Honestly, we all have that one friend — the one who's always planning to go skydiving or bungee jumping or raw fish consuming. They keep you safely in touch with your dangerous side, usually without you ever having to leave the house. For someone out there, that friend is Tom Cruise.
Of course, Cruise doesn't cowardly consume exotic fish to satisfy his taste for the edge of existence. Instead, he dangles from planes in Mission: Impossible sequels. In case you've somehow avoided (why?) the trailer for Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation (the fifth entry in the surprisingly consistent franchise), there's a very Cruisey scene — quite possibly the Cruisiest scene in all of cinema — wherein Tom grips the side of an intimidatingly large Airbus A400M and braces himself for the sort of high Weedmaps will never be able to find for you.
During Paramount's CinemaCon presentation on Tuesday, Cruise explained his reasoning for such cinematic tomfoolery. "I've always wanted to do that," Cruise told an audience of theater owners. "I like to keep the audience on the edge of their seats." That bland bit of description aside, the stunt itself is an undeniable visual triumph. According to Variety, Cruise was actually equipped with special contact lenses so he could keep his eyes open in spite of the wind pressure at 5,000 feet in the air. Furthermore, Cruise had to perform the mastodon of a stunt eight different times.
"I [was] actually scared shitless," Cruise told the audience.
No shit.
