Politics May Have Just Killed Our Chances To See A Tom Cruise Movie Actually Shot In Space

It's not often at a science website that you get to cover Tom Cruise updates, but here is our chance to talk movies. A Tom Cruise space movie that was actually going to be shot in space has been canceled, reportedly for political reasons.

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Tom Cruise is well-known for performing a lot of his own stunts, occasionally motorbiking off a cliff, scaling tall buildings, and throwing himself out of planes with the confidence of a man who hasn't yet heard of gravity and/or death.

In 2020, NASA confirmed that the actor was working with them to shoot a movie in space, turning our orbiting laboratory temporarily into an orbiting movie set.

"NASA is excited to work with [Tom Cruise] on a film aboard the [International Space Station]!" then NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine wrote on X (then Twitter) in a now deleted post. "We need popular media to inspire a new generation of engineers and scientists to make NASA’s ambitious plans a reality."

"Should be a lot of fun!" SpaceX CEO Elon Musk added.

It could have been a lot of fun. Cruise was set to work with director Doug Liman, whom he previously worked with on the excellent time travel/alien invasion movie Edge of Tomorrow. According to the director, who also made The Bourne Identity and 2024's Road House, the focus was on making a great movie, though getting to float around in space around 408 kilometers (253 miles) above the Earth wouldn't exactly be a hassle.

"I’m more excited about going to space," Liman told Deadline in September 2025, "but our goal is too make something great. A lot of people are trying to do gimmicky things like, ‘Oh, it’s in space.’ I’m not interested in doing something that’s a just promotional gimmick. I want to make a film that people watch in a hundred years when maybe there’s hundreds of movies shot in outer space and there’s nothing special about it being in outer space."

There were a lot of hurdles to get through, as the ISS wasn't really designed to be a movie set. But with a movie budget, it would have at least been financially feasible.

But now, it appears that the project has been canceled. The actor, who has not made any political endorsements during his long career, reportedly did not want to ask President Donald Trump for the go ahead.

“From what I understand, they would need NASA coordination to do the movie, and supposedly Tom Cruise did not want to ask Donald Trump for a favor. You’d need permission from the federal government," a source close to the project told Page Six, adding "Tom didn’t want to ask for political reasons".

Earlier this year, Trump had attempted to honor Cruise with a Kennedy Center Honor, given out to people in the performing arts for "their lifetime of contributions to American culture". Cruise declined, per the Washington Post, citing "scheduling conflicts".

It's unclear what the logistics of making the movie would have entailed, or even the idea behind it. But it looks like, for now at least, the project has been shelved indefinitely. We may never get to see Tom Cruise in space.