Knight and Day is a 2010 American satirical action comedy film directed by James Mangold and starring Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz. The film was the second on-screen collaboration of Cruise and Diaz after Vanilla Sky (2001). The film follows June Havens (Diaz), a classic car restorer, who unwittingly gets caught up with Roy Miller (Cruise), an eccentric secret agent, as Roy is on the run from the CIA.
The film's investors offset funding costs by paying Cruise a lower advance fee and providing him a share of revenue only after the financiers were repaid their investment in the production. Filming took place in several locations, mainly in several cities located in Massachusetts, while other scenes were filmed in Spain and parts of Austria and Jamaica.
Knight and Day was released in the United States by 20th Century Fox on June 23, 2010, and received mixed reviews from critics with praise for its action sequences and the performances of Cruise and Diaz, but criticized its script. The film grossed $262 million worldwide and was remade in Hindi as Bang Bang!, with Hrithik Roshan and Katrina Kaif in the lead roles.
Plot
June Havens, who is returning home to Boston from buying car parts in Wichita, collides with Roy Miller at the airport, and is bumped to a later flight. John Fitzgerald, a CIA agent, assumes June is working with Roy and puts her back on the plane.
On the plane, while June is in the restroom, Roy subdues the passengers and flight crew, who are agents sent by Fitzgerald, and crash-lands the plane in a cornfield. Drugging the shocked June, Roy warns that agents will come after her. Waking at home, she prepares for her sister April's wedding.
June learns April wants to sell their father's 1966 Pontiac GTO tri-power, which June had planned to restore as a wedding gift. She is picked up by Fitzgerald and his agents. Roy appears and rescues her, while also killing numerous agents in a highway chase.
June flees to her ex-boyfriend Rodney, a firefighter, before Roy arrives and pretends to take her hostage, shooting Rodney in the process. He convinces June she is safer with him and reveals that he has the Zephyr, a perpetual energy battery and that he had been assigned to guard its inventor Simon Feck, until Fitzgerald tried to steal the battery, framing Roy.
In Brooklyn, June and Roy discover Feck has gone into hiding, but left Roy a clue that he is in the Alps. They are attacked by henchmen sent by Antonio Quintana, a Spanish arms dealer. June gets drugged again and drifts in-and-out of consciousness as they are captured and then escape to Roy's off-the-grid island.
Accepting a call from her sister, June accidentally leads Quintana's men to the hideout. Escaping Quintana's unmanned aerial assault vehicle in a helicopter, Roy knocks June out to circumvent her fear of flying in the tiny helicopter.
June wakes up aboard a train in Austria, where Roy has reunited with Feck, and they manage to kill Bernhard, an assassin hired by Quintana. After checking into a hotel in Salzburg, June follows Roy to a meeting with Naomi, Quintana's henchwoman, where he offers to sell the Zephyr.
Fitzgerald and CIA Director Isabel George finds June and reveal Roy used her at the airport to smuggle the Zephyr past security. Heartbroken, June leads them to the hotel. Fleeing across the rooftops, Roy is shot and falls into the river with the Zephyr.
Feck is kidnapped from CIA custody by Fitzgerald, the real traitor, to be delivered to Quintana in Spain. Returning home, June attends her sister's wedding, and visits an address Roy had been monitoring, where she meets his parents and learns his real name is Matthew Knight.
His parents believe their son, an Army sergeant and Eagle Scout, was killed in action and have won various lotteries and sweepstakes they do not remember entering. Leaving a message on her own answering machine declaring she has the Zephyr, June is taken by Quintana's men to Seville.
Drugged with a prototype truth serum, June explains that Roy's deal with Quintana was meant to alert the CIA so June would be returned home safely in time for the wedding. Roy tracks Fitzgerald, rescues June and leads Quintana and his men on a car chase.
Quintana is killed by a bull stampede and Roy trades the Zephyr to Fitzgerald for Feck. Fitzgerald shoots at Feck anyway, but Roy takes the bullet. Right after Feck reveals that the battery is unstable it explodes, killing Fitzgerald.
Roy is hospitalized in Washington, D.C., where George tells him June has moved on and welcomes him back to the CIA. However, George's coded language reveals that he will be killed. June, disguised as a nurse, drugs Roy and breaks him out of the hospital. Waking up in the rebuilt GTO, Roy and June drive towards Cape Horn and his parents unexpectedly receive their own tickets there.
Cast
Production Development Before film director James Mangold signed on to Knight and Day, it was previously associated with director Tom Dey. More than 12 writers contributed to the film. The Writers Guild of America, West, decided that due to this large number of contributors, only Patrick O'Neill, who had worked on the beginning layout of the script, would get credit. Other writers that worked on the film's script included Scott Frank, Laeta Kalogridis, Ted Griffin, Dana Fox, and Simon Kinberg.
