Tom Cruise is known for his action-heavy roles. Specifically, he's also known for being as much a part of the action heavy roles as possible. Tom Cruise basically insists on performing his own stunts, even when that requires reportedly firing insurance companies, or occasionally results in him breaking his own bones. It's clear that the Mission: Impossible actor truly enjoys the physicality of performing stunts, but it turns out he enjoys doing the work so much that he has to be told to stop smiling while filming.
Tom Cruise might enjoy climbing up the sides of buildings as part of making a movie, but his characters aren't really supposed to be having a good time when involved in life and death struggles to save the world. This makes it a problem when Cruise, according to the actor himself, can't stop smiling while filming these stunts. In a recent appearance on The Graham Norton Show Cruise said,
The first time of any stunt is nerve wracking but it also exhilarating. I have been told a few times during shooting a stunt to stop smiling.
While Tom Cruise says that doing his own stunts is nerve wracking, apparently the excitement is ultimately what wins out as the actor has to be told to stop smiling on the set. Who knows how many takes get ruined by Cruise because he's supposed to look serious as jumps across rooftops but the camera catches him was a massive grin.
There have certainly been times when Tom Cruise likely has not been smiling. He rather famously broke his ankle while filming the most recent Mission: Impossible movie, which is just one of the bones the actor says he's broken over the years. Yet he never takes the stunts likely and says he works hard to make sure he's properly prepared for each stunt. Cruise went on (via The Telegraph), saying:
I am a very physical actor and I love doing them. I study and train and take a lot of time figuring it all out. I have broken a lot of bones.
We've seen some examples of what we can expect as far as practical stunts in Mission: Impossible 7 through cell phone videos that captured the various insane things the actor will get up to in the new movie. We've seen him drive a motorcycle off a cliff and get in fights on board moving trains. That sort of stuff seems downright tame compared to the HALO jump from the last movie, but we very well could still see something much bigger from the actor in both that movie, and Mission: Impossible 8 which is set to begin filming right after Mission: Impossible 7 is done.
Unfortunately, whatever the next two Mission: Impossible movies have to offer us, we'll be waiting a bit longer to see. The films have once again been delayed from their November 2021 and 2022 dates and will now be seen in May 2022 and July 2023 respectively.
