‘Top Gun: Maverick’ Director Discusses Paying Homage to the Iconic Beach Volleyball Scene
“Top Gun” is one of the most iconic films of the 1980s. But now, nearly four decades after its release, there are multiple aspects of the Tom Cruise film that remain iconic in themselves. The soundtrack, above all else, is one of the film’s hallmarks, eventually seeing just as much success as “Top Gun” the film. However, with “Top Gun: Maverick” to make its theater debut on Friday, fans will be treated to yet another iconic aspect of the film. While “Top Gun” is, in part, memorable for Tom Cruise’s iconic volleyball scene, “Top Gun: Maverick” director Joseph Kosinski revealed just how that scene will feature in the new movie.
During an exclusive with Screen Rant, Kosinski not only revealed how the creative team paid homage to Tom Cruise’s 1986 beach scene. He also shared some of the conversations leading up to the scene’s making.
“[W]hen people heard I was starting to prep this movie,” the “Top Gun: Maverick” director began, “everyone was asking me about the beach scene. I knew that was something we couldn’t avoid.”
So how exactly did writers incorporate the iconic scene into “Top Gun: Maverick”? With football.
As per the outlet, the Top Gun trainees head to the beach, where viewers get to watch them play football in wet jeans. However, adding the football scene to the script wasn’t as easy as it sounds.
“I didn’t want to do the scene just for the sake of doing it,” Kosinski explained. “Our screenwriting team came up with a really clever way of integrating that sequence into the story of our film. And then, when it came to that day, we had fun.”
‘Top Gun: Maverick’ Will Not be Streaming Any Time Soon
As one of the most look-forward-to films of the year, it’s disappointing that “Top Gun: Maverick” will not be available for streaming. And while some films tend to release across streaming platforms a month or two after their theater premiere, film star Tom Cruise is adamant the new movie will not be on Paramount Plus, or any other streaming platform for that matter, any time soon.
The Pete “Maverick” Mitchell actor explained his stance during a Q&A session at the Cannes Film Festival in Southern France earlier this month.
Simply put, he said a streaming premiere “never was going to happen, ever. I make movies for the big screen.”
Cruise did elaborate, though, that part of his decision to keep “Top Gun: Maverick” from streaming is because of the time he has spent with theater owners — “The people that serve the popcorn, the ones who make this (movie experience) happen.”
He specifically relayed the struggle of theater owners during the COVID-19 pandemic, sharing he called several of those individuals. While speaking with them he said, “Please, I know what you’re going through. Just know we are making ‘Mission: Impossible’ and ‘Top Gun’ is coming out.”
