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Top Gun star Val Kilmer has died at the age of 65.
Kilmer, who played opposite Tom Cruise as “Iceman” in the 1986 action film and reprised the role for the 2022 sequel, Top Gun: Maverick, died of pneumonia, his daughter said in a statement.
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The actor was also known for playing Batman in Batman Forever and Jim Morrison in The Doors.
Diagnosed with throat cancer in 2014, Kilmer later recovered, though the experience damaged his vocal cords. He later premiered a documentary about his life, Val, at the Cannes film festival in 2021, which included footage he shot himself on a camcorder of his recovery process.
As Tom “Iceman” Kazansky in the original Top Gun film, Kilmer played a rival and foil to Tom Cruise’s Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, graduating at the top of his class.
Despite their hostile relationship, Iceman found respect for Maverick after being rescued from several enemy MiG-28s, prompting the famous Kilmer line, “You can be my wingman any time”.
The sequel, Top Gun: Maverick, which reportedly spurred then-prime minister Scott Morrison to hire an entire cinema for 50 of his staff to watch, was Tom Cruise’s first motion picture to cross the $1 billion mark and featured Kilmer in a cameo role, currently his last on-screen performance.
Maverick’s plot included the death of Iceman from cancer and his subsequent funeral.
The film, released 36 years after the original, won huge praise from critics, with The Daily Telegraph’s Robbie Collin branding it the best studio action film since 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road, and The Financial Times’ Danny Leigh arguing its storytelling “reminds you of the best version of old Hollywood”.
It was also the most-viewed movie on Qantas flights for the 2022 calendar year.
