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Tom Cruise on filming the most dangerous stunt of his career for 'Mission: Impossible 7'

Actor Tom Cruise talking and making selfie with his fans during a pause on the set of the film Mission Impossible 7 in Piazza Venezia, just in front of the Victor Emmanuel II Monument (Tomb of the Unknown Soldier). Rome (Italy), November 29th 2020 (Photo by Samantha Zucchi/Insidefoto/Mondadori Portfolio via Getty Images)
Tom Cruise has described a terrifying stunt. (Samantha Zucchi/Insidefoto/Mondadori Portfolio via Getty Images)

Tom Cruise has revealed that Mission: Impossible 7 will feature the most dangerous stunt of his career – which could have gone horribly wrong in a number of ways.

Cruise, 58, is not just the face of the Hollywood blockbuster action films – he is also known for fearlessly taking on many of his own stunts rather than using a body double.

Read more: Quiz: how well do you know the films of Tom Cruise?

Now he has explained to Empire just how risky his most recent shoot was, with a tricky scene involving a motorbike, a helicopter and a cliff jump.

The star had to ride the bike off the edge of a cliff as a helicopter filmed the hair-raising stunt.

Watch: Tom Cruise returns Golden Globes in protest

A train track at a quarry near Stoney Middleton in Derbyshire, that has been reported as a location for the latest Mission: Impossible film. Mission: Impossible star Tom Cruise has been filling action scenes on top of a moving mock steam locomotive in the North York Moors in recent days. Picture date: Sunday April 25, 2021. (Photo by Danny Lawson/PA Images via Getty Images)
A stunt set-up from Mission: Impossible 7. (Danny Lawson/PA Images via Getty Images)

He said: “If the wind was too strong, it would blow me off the ramp. The helicopter was a problem, because I didn’t want to be hammering down that ramp at top speed and get hit by a stone. Or if I departed in a weird way, we didn’t know what was going to happen with the bike.

"I had about six seconds once I departed the ramp to pull the chute and I don’t want to get tangled in the bike. If I do, that’s not going to end well.”

Actor Tom Cruise and actress Hayley Atwell on the set of the film Mission Impossible 7 at Imperial Fora in Rome. Rome (Italy), October 13th 2020 (Photo by Samantha Zucchi/Insidefoto/Mondadori Portfolio via Getty Images)
Tom Cruise is glad to be back in work. (Samantha Zucchi/Insidefoto/Mondadori Portfolio via Getty Images)

Cruise, who has been filming the seventh instalment of the action film franchise in the UK, said there was the heightened emotion of knowing that he was helping the whole cast and crew to get back to work after the pandemic had put many of their industry out of business for months.

He said: “All those emotions were going through my mind. I was thinking about the people I work with, and my industry. And for the whole crew to know that we’d started rolling on a movie was just a huge relief. It was very emotional, I gotta tell you.”

Mission: Impossible 7 is due to be released in the UK in May 2022.

Watch: Tom Cruise on making a Mission: Impossible in the coronavirus pandemic