Joseph Kosinski had half an hour to convince Tom Cruise to make 'Top Gun: Maverick'.

The 48-year-old director has helmed the long-awaited sequel to 'Top Gun' and revealed how he had to pitch the plot to Tom in Paris in a bid to get the project off the ground.

Joseph told Polygon: "So I read the script, I had some ideas, and Jerry (Bruckheimer) liked those ideas. He said, 'You know what, you gotta go pitch this to Tom directly.'

"So we flew to Paris, where Tom was shooting 'Mission: Impossible', we got about a half hour of his time between setups. And I basically had 30 minutes to pitch this film, which I didn't realise when we were flying over. But when I got there, I found that Tom really didn't want to make another 'Top Gun'."

The filmmaker added: "It's one of those moments as a director, you have one on every film, where you're on the spot to make a case for why this movie should be made. I had 30 minutes to do it.

"And at the end of the pitch, he picked up the phone, he called the head of Paramount Pictures and said, 'We're making another 'Top Gun'.' It's pretty impressive to see the power of a real movie star in that moment."

Joseph also revealed why the film is titled 'Top Gun: Maverick' as he wanted the flick to be a "character-driven story".

He recalled: "I just had the title, you know, which I think kind of summed it all up.'We aren't going to call it 'Top Gun 2, we're going to call it 'Top Gun: Maverick.' It's a character-driven story, a drama with this giant action film around it. And that to me was what a 'Top Gun' movie is."