Tom Cruise’s Amazing 1992 Legal Thriller Is Returning to Streaming Next Week

Courtroom dramas do not usually come with this much movie-star heat, but A Few Good Men is not a normal courtroom drama. It is the film that gave the world one of the most quoted shouting matches in Hollywood history, and it still plays like a proper event movie more than 30 years later. Even people who have never actually sat down and watched the whole thing probably know at least one line from it.

That is the kind of cultural staying power most legal dramas never get close to. Now it is getting a new free streaming home, with Tubi adding it on April 1. Directed by Rob Reiner and adapted from Aaron Sorkin’s play, the movie follows Navy lawyer Daniel Kaffee as he is assigned to defend two Marines accused of murdering a fellow soldier. What starts as a legal case becomes something much bigger as the story turns into a battle over military power, personal pride, chain-of-command loyalty, and how far people will go to protect the system they serve. Sorkin’s writing gives the film a lot of its punch, but it is the cast that really sends it into another league.

The cast includes Tom Cruise as Daniel Kaffee, Jack Nicholson as Colonel Jessup, Demi Moore as JoAnne Galloway, Kevin Bacon as Captain Ross, Kiefer Sutherland as Kendrick, and Kevin Pollak as Sam Weinberg.

Is ‘A Few Good Men’ Worth Watching?

Roger Ebert’s review stated that A Few Good Men is a solid, well-acted courtroom drama that ultimately holds itself back by over-explaining everything. The film clearly knows where it’s going and hits all its beats, but the review noted that it doesn’t trust the audience enough to figure things out on their own, which takes away a lot of the tension.

“Nicholson is always fun to watch, as he barks and snarls and improvises new obscenities. Cruise is an effective contrast, as the immature young officer who discovers himself. Bodison, the stubborn defendant, gives the most interesting performance in the movie, because we can see the battle going on inside and the movie allows it to happen almost as a separate scenario. But the movie doesn’t quite make it, because it never convinces us that the drama is happening while we watch it; it’s like the defense team sneaked an advance look at the script.”

A Few Good Men will stream on Tubi from April 1.