Ethan Hunt jumps 25,000 feet

out of a plane before landing in Paris.

A risky move like this

would normally require a stunt double,

but that's actually Tom Cruise,

and that background behind him

is not a green screen.

The actor is famous

for almost always doing his own stunts,

no matter how dangerous.

From climbing the world's tallest building

to hanging off the side of a plane

to pulling off perhaps

one of the most dangerous helicopter chases

ever captured on film,

Cruise is always finding new ways to top himself.

And he's not stopping anytime soon.

At more than 2,700 feet,

the Burj Khalifa in Dubai

is the world's tallest building.

So it was only a matter of time

before Cruise decided to climb it.

For this stunt,

the actor had to climb 1,700 feet in the air,

so he had to wear a special harness

attached to strategic points in the building.

To do this, the crew needed

to break 26 different windows --

with permission, of course.

This harness was so tight,

Cruise said it cut off his circulation.

The 65-millimeter IMAX cameras

and additional helicopter shooting the scene

only had a limited amount of time to record,

so they had to move fast.

But Cruise wasn't just climbing the building.

He also had to fall four stories

and run down the surface of the building

in a move known as an Australian rappel.

All of this required a lot of preparation.

Cruise practiced by climbing up

a makeshift glass wall

heated with artificial lights

to replicate the hot temperature

of the windows on the Burj Khalifa.

Stunt coordinator Gregg Smrz

estimated that Cruise and the crew

put in at least 200 hours of rehearsal time.

This isn't Cruise's first experience climbing, however.

In 2000's "Mission: Impossible 2,"

he climbed a 2,000-foot cliff in Utah

attached to nothing but a thin safety rope

and had to jump 15 feet

from one cliff to another.

The stunts in "Edge of Tomorrow" were tough,

but it was actually the costume

that made it even more so.

Throughout the film, Cruise's character

wears metal exoskeleton armor,

something that typically might be added on through CGI.

But Cruise wore a real suit,

sometimes for up to six hours a day straight.

One version weighed 85 pounds,

and another version weighed around 130 pounds,

thanks to a sniper rifle

and missile launcher on the back.

Here's what Cruise normally

looks like running in a scene.

Compare that to this shot of him

and his costar Emily Blunt

running while both wore the suits.

In another stunt for the film,

the actor was attached to a wire

and thrown across the room while wearing it.

To take some of the weight off

and help them run more easily,

Cruise and Blunt were often attached to cables.

It took Cruise 30 minutes to get into the suit

and 30 to get out.

The team eventually got that down

to around 30 seconds.

While Cruise had plenty of experience

flying planes in "Top Gun,"

in "Rogue Nation," he decided to go into the air

in a rather unconventional and more terrifying way.

For the film's opening scene,

he had to cling onto the side of an Airbus A400M

that took him up 1,000 feet

at a speed of 100 knots

for six to eight minutes.

The plane took off,

did a complete circuit, and landed --

all with Tom Cruise secured to the side

with this wire that would later be erased

in postproduction.

Because the plane went so high into the air,

Cruise had to wear special contacts

to protect his eyes from flying debris

and strong gusts of wind.

Plus, the crew had to make sure

takeoff conditions were absolutely clear.

If they ran into even a single bird

or some rocks on the runway,

it could severely injure the actor.

The stunt had to be performed over and over again

until the actor, director, and crew

felt they got it right.

For Cruise, he didn't feel confident in the take

until he had gone up eight times.

The fifth "Mission" entry contained not one

but two death-defying stunts,

this one involving military-style preparation.

In the film, Ethan Hunt

needs to open an underwater vault.

The vault itself was created using CGI,

but Cruise still needed

to work underwater for the sequence,

which clocks in at just about six minutes long.

He started by jumping off a 120-foot ledge

into a tank filled 20 feet high with water.

Then Cruise needed to film takes

while holding his breath

for four to six minutes.

According to Cruise,

most underwater sequences might have an actor

hold their breath for up to 10 seconds,

so this was definitely a challenge.

He trained with free-diving expert Kirk Krack

on a breath-hold special operations program

designed for military personnel.

Part of his training involved breathing exercises

that would lower his standard heart rate,

essentially training his body to use less oxygen.

And he wouldn't just be sitting

in the water during the shoot --

he would be swimming around.

Why so long?

Well, they had just 10 days to film the sequence,

so director Christopher McQuarrie

shot in a series of continuous takes,

meaning the actor couldn't easily pop up for air.

While Cruise hasn't gone to space -- yet --

he has performed a zero-gravity stunt.

In "The Mummy," he had to hold

his breath underwater yet again, dodge explosions,

and even fight Russell Crowe.

The biggest standout stunt was this sequence,

in which a cargo plane plummets to the ground.

Cruise was offered the chance

to shoot it on a soundstage,

but he declined and opted for the real thing.

To imitate the experience of the crash

where the characters float up into the air,

they shot on a plane that NASA

typically uses to train astronauts.

They decked out the inside of the plane with padding

to make it look like a real cargo plane.

The plane couldn't go into zero-gravity mode

until it was at about 25,000 feet.

Once at that position,

it would free-fall for 22 seconds.

During that time,

Cruise endured four high-altitude flights.

The sequence was eventually wrapped

after a whopping 64 takes.

And while Cruise's stunts

usually require a lot of rehearsal,

the actor actually said

that that was quite tough here,

as floating in the air makes things unpredictable.

Cruise has flown a plane

and hung onto the side of one,

but for "Fallout,"

he also learned to fly a helicopter

as part of an aerial chase sequence.

The 2018 film contains

an array of the actor's most daring stunts,

like this motorcycle chase,

in which the actor rode through the streets of Paris,

sometimes at 100 miles per hour.

For the helicopter chase,

Ethan Hunt flