Tom Cruise risked his life, nearly died while doing his stunt for Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning

Tom Cruise left his crew in dilemma while he was performing his stunts for his much-anticipated film Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning. While the actor was busy shooting a tough stunt on the wing of a plane flying over South Africa, it seemed that he had passed out. And everyone on the sets felt he was about to die.

Tom - who is 62 and is always keen on doing his own stunts - was reportedly flying the biplane all by himself. He laid out flat on the wing for straight 22 minutes. This was 10 minutes longer than what the safety guidelines permitted. Director Christopher McQuarrie revealed this during a masterclass at the Cannes Film Festival 2025 where Mission: Impossible The Final Reckoning was premiered ahead of its release.

"When you leave the cockpit of the plane, it's like stepping onto the surface of another planet," McQuarrie, 56, said, as reported by The Sun. "The wind is hitting you in excess of 140 miles an hour (225kmh) coming off the propeller. You're breathing, but only physically you're not actually getting oxygen," he added.

The popular American filmmaker, who has directed the last four movies of the series, also revealed that Tom didn't show any inhibitions in pushing himself to an extent that he was physically tired and find it tough to "get back up off the wing". As the director said, Tom was "laying on the wing, his arms hanging over the front. We could not tell if he was conscious or not."

Tom, who is also a trained acrobatics pilot, was told to give a hand signal to tell the team if he was in trouble. But the filmmaker mentioned that one can't do this in an unconscious condition. Unfortunately, the plane had only six minutes of fuel left, but Tom finally stirred.

"We watched Tom as he pulled himself up and stuck his head in the cockpit so that he could replenish the oxygen in his body and then climb up into the cockpit and bring the plane safely down to land. No one on Earth can do that but Tom Cruise," McQuarrie revealed.

Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning First Reviews

After close to three decades, the Mission: Impossible franchise is - as reports say - is nearing its conclusion. Going by the film's first reviews, it's a mixed offering. For the unversed, Tom Cruise reprises his role as Ethan Hunt for supposedly one last time in the film. One of the tweets that has gone viral on X reads, "#MissionImpossible The Final Reckoning is a THRILLING and SHOW-STOPPING cinematic event. @TomCruise & McQ give us EVERYTHING in this non-stop, nerve-shredding spectacle that goes deeper and darker than ever before. M:I continues to deliver BIG. This is why we go to the movies."

Another post on X reads, "Honestly, #MissionImpossible The Final Reckoning felt like it was a real ending to the franchise and despite a bumpy second act, the movie delivers the goods, the stakes and that everyone is not safe with a banger ending. I will never recover from the underwater scene."

Another fans called the movie a "love letter to fans". He posted, "MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE THE FINAL RECKONING is a love letter to fans who just rewatched the entire series. It ties the entire series together as one story rather than 8 entries. First time I've cried in the series. Plane sequence is one of cinema's greatest stunts. I loved it."