Much has been said about the daring motorcycle stunt in the upcoming actioner Mission: Impossible 7 – Dead Reckoning Part One, for which Tom Cruise threw himself off a steep cliff on a motorcycle, only having a few seconds to open a parachute in time . But that’s far from the only scene from the cop sequel where Cruise, notorious for such interludes, took a big risk to create a breathtaking handcrafted action sequence.
For another order the now 60-year-old (!) has been training for years in one of the “most dangerous sports in the world”, according to a new making-of video for “Mission: Impossible 7”. We are talking about the so-called fast flyingwhere you fly down a mountain with a small paraglider at high speed (Cruise itself speaks of up to 80 km/h!), just a few meters above the ground.
That a lot can go wrong is also emphasized in the above excerpt, as speed flying with its delicate flight maneuvers at extremely high speeds is considered extremely unpredictable, not least because you are very dependent on the weather and can cause even the slightest headwind complications. “Flying so close to rocks looks beautiful, but behind the scenes we were terrified,” reveals the director Christopher McQuarrie.
Daring stunt, daring shoot
Plus, the stunt itself is only half the challenge. In addition, it is of course important to capture the whole thing in such a dynamic way that the spectacle only really comes into its own in the finished film. Because a helicopter or a drone, according to McQuarrie, could not do this, a system was considered in which two helicopter-controlled mobile cameras on the screen of a second speedflyer capture the cruise that circles next to it. And the proximity of the two planes was certainly not harmless.
Fortunately, everything went well here too. The undoubtedly breathtaking result can soon be admired on the big screen: “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One” opens in German cinemas on July 13, 2023. “Dead Reckoning Part Two” follows a year later on June 27, 2024.