , which will place the MCU's new Sentinel of Liberty in the middle of a Captain America: The Winter Soldier -style grounded thriller.

Empire has shared a look at Sam Wilson's new costume in Captain America: Brave New World .

Sam Wilson donned his iconic white Captain America suit from the comics in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier 's finale. Mackie will now lead Captain America: Brave New World 's characters while wearing a more classic dark blue costume. According to Captain America: Brave New World director Julius Onah, " Sam finds himself almost standing between Samuel Sterns [The Leader] and what he thinks the government owes him, and how he wants to go about getting that ."

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How sam wilson's captain america suit differs from steve rogers', it looks most like the captain america: the winter soldier stealth suit.

Sam Wilson's most famous Captain America costume is the white one he wore in T he Falcon and the Winter Soldier finale. That suit is very different from any of the Captain America costumes Chris Evans' Steve Rogers wore throughout his MCU appearances . The reason Sam has opted to change his look could be due to a few elements. The simple answer is that Marvel Studios likes to give heroes a new suit with each appearance. Given Captain America: Brave New World 's more grounded story, the darker suit could have been chosen to fit the film's tone.

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There are some elements in Sam's Captain America: Brave New World costume that can be compared to Steve Rogers' superhero suits. As both movies are said to have similar tones, the dark blue costume Sam wears is likely a throwback to Steve Rogers' suit from Captain America: The Winter Soldier , which he wore for stealth reasons. However, the new Captain America suit also sports the red and white color scheme of most of Steve's Captain America costumes for Sam, mixing a stealth look with that of Captain America's classic representation of the US.

Despite the similarities, there are still a few differences between Sam Wilson's Captain America: Brave New World costume and Steve Rogers' suits. Instead of having a helmet like Steve had on multiple suits, Sam Wilson opted to sport a red visor. That helps him in a way Steve Rogers never needed, as Sam Wilson will still have wings on his Captain America suit despite not being the Falcon anymore. Sam also seems to wear gauntlets instead of gloves like Steve's, making his look a little more unique in Captain America: Brave New World .

Captain America: Brave New World

Captain America: Brave New World (formerly titled New World Order)  marks Sam Wilson's first MCU big-screen appearance as Steve Rogers' successor after receiving the suit and shield in Phase 4's The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Anthony Mackie returns as the titular Avenger alongside Danny Ramirez as Joaquin Torres, Carl Lumby as Isaiah Bradley, and Tim Blake Nelson as The Incredible Hulk's former ally Samuel Sterns. Harrison Ford makes his MCU debut replacing the late William Hurt as Thaddeus Ross.

Source: Empire