Just how mighty is Tom Cruise's draw? Based on Monday evening's premiere of The Last Samurai, pretty darned powerful.

Penelope Cruz walks the red carpet with boyfriend Tom Cruise at the L.A. premiere of his new film, The Last Samurai. [AP]

An army of Cruise-gawkers including Alyssa Milano, Anne Archer, Annette Bening, Robert Downey Jr., JAG's Catherine Bell, Evan Rachel Wood, Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen and, of course, David Hasselhoff, assembled for the Westwood screening.

The movie, which stars Cruise as a Civil War veteran who embraces the way of the samurai warrior in 19th-century Japan, opens Friday.

Heavy praise was lavished on Cruise, with no one cooing more than lady love Penelope Cruz. "I have learned so much from Tom," said Cruz, wearing black Ungaro. "Integrity. Respecting yourself. It's not a coincidence that he has been (on top) for so long and that people love him so much."

Dressed in a black turtleneck with a close-cropped haircut, Cruise arrived looking very much like his Mission Impossible character, Ethan Hunt, although MI:3, he says, won't shoot until he nails the script: "It's a Rubik's Cube we're banging our heads against the wall trying to crack."

Currently, Cruise is working with Jada Pinkett Smith on Collateral (that title likely will change, says Cruise's producing partner Paula Wagner).

"I'm getting the chance to be in the light and glory of Tom Cruise," marveled Pinkett Smith, who came in a brown leather Gucci trenchcoat on the arm of hubby Will Smith. "Tom's been so busy, but he definitely wants to get our kids together."

Will Smith admitted even his action characters would be a hard match for Cruise this time around. "It's kind of hard to fight a dude with a sword," said Smith. "I should have been a black samurai."

Like the samurai, Cruise too would sacrifice his own life for honor: "I believe my own integrity is more important than my body," he said, although many of his female fans would no doubt disagree.

Among them: pregnant Charmed actress Holly Marie Combs, who was anxious to see Cruise's strapping bod draped in a kimono. Said Combs: "Tom Cruise in even a burlap sack is just so much more spectacular than any other ordinary man."

With Cruise and Cruz retreating to the East Coast after their red carpet duties to make the New York premiere, the celeb quotient at the after-party was shockingly low. Too bad, considering all the work Warner Bros. special events department put into transforming the Armand Hammer Museum courtyard into a 19th-century Japanese village.

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