Tom Cruise Showed Up At CinemaCon and Paid Tribute To Val Kilmer And 'How Much He Loved Movies'

It's been just two days since Top Gun and Batman Forever actor Val Kilmer died at the age of 65 years old. Tom Cruise is at CinemaCon to promote the next Mission: Impossible movie at the Paramount Pictures panel. When he took to the stage to talk The Final Reckoning, Cruise took some time to honor Kilmer.

When Cruise addressed CinemaCon, he said something that led to an eruption of cheers from the audience. In his words:

Tom Cruise and Val Kilmer have known each other for 40 years, so it can't be an easy week for the action star. Here's what he told the crowd at the convention, which CinemaBlend was in attendance to hear:

After that, Cruise requested a moment of silence from the The Colosseum crowd just prior to changing the subject to talking about the four-time Mission: Impossible director, Christopher McQuarrie and presenting a new trailer for Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning to follow the first teaser from November. Here he is at the event:

According to Val Kilmer's daughter Mercedes (per The New York Times), the actor died on Tuesday night from pneumonia in Los Angeles surrounded by family and friends. Previously, Kilmer dealt with throat cancer that required two tracheotomies, but recovered from them.

In 2020, he shared that he had been cancer-free for four years, but was still dealing with medical treatments associated with the fallout. As a result of the surgeries he'd been using an electric voice box in his trachea in order to talk and required a feeding tube to eat.

The actor had slowed down working in Hollywood in recent years, but he did notably return as Iceman for Maverick. As director Joseph Kosinski told CinemaBlend's ReelBlend podcast, Cruise and producer Jerry Bruckheimer were "adamant" about bringing him him back.

Kosinski also told us that after they called the actor it was Kilmer who "cracked how he could be in it" and created a scene that saw the previous rivals now as friends and wingmen. The Maverick director said the scene was "very emotional" for Cruise to shoot with Kilmer.

Along with Kilmer's role in Maverick, and releasing a documentary called Val in 2021, he's of course known for being a movie star since the 1980s. His early work had Kilmer starring in Real Genius, playing Jim Morrison in The Doors and starring in classics like Tombstone, Heat and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.

This was such a sweet tribute from Tom Cruise. It follows Jim Carrey also taking some time to speak about Val Kilmer after his death this week. We'll be watching all the best Val Kilmer movies now to remember the late actor further.