Tom Cruise has risked his life over the years for his love of movies and entertaining audiences around the world with some truly death-defying stunts. As Mission: Impossibl e potentially concludes with Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning, it’s a great time to celebrate Tom Cruise’s action-packed stunts by looking back at the most intense of the bunch.
All Mission: Impossible Movies, Ranked
Tom Cruise leads the Mission: Impossible franchise in 8 movies spanning 3 decades, but which Mission: Impossible movie can be seen as the best of all?
The most intense and wildest stunts in the Mission: Impossible series are all thanks to Tom Cruise’s confidence, and the countless crew that work to make sure that it happens so that millions worldwide can watch. As such, here’s a look at the most dangerous and best stunts across all 8 Mission: Impossible movies over the last 30 years.
8 The Rooftop Jump
Breaking an Ankle in Mission: Impossible – Fallout
- Featured in: Mission: Impossible – Fallout (2018)
While not the most risky and action-packed move, it’s still one that resulted in Tom Cruise breaking his ankle. During the filming of Mission: Impossible – Fallout, Tom Cruise was required to jump between two buildings in London, but what resulted was Tom Cruise overshooting his jump and breaking his right ankle during the landing. With safety assured between the two buildings, there was no chance Tom Cruise could have died from the stunt, but it still resulted in an injury that fans can actually see on-screen when Ethan Hunt limps away and proves Tom Cruise’s dedication to finishing a take.
7 Holding onto the Airbus A400M
Cruising Altitude in Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation
- Featured in: Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (2015)
Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation features a dream come true for Tom Cruise, as he gets to hang on the wing of an A400 plane, instead of being relatively normal by sitting in a passenger seat with a seatbelt on. While the stunt does have its safety checks, like a harness and straps to ensure Tom Cruise isn’t going anywhere, it’s still extremely risky. The speed of the plane, the wind rushing on his face, eyes, and ears, all make for something most people wouldn’t dare to attempt, especially when a rock or a bird at that speed could spell a fatal disaster. Tom Cruise strapping himself to the outside of an Airbus A400 is just the tip of the iceberg with his stunts, but easily one of his best.
6 HALO Jump
A 25,000 ft Jump in Mission: Impossible – Fallout
- Featured in: Mission: Impossible – Fallout (2018)
The literal highest stunt of Tom Cruise’s career comes from Mission: Impossible – Fallout, where Tom Cruise committed to a HALO jump. Tom Cruise wanted the experience to feel real and exhilarating to audiences, so he opted to jump from a C-17 military plane over 30,000 feet in the air at speeds that could reach 220 MPH. Even with a specially designed oxygen mask to ensure Tom Cruise wouldn’t pass out from the lack of oxygen at that height and altitude, it’s still an extremely risky stunt that sees fans rewarded with a breathtaking scene.
10 Best Spy Games To Play If You Like Mission: Impossible Movies, Ranked
Games like Alpha Protocol and Splinter Cell can give fans of Mission: Impossible the chance to feel like they're playing Ethan Hunt in a spy thriller.
5 Climbing Burj Khalifa
Cruising on the Tallest Building at 2,723 ft in Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol
- Featured in: Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol (2011)
As the tallest building on the planet, that’s over a mile and a half above the Earth itself, it’s no surprise that Tom Cruise would want to climb it. With safety ropes and harnesses to hold him up, Tom Cruise conquered the Burj Khalifa by climbing it, and even the more challenging aspects of the scene were practical and real, where Tom Cruise ran across the glass windows and even leaped in the air while attached to his rope. It’s terrifying, and anyone afraid of heights can certainly feel the scale of this stunt when they watch Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol.
4 Underwater Breathing for an Underwater Vault
Tom Cruise Held His Breath for 6 Minutes in Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation
- Featured in: Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (2015)
One of the most complex and intricate underwater stunts of any movie comes from Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation, where Tom Cruise wanted to film practically underwater. Being underwater is far different from standard acting, as not only is the actor holding their breath, but they are exhausting themselves physically, while still trying to provide a performance. With these extreme conditions, Tom Cruise would hold his breath for 6 minutes and 30 seconds to provide the crew with the longest take. Even if the set was CGI, Tom’s breath control was very much a real factor of the movie, and scary, since he not only has to do the action, but hold his breath long enough to film the scene, wait for air bubbles to clear from the diving crew, and then wait for the divers to come back to give him air.
7 Highest-Grossing Tom Cruise Movies, Ranked
Movie megastar Tom Cruise has starred in a number of box office smash hits that have made him one of Hollywood's highest-grossing actors.
3 Helicopter Flying Through Canyons
Corkscrew Turns in Freezing Weather for Mission: Impossible – Fallout
- Featured in: Mission: Impossible – Fallout (2018)
Tom Cruise’s pilot license certainly came in handy during Mission: Impossible – Fallout, even if it must have stressed out every member of the cast and crew. The film’s third act sees Ethan Hunt pilot a helicopter, weaving and maneuvering to avoid another deadly helicopter in an epic chase. Instead of allowing two stunt teams to go at it, Tom Cruise pilots a helicopter himself, weaving dangerously close to canyons and mountains where speed is everything, and one wrong turn could result in a deadly crash and collision with the other helicopter. Tom Cruise even dares to make some challenging corkscrew turns and finishes it all off by dangling from a helicopter payload that is over 2,000 feet in the air.
2 Motorcycle Cliff Jump
Going Full Throttle a Cliff Into a BASE Jump Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning
- Featured in: Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning (2023)
One of the, if not the most dangerous stunt in the Mission: Impossible series is the motorcycle cliff jump from Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning. The stunt involved building a ramp off a cliff in Norway, where Tom Cruise would ride a motorcycle across it and leap in the air, deploying a parachute at a safe distance, but even then, there’s still wind and rock walls around him that could disrupt the entire thing and result in serious injury or death. Yet, Tom Cruise defies death with every stunt, and this is no exception, where Tom Cruise elegantly leaps from the motorcycle and deploys his parachute. What makes this stunt even better is that it wasn’t filmed just once, but over six times.
1 Clinging to a Bi-Plane
8,000 ft with 140 MPH Winds in Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning
- Featured in: Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning (2025)
A dogfight occurs in the final act of Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning between a yellow bi-plane and a red bi-plane, where Tom Cruise seems to be clinging on for dear life as he tries to commandeer the plane and leap to the other one. It’s a wild spectacle to watch, and it only gets wilder when one witnesses it for real, as Tom Cruise really did hang off of a moving, barrel-rolling bi-plane. Even with safety harnesses, Tom Cruise still risked it all. The beating winds, blasting propellers, and fast-moving planes would exhaust anybody, especially with multiple takes for such an extensive sequence that thankfully paid off.
6 Lingering Questions We Have After The End Of Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning
Is this really the end for Ethan Hunt and the IMF? Here's which questions persist after the end of Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning.