Tom Cruise wasn't the most limber fellow before shooting The Last Samurai. "I couldn't touch my toes," admits the megastar, 41. But that all changed with the extensive training Cruise underwent for the 19th-century epic (opening Dec. 5), in which he stars as Capt. Woodrow Algren, an alcoholic Civil War veteran who's enlisted to train the troops of Japanese emperor Meiji. Cruise recently spoke to reporters about training for the film, shooting in Japan – and whether he got to keep the sword.

With the holidays here, do you plan on doing any cooking?
I can cook. I've cooked turkeys in my day, but when Mom is around, I let her do that. My mother is a great cook – fried chicken and southern stuff. I like her stuffing best, and her turkey.

Are you going to get to celebrate Christmas with your kids this year?
Yeah ... we're going to be with kids, everyone. We're going to do a lot of things.

A nice Christmas present might be a Best Actor Oscar. What do you think of your chances for The Last Samurai?
I don't know, sir. I don't know.

But do you think this is your best chance to win one?
I really don't know. I think that if something like that happened, it'd be wonderful. But I don't make a movie for that. I don't know how to choose a movie or make a movie in that way. I just go out and do the best I can, and have some fun.

How did you train for your part in The Last Samurai?
I couldn't touch my toes when I started working on this. I bent down and I couldn't get my hands past my knees. I put on 25 lbs. for the picture ... and we did all kinds of Chinese sword work to build up my forearms and my shoulders. It was a lot of training, and the guys I worked with were excellent.