Hollywood star Tom Cruise’s ‘physically punishing’ stunt for Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning required him to wear a specially designed suit and mask, usable for only 10 minutes at once. He also revealed that he breathed his own carbon dioxide during the stunt.
During his interview with Empire magazine, Tom Cruise said, “I’m breathing in my own carbon dioxide. It builds up in the body and affects the muscles. You have to overcome all of that while you’re doing it, and be present.” For the action scene, Tom Cruise’s Ethan Hunt explores a sunken submarine, filmed in an “8.5 million-litre water tank on a gimbal that rotates on command,” reported Empire.
Mission: Impossible franchise’s director Christopher McQuarrie narrated the scene as “challenging, terrifying and really physically punishing” for Tom Cruise. “He’s in a rotating structure filled with debris, and you had to find a way to make that environment look as chaotic and unhinged as humanly possible. But in a way that you could repeat, and that Tom could navigate, and survive”, said McQuarrie.
This underwater sequence is not the first time Tom Cruise has dived deep for the franchise. In Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (2015), the actor performed another underwater stunt where he held his breath for about six-and-a-half minutes.
In an earlier interview with Empire, Tom Cruise revealed that he frequently passed out while filming another action sequence for the upcoming film, which required him to dangle off the side of a flying aeroplane.
He said, “When you stick your face out [of an aeroplane], going over 120 to 130 miles an hour, you’re not getting oxygen. So I had to train myself how to breathe. There were times I would pass out physically; I was unable to get back into the cockpit.”
Helmed by Christopher McQuarrie, the final installment of the Mission: Impossible franchise, Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning, is set for a worldwide release on May 23, 2025. The film also stars Hannah Waddingham, Nick Offerman, Katy O’Brian, and Tramell Tillman.