Life is so much more than a box of chocolates to Tom Hanks.
On Nov. 10, the Oscar winner sat down with The Bill Simmons Podcast to talk about the favorite films he has worked on during his 40-year career in Hollywood. With nearly 100 films on his résumé and two Oscars, he has a lot to cherry-pick from, but the big ones that stand out have special ‘personal' meaning.
Tom told host Bill Simmons that working on 1992's A League of Their Own was like being a kid again.
"All I did all summer was play baseball," he said. "I shagged flies. I ate turkey dogs. I took infield with Robin Knight and a ton of other people. I played baseball all summer long in Evansville, Indiana, and in Wrigley Field."
The actor, who's been married to actress and musician Rita Wilson since 1988, continued, "I had all my kids with me, I had all my family with me….We lived in a house in the middle of cornfields… It was a great summer, and my entire family still speaks about it."
The second movie the performer loves is 2000's Cast Away, in which Tom's main co-star was a volleyball.
"We had just bold adventures when we were making that movie," he said. "I mean we were out in the middle of the ocean just —you know— trying to grab shots. We were off in Fiji on two different occasions… There was nothing but adventures every single day, every single night."
With just one spot left, fans might guess that Tom's Oscar-winning turns in Philadelphia or Forrest Gump might win out, or beloved coming-of-age movies like Toy Story or Big, but...nope.
"The last film I would say was magical for me was a movie called Cloud Atlas," Tom told Bill about the 2012 sci-fi movie. "We shot it on a hope and a dream and nothing but a circle of love in Berlin, Mallorca and Dresden."
"We were part of this big, massive ensemble of fantastic people who were just trying to do the hardest, best work on this deep throw," he went on.
Catch Tom in his latest project, Finch, on Apple TV+, in which he shares the screen with a co-star who may give Wilson the volleyball a run for his money: In a post-apocalyptic earth, his sidekick is a robot built to protect the life of his creator's beloved dog.