Casting The film changed lead cast members multiple times while the production was mired in "development hell". Prior to finalizing on actors Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz, when the film was titled Wichita, comedian and actor Adam Sandler was offered a starring role in the film; he declined, saying, "I just don't see me with a gun." Wichita was developed under production at Revolution Studios; the film was later moved to Sony Pictures. At Sony Pictures, actors Chris Tucker and Eva Mendes were slated to portray the two lead roles in the film; it was titled Trouble Man and intended as a romantic vehicle film for the two actors.
After Tucker and Mendes dropped out of the lead roles, Diaz signed on to the film with Sony Pictures, and actor Gerard Butler met with production staff regarding starring opposite Diaz. Butler instead decided to take on the lead role in the film The Bounty Hunter, opposite actress Jennifer Aniston. Cruise, who at the time was auditioning for parts in five films, including Salt, and The Tourist, decided he wanted to star in Knight and Day, and he wanted to modify the role of the male lead character with his own ideas.
Financing The film's production partners, New Regency and Dune Entertainment, offset financing for the film by paying Tom Cruise a lower advance fee than he normally received. Cruise previously normally received $20 million or higher in an advance fee, but he only received $11 million for Knight and Day. Cruise also agreed not to receive first-dollar gross, which was customary for him. That meant that Cruise would not receive a share of the film's revenue until Knight and Day funding investors had first gained back their investment in the production. In total, production costs for the film exceeded $125 million.
Filming Principal photography began in mid-September 2009 in Boston and Bridgewater. Airport terminal scenes were filmed at Worcester Regional Airport. Filming also took place in Melrose, Danvers, and New Bedford, Massachusetts. Filming was also done in Spanish cities Seville and Cádiz, the Austrian city of Salzburg, and the Jamaican town of Port Antonio.
Music
The Black Eyed Peas recorded a theme song for the film, titled "Someday".Black Eyed Peas new Song Someday ('Knight and Day' theme) for Upcoming Tom Cruise/Cameron Diaz Movie
Marketing
Knight and Day had been set for a June 25, 2010, release date, but FOX moved its debut up two days to June 23; in the face of poor initial tracking numbers. The New York Observer analyzed the marketing for the film, which included an attempt at pushing a "viral video" of the two main stars; journalist Christopher Rosen commented on the desperation level of the publicity campaign, "the marketing for this thing has seemed more intrusive and desperate than any other big-ticket release in some time." Film producer Don Carmody commented negatively regarding the film's trailer, calling it "dull", and said the film would not do well because of the age of its two stars, "Cameron Diaz I think was a star, but she's no longer a star. Some of those stars are getting a little up there (in age)." The Hollywood Reporter noted that "potential viewers remain startlingly indifferent to whether they actually end up seeing it. And attention thus far is still drawn mostly by those under 25, which indicates that the fans who grew up with star Tom Cruise have moved on."
FOX attempted to increase word of mouth advertising for the film by showing a sneak preview on June 19, 2010; the Los Angeles Times reported the same day that pre-release surveys determined that the film was likely to become a commercial flop. Projections indicated that the film would only make $20 million at the box office; much less than the film production cost of $125 million. alternate link FOX production President Emma Watts said of the film's commercial prospects, "We aren't exactly where we hoped we would be." The Los Angeles Times noted that "... Cruise and Diaz are not as popular with younger moviegoers, who often drive big opening weekends in the summer. ... Among teenage and college-age males, the movie is barely registering, according to people who have seen the survey results." New York Magazine reported the film was "tracking miserably" before its first week. New York Magazine reported that "one of the film's biggest handicaps: its star, Tom Cruise". A FOX official commented to New York Magazine regarding the film's pre-release polling data, "at those numbers, we can't open the movie right now. Hopefully, they'll change in the next few days."
Upon hearing that tracking data on June 22, 2010, showed the film was not likely to produce revenue over $30 million in its first five days on screen, a FOX executive told TheWrap he was "confounded", and commented, "Tracking says one thing, but our sneak previews this weekend said something totally different. ... but if you look at the empirical data, we're nowhere." New York Magazine reported that the day before the film's release, a long scene from Knight and Day was made available on iTunes in an attempt to improve the lackluster 28–31% "definite interest" level of the movie. After results were reported from the film's initial debut, FOX distribution executive Bruce Snyder commented to The Hollywood Reporter, "It's an adult movie opening on a Wednesday, but we opened it there and snuck it on Saturday because we believe the word-of-mouth will be good, so we're set for a pretty good opening weekend. Remember, it's an original, adult movie, which we expect will run for quite a while."
Alternative versions An "extended cut", which adds eight minutes of footage mostly extending scenes and a new opening that better establishes June Haven's profession as a car restorer, was released on VOD in North America. it had not been released in DVD region 1, though it had been released in regions 2, 3, and 4.
Reception Box office