Mission Impossible – Dead Reckoning

Interesting wee clip. I’m sure I can see a bit of doubt on Cruise’s face in a few shots.

No wonder films cost so much to make these days.

Fair play to the bloke. Like him or not, that took some balls!

Watched that last night. Impressive, mad, and shows he’s absolutely dedicated to his craft.

Tom Cruise is doing a sterling job of single handedly keeping bonkers action stunt coordinators in work. Can you IMAGINE the insurance costs though.
“Sorry, Mr Cruise wants to do WHAT now?!”

I still cant believe he’s 60… there has to be a horrible Dorian Gray portrait somewhere doesn’t there?

I’m grinning like an absolute loon, I cannot WAIT for these films to come out. Whereas the Bond films have got stodgier and stodgier, the Mission Impossible films* have just got better and better.

* with the exception of MI2, which was, admittedly, dreadful, and I think the reason that Cruise stepped in to produce as he wasn’t having that any more

He wasn’t even wearing a helmet, and he did it 6 times!

Very impressive.

The Biggest Stunt in Cinema History

Saw Tom Cruise & totally misread that.

Mind blowing!

That stunt must have cost millions alone.

I remember seeing a similar stunt on Nitro Circus going wrong and the motorbike ended up falling more slowly than Travis Pastrana so he ended up underneath the bike whilst falling and needing to pull the parachute! Think he pulled right at the last minute.

It makes my balls tingle just seeing the vertical drops off the side of the mountain.

double post.

“Sorry, Mr Cruise wants to do WHAT now?!”

There’s some talk of him going to space for either then next MI or some other “Tom Cruise wants to make a film”.
Actually real proper space, not filming in a zero-G plane and a soundstage…

The steam-train-off-a-quarry stunt was filmed near mine.

SIX TAKES riding a bike off a cliff and transitioning into a base jump. I think after the second or third, I’d be a little peeved if it wasn’t in the can.

the Mission Impossible films* have just got better and better.

I have the unpopular opinion that the third one was the best. Philip Seymour Hoffman was certainly the best villain.

I think after the second or third, I’d be a little peeved if it wasn’t in the can.

That’s why he’s in charge. He’s doing it for himself. All the bucks stop with him. Amazing stuff.

Interested to know how many base jumps in total he’s done. Even a single ‘vanilla’ base jump apparently carries a 0.04% chance of death, I suppose due the risk of the canopy not deploying properly with no time to do anything about it, or other uncontrollable risks. Plus the not inconsiderable extra risk of something going wrong in the ride up/separate from bike covered in cameras bit.

I have the unpopular opinion that the third one was the best. Philip Seymour Hoffman was certainly the best villain.

He definitely was, he was proper dead-eyed terrifying.

I think the first was good, the second was really dreadful, and the third proved that there was life in the franchise if they made it a bit smarter. With the success of the third (and, I would imagine, the sheer force of nature that is Mr Cruise) meant the budgets clearly increased for the ones after that so it became more of a ‘spectacle’, leading to enormo-stunts as above…

He practices stunts for weeks, a lot more practice and safety than an average base jump or bike trick.

He is probably one of the last to keep going like this, and it works well, the stunts cost a fortune, but it’s free advertising for the film in a lot of ways, all very clever.

I believe he also only does stunts where he’s the only one to suffer if it goes wrong and leaves multi stuntmen stuff to the pros for life endangering stuff.

Interested to know how many base jumps in total he’s done. Even a single ‘vanilla’ base jump apparently carries a 0.04% chance of death

So that means a 99.96% chance of survival. If he’s done 100 jumps (which there’s every chance he has), the chances of him surviving them all are .9996^100, which is 67%, give or take. 2-1 odds, oof.

I want to know what happened to all the smashed up bikes dribbling petrol and oil all over the countryside.

I doubt he’s done 100 base jumps, I think he’s done a LOT of regular skydives, and has a lot better preparation/training than a lot of people, but even so, imagine the insurance premiums!

Did it say what happened to the motorbike? Was there some way to recover it, or did they just have to collect many pieces of motorbike from the ground afterwards?

SIX TAKES riding a bike off a cliff and transitioning into a base jump. I think after the second or third, I’d be a little peeved if it wasn’t in the can.

I’m fairly convinced that he’s doing it because he just loves doing it. There’s been loads of “behind the scenes” stuff on his stunts – the one where he’s hanging off the side of the A400? That one was about 8 takes. The parachute jump into Paris was apparently about 12 jumps.

* with the exception of MI2, which was, admittedly, dreadful, and I think the reason that Cruise stepped in to produce as he wasn’t having that any more

Opening shot in Utah for the climbing scene was brilliant, though.

Even a single ‘vanilla’ base jump apparently carries a 0.04% chance of death

A fixed percentage regardless of the actual height / proximity to objects etc?

Or is that the % the main chute fails to deploy?

As base jumps go, that one is pretty high – the risk of death must increase massively as the height drops…

SIX TAKES riding a bike off a cliff and transitioning into a base jump. I think after the second or third, I’d be a little peeved if it wasn’t in the can.

Pretty sure he’s loving every one of them!

Plus he’s a perfectionist, so get as many different takes as you can so you can combine footage to get the best end result.

Cruise’s dedication is phenomenal and the MI films have been terrific.

I admire him a lot. He’s good with he locals too.

We once rented some special lenses to a job where Cruise was involved – he took a shine to the lenses apparently.

He’s the only star currently delivering in cinema and I’m damn excited for this new MI film.

However for all the expense in these blockbusters the only constant is the reliance on gaffer tape! Spotted several times there.

the risk of death must increase massively as the height drops…

The risk of death only really starts at ground level, unless you hit something on the way down, obviously. 🙂

I get what you mean obviously, the choice of location and the clearance he gets from the cliff due to the speed will help. The added complexity of separating cleanly from the bike makes up for that. It’s just that there is a degree of uncontrollable risk in base jumping which makes it mind-boggling for someone like Cruise to go at it repeatedly.

I’m grinning like an absolute loon, I cannot WAIT for these films to come out. Whereas the Bond films have got stodgier and stodgier, the Mission Impossible films* have just got better and better.

Totally.

Bond fell off a green screen cliff years ago for me one old bank holiday Monday

(I’m pretty sure they would have done a proper clean up job.)

Sure, John Woo wasn’t a good fit but the Moab stuff is good.

So that means a 99.96% chance of survival. If he’s done 100 jumps (which there’s every chance he has), the chances of him surviving them all are .9996^100, which is 67%, give or take. 2-1 odds, oof.

0.04% is the probability per event, so over 100 events it would be something like a 4% chance of it occurring over those 100 events, again this would be a statistical chance, not the same across the board.

Very good!

I’m not that familiar with MI. Which one is it where the motorbike tyres switch from road tyres to knobblies and back again during a chase across twisty tarmac and dusty desert?

I’m not that familiar with MI. Which one is it where the motorbike tyres switch from road tyres to knobblies and back again during a chase across twisty tarmac and dusty desert?

2.

I actually quite liked 2, it’s got a distinctive John Woo style and the scenery is amazing. As a “franchise finding it’s feet” movie, it’s good, it introduces Luther – although it obviously sort of glosses over what happens to Nyah.

Was in Sydney a couple of months ago, saw a lot of the locations. The “bad guy house on the bay” was a set – we stood on the actual site which was just a small public park. Bare Island Fort (the “secure Biotech facility”) is cool, I’ve ridden over that wooden bridge. 🙂

0.04% is the probability per event, so over 100 events it would be something like a 4% chance of it occurring over those 100 events

That’s a big old stats fail I’m afraid (as confirmed by MrsIHN, who’s a professional risk-calculating number-cruncher)

I actually quite liked 2

I remember liking it at the time, but rewatched two or three months ago as All4 had all the MI films so went through the lot. It’s really, really bad.

It’s quite interesting watching the filming part of it. It looks like he’s jumping a normal rig, as opposed to a BASE one, so oddly has the option to both use an AAD and/or pitch his reserve if he has time or gets line twists. It’s for sure a BASE canopy though, super-big and docile and is being folded so it opens as good as it can be.

30 jumps a day was mentioned, with 500 jumps total. I’d like to know if his total jump numbers are 500 or if that is just for that film. Either way, 30 jumps a day is a lot. Even doing back to back with two rigs and packers it’s hard for a professional team of AAA jumpers to maintain over 20. I guess he doesn’t care so much about debriefing and has a plane on tap, but even 30 hop-n-pops takes time for the climb and canopy ride down.

I’d like to know if his total jump numbers are 500 or if that is just for that film

AIUI he’s been skydiving for years, so I’d expect his total numbers to be much higher…

He’s got a tonne of tunnel time though. From what I remember, Milko and Sian spent a lot of time with him getting him ready for the Paris/C17 stunt.

On the jumping, I think he stopped when the money behind his films realised he could get hurt. When he started producing his own he realised he could do that again, so started. He was a USPA B license (again?) for the C17 jump, but must have had more than that. He needed B to wear a visor. To be fair to him, if I had his money, I’d be spending most of my time jumping. Mine has to be worked around, well, work.

Yeh looking forward to it, saw them filming while out on an mtb ride. Love MI films though rewatched 2 amazed it didn’t break the franchise.

There’s the stunt where he broke his ankle in the last MI film. They actually used this take in the film where he hobbles off still in character! clip here

The detail and dedication he puts into his films pays off, they’re brilliantly entertaining and that’s what he aims for. Absolutely nuts stunt that and six times.

@Drac… Don’t read about the wingsuit BASE in the new Point Break then: https://ftw.usatoday.com/2015/12/how-the-creators-of-point-break-filmed-a-death-defying-wingsuit-stunt

I do not disagree with anyone about Tom’s energy and enthusiasm, but that ^^^ is a level above.

has a plane on tap

and endless supply of motorbikes, choppers, drones, lackeys, scaffolders, diggers, fluffers