Movie · 2017 · Comedy, Crime, Drama · 1h 55m · R · English
Curator score: 5.0/10 (446K ratings)
It's not a felony if you're doing it for the good guys.
Overview
The true story of pilot Barry Seal, who transported contraband for the CIA and the Medellin cartel in the 1980s.
Ratings
Curator score: 5.0/10
IMDb: 7.1/10
Letterboxd: 3.45/5
Rotten Tomatoes: 85%
Metacritic: 65
TMDB: 6.9/10
Director
Doug Liman
Production
Universal Pictures, Cross Creek Pictures, Imagine Entertainment, Vendian Entertainment, Quadrant Pictures, Hercules Film Fund
Cast
Tom Cruise, Domhnall Gleeson, Sarah Wright, Jesse Plemons, Caleb Landry Jones, Lola Kirke, Jayma Mays, Alejandro Edda, Benito Martinez, E. Roger Mitchell, Jed Rees, Fredy Yate, Mauricio Mejía, Robert Farrior, Morgan Hinkleman, Alberto Ospino, Felipe Bernedette, Daniel Lugo, Jayson Warner Smith, William Mark McCullough
Curator Review
Verdict
A slick, loose-limbed crime caper with a strong Tom Cruise performance, American Made is more entertaining than profound, but it moves fast and keeps the absurdity of its true story front and center. Its uneven visual style and sketchy historical compression are real drawbacks, yet the film’s energy, humor, and moral slipperiness make it an easy recommendation for viewers who like their crime dramas playful and chaotic.
Best for
Viewers who enjoy charismatic antiheroes
Fans of crime stories with dark humor
People interested in 1980s drug-and-CIA scandal material
Audiences who like breezy, fast-moving true-crime dramatizations
Skip if
You want rigorous historical accuracy
You dislike shaky, digital, faux-doc visual style
You prefer serious, grounded crime dramas
You need a tightly structured, emotionally deep character study
Overview
American Made works best as a hangout movie about a man who keeps stumbling into bigger and worse schemes. Tom Cruise plays Barry Seal with enough charm and weariness to make the character feel like a hustler who knows he is in over his head, even when the movie itself is skating on thin ice.
Worth noting
Doug Liman keeps the pace brisk and the tone lightly comic, which helps the film glide over some of its messier narrative and factual shortcuts. The result is less a sober biopic than a glossy, chaotic tour through 1980s corruption, where every deal seems funnier and more dangerous than the last.
Bottom line
It is not the most polished or emotionally resonant crime film of its era, but it has a scrappy entertainment value that sticks. If you can forgive the rough edges, it delivers a distinctly American mix of greed, absurdity, and self-destruction.
Top Letterboxd reviews
demi adejuyigbe · 1030 likes
Entertaining enough, and it’s fun to see Tom Cruise do something that asks him to be a bit more of a person than an action star, but every shot had me going “why it look like that”
Sean Fennessey · 747 likes
Without question the weirdest choice Cruise has made in the 21st century, not just because of Doug Litman’s decision to shoot the film like a Netflix documentary with mediocre re-enactments, shaky cam digital, and bizarre framing in every scene. But more so because it’s the antithesis of Late Cruise’s brand: it’s narratively baggy, he’s mortal and morally compromised, and when it ends you don’t think he’s the most impressive man alive. There’s something amusing about Maverick landing on dirt runways… more Without question the weirdest choice Cruise has made in the 21st century, not just because of Doug Litman’s decision to shoot the film like a Netflix documentary with mediocre re-enactments, shaky cam digital, and bizarre framing in every scene. But more so because it’s the antithesis of Late Cruise’s brand: it’s narratively baggy, he’s mortal and morally compromised, and when it ends you don’t think he’s the most impressive man alive. There’s something amusing about Maverick landing on dirt runways… more
Jacob Cunningham (4.5★) · 663 likes
It's so good that it made me forget that Tom Cruise was even in The Mummy.
Cameron Howe (4★) · 473 likes
Why the fuck was this so good?
Well I thought I'd edit this and tell you. It's interesting to watch. Tom Cruise is actually a lot of fun in this role (yeah, I don't know what year it is either) and Domnhall Gleeson is pretty good too. There's a couple of dumb choices mainly to do with camera work but that doesn't stop it being a fun action romp.
Griffin Newman · 457 likes
In France this movie is called BARRY SEAL: AMERICAN TRAFFIC, which is a far better title.
2013 · Crime, Drama, Comedy · 3h · R · Curator 7.9/10 (5.7M ratings) · Where to watch: Amazon Prime Video, Paramount Plus Premium, Paramount Plus Essential, AMC+, Philo, Amazon Prime Video with Ads
Shares the manic energy, moral rot, and comic excess of a hustler rising through chaos.