If you watch an action movie, it’s normal for most combat scenes and risky situations to be performed by stuntmen (also known as “doubles”). These are individuals who are physically and psychologically trained to bring to life moments that would be too dangerous for the actors and too costly for the production companies (mainly due to the insurance costs for the artists).
But if there’s an actor who defies this status quo whenever he gets the chance, it’s veteran Tom Cruise. To this day, the American actor is famous for personally performing many of the dangerous action scenes in his films. The secret? Mainly that he produces all these movies, so in the end, he gets to do what he wants. It’s that “simple.”
Among all the risky situations he has undertaken himself, one stands out above the rest: the airplane scene in Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation. Because, yes, running down the side of a building is amazing. So is sprinting away from a series of explosions. But clinging to the door of a plane in mid-flight, over 300 meters in the air, is something that the vast majority of us wouldn’t want to experience even in our worst nightmares.
However, Tom’s love for risk doesn’t necessarily make him crazy. To shoot this incredible scene, the Hollywood actor wore a full-body harness under his suit, which was connected to the plane itself via a cable that passed through the door he was clinging to. He also wore special contact lenses to protect his eyes from the wind. And the best part? The scene had to be repeated 8 times to get the perfect shot.
The result is a scene that we still talk about today, 8 years after the film’s release, and no green screen was used. It’s a scene that didn’t intimidate the actor but rather delighted him to the point that in his latest film, Top Gun: Maverick, he actually piloted the jet of his character, Captain Pete Mitchell. As the younger generation would say, “It’s crazy.”
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