Tom Cruise takes on speedflying for 'Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One'
Go behind the scenes with Tom Cruise as he performs one of the "most dangerous sports in the world" for "Mission: Impossible." (Credit: Paramount Picture/Skydance)
Tom Cruise took on a dangerous new sport for "Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One."
Cruise, 60, performs his own stunts and the actor chose speedflying for his latest film.
Speedflying is similar to paragliding but uses a much smaller canopy and is "completely unpredictable," according to director Christopher McQuarrie.
"To shoot these stunts for ‘Mission: Impossible,’ with Tom there are no limits, so we become a little bit more adventurous every time," McQuarrie noted.
‘MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE' STAR TOM CRUISE ADMITS HE ENJOYS ‘PRESSURE’ OF INTENSE SCHEDULE
"Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One" features speedflying, one of the world's most dangerous sports. (Getty Images / Paramount Pictures and Skydance)
Cruise's newest stunt requires perfect weather, specifically wind patterns.
"It's a very beautiful and delicate sport," Crusie said.
"But it also is one of the most dangerous stunts in the world," added McQuarrie. "Any sort of cross wind could put Tom in peril."
In the behind-the-scenes footage, released by Paramount Pictures and Skydance, Crusie also noted, "We’re gonna do spirals and we’re landing at an incredibly high speed, over 80 kilometers an hour."
At one point, Cruise called off a scheduled speedflying moment because it was "too dangerous" and viewers saw him prepare once the weather was more suitable.
"Flying really close to rocks looks quite beautiful," McQuarrie said. "Behind the scenes, we were all in absolute terror."
WATCH: TOM CRUISE TAKES ON SPEEDFLYING FOR ‘MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE - DEAD RECKONING PART ONE’
"Mission: Impossible" first began as a TV series that followed a secret spy agency, Impossible Missions Force. The show ran for seven seasons in the '60s. "Mission Impossible" was turned into a film franchise in 1996 – starring Cruise.
"Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One" is the seventh installment of the franchise will be in theaters July 12.
Tom Cruise attends the Australian premiere of "Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One." (Getty Images)
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Cruise recently spoke in depth about how he trains for his films.
"Look, as an actor and just in my life, I've always trained just to make movies," Cruise told Fandango. "I train in many things – singing, dancing, motorcycles, cars – and also my personal life, I like skydiving and speed-flying and all these things. And I like to then go learn these things and then apply it to the movies."
"But it is a real trick, and I have gone through to figure out, ‘How do I train? How do I maintain? How do you hit peak right at the moment?’ Because also when I'm doing a sprinting scene, I don't just run once. Sometimes I've done 50 sprints in one day."
Tom Cruise as Lt. Pete "Maverick" Mitchell riding a Kawasaki GPZ 900 R in the movie "Top Gun." Cruise performs his own stunts. (Photo by CBS via Getty Images)
He continued, "So, I have to think about what the recovery time is, what scenes I'm shooting before and after, and I've gotten better at really structuring things within the film and sitting down and going, ‘Here’s where I have to prepare for the jump off the motorcycle.' So, there are certain things in you using your body a different way or if I'm doing gymnastics or a fighting scene. You know, you don't want to do a fight right there when I'm going to sprint. And how do I prepare? And how do I recover?"
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