There are reasons for me not to be a fan of Tom Cruise, but I will not be getting into them.  Whatever the case, he makes some pretty good films.  There are some duds, of course.  I do not enjoy his Mission Impossible franchise, and there are some other movies of his that have not fit my fancy.  In any case, despite being more known as an action star, it is his forays into comedy that I think I like the most.  It is good to have some levity.  That is a principle that applies to faith as much as anything else in life.  It can also be difficult to let go of what you are good at, especially if it makes you money.  In Knight and Day (2010), you have a combination of these things for Cruise, sans the faith, sadly.  It sort of works, too.

What June Havens (Cameron Diaz) is working on at the beginning of Knight and Day is returning to Boston, Massachusetts, after traveling to the Midwest for car parts.  As somebody who restores classic vehicles, she claims that places like Wichita, Kansas, are the best places to find needed components.  While walking through the airport, she is spotted by Roy Miller (Tom Cruise), who bumps into her before and after going through the security checkpoint.  At the gate, despite having a ticket, the attendant tries to say that she is not on the list and deny her entry.  He happens to be on the same flight and is allowed to board, telling her it is a sign before continuing.  To his surprise, she eventually talks her way onto the plane, and they chat as they take off.  A bond is forming between them, but he also appears to be a little distracted by the other passengers.  We see the reason why as she is in the restroom applying makeup and psyching herself up to take their interaction further.  While she is taking her time, he is attacked by everyone else, including the pilots.  He is able to subdue them all before she re-emerges, boldly kissing him.  Nothing seems amiss until she glances towards the cockpit and notices the door ajar.  This is when he admits that they are all dead, including the pilots, and he goes to try to land the plane.  It is more of a controlled crash in Midwestern corn fields, but they are able to walk away from it.  They do not get far before he stops her to warn about her impending arrest.  He predicts that authorities will soon come for her, but to tell them nothing, and that if they offer protection, it means they plan to kill her.  He says all this after giving her a drug that knocks her out, and she wakes up in her bed in Boston.  Her hopes that it had been a nightmare are compromised by a number of notes he leaves around the apartment, and by the incident with the plane being reported on the news.  Nonetheless, she goes to her sister’s, April Havens (Maggie Grace), dress fitting for April’s upcoming wedding.  Seeing some suspicious people watching her, she tries to leave but is picked up by John Fitzgerald (Peter Sarsgaard) of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).  He feeds June all the lines Roy had predicted would be said to her, including how their offer of safety actually meant her impending murder.  Before this can happen, Roy locates the car in which she is being transported and comes to her rescue.  However, because she still does not trust him, she runs and finds her ex-boyfriend, Rodney (Marc Blucas), a firefighter.  She tries to tell Rodney everything going on, but he does not believe her and is wounded by Roy.  Once more, June is in Roy’s care, and he suggests that the only way she has a chance of staying alive is by sticking with him.  Seeing the skill he has already displayed, she accepts.  With it also comes some confidence, and he reveals that he is in possession of a special battery that has the capacity to power a small city.  Their next move is to collect its inventor, Simon Feck (Paul Dano), whom Roy had left in a safe house in New York.  Unfortunately, he is not there and they are attacked by armed men working for Antonio Quintana (Jordi Mollá), a Spanish weapons dealer who wants the device.  Due to her hysterics, Roy again drugs June, and she wakes up on his private tropical island where he thinks they are safe.  Their security is compromised when she attempts to answer a phone call from April.  Now that their location has been determined, the CIA’s counter-terrorism director, Isabel George (Viola Davis), launches a drone strike.  Once more, June must be knocked out, and this time she awakens on a train in Austria where they collect Simon.  They stop in Salzburg, where June follows Roy to a secret meeting with Antonio where she believes her protector is trying to sell the device.  Not knowing what to believe anymore, she allows herself to be taken by the CIA and brought to John and Isabel.  They release her with a device to signal the location of the battery, which Roy brings to their planned dinner later that night.  Upon triggering the locator, they are swarmed by CIA operatives, but he makes his escape, seemingly shot in the process and falling into a river.  She is sent home where she is able to attend April’s wedding.  Yet, while looking over the car she had intended to gift to the newlyweds, she suddenly misses Roy.  Remembering an address she had seen on his phone, it being not far from Boston, she drives there and discovers it is his parents.  They think he died fighting in the military, but looking around their house demonstrates that he had been honest about everything else.  Thus, she hatches a plan to find Roy by signaling to Antonio that she has the battery.  She is taken to his Sevilla headquarters.  On the way there, too, is John, who had captured Simon and has been trying to pull off the plan of which Roy had been accused.  Of course, Roy is there, too, and following a chase through the streets of Sevilla, it comes down to John, Roy, and Simon on a dock.  Roy trades the battery for Simon, and John takes off in a small plane, but not before attempting to shoot Simon.  Yet, the device proves unstable, blowing up before John can get far.  It is Roy that prevents Simon from being shot, being wounded in the process.  When he comes to in the hospital, it is with Isabel there to give him some veiled threats.  This time, it is June that does the rescuing, and they drive off to South America together.

I do not know if what you see in Knight and Day is a recipe for a healthy relationship.  After all, it involves drugging and lying, to name two of the many unconventional ways in which this courtship unfolds.  Then again, maybe this still single guy is not the best person to be giving advice.  Nonetheless, one cliché that often comes up when two people get together is whether their relationship is fated.  This has a Christian component since, at different points in history, there have been those who have claimed that they are destined to be in Heaven no matter what they do on Earth.  Catholics do not believe in predestination, and this is a bit too philosophical a discussion for this movie.  At the same time, Roy says something pertinent on this score.  Before he and June get on the plane, he tells her that everything happens for a reason when she is told she cannot board.  He says this as a throwaway line, the kind of thing you tell someone who has experienced a bit of rotten luck in order to cheer them.  Later, it can be inferred that had she not convinced the gate attendant to let her on, she would not have fallen in love.  One can twist their brains around in many directions trying to see God’s hand in such a situation.  On the surface, the cliché about things happening for a reason is true.  If we are following God’s plan for our lives, it can be an explanation for everything that ever happens to us.  There is also peace in accepting things as they are, not as we want them to be.  This is different than saying that June and Roy are destined to meet each other and fall in love.  Then again, this is Hollywood, where stories are prone to flights of fancy.  A more Catholic way of looking at June and Roy’s relationship is the mutual way for which they care for one another.  The willingness to risk one’s life for a person they love, no matter who they are, is as Christian an ideal as there is.

Nonetheless, there is not much else that is Christian about Knight and Day.  It is fine as these things go, with nothing too objectionable.  Cruise and Diaz do well together on the screen, and if you care about such things, then there is your raison d’être.  Otherwise, meh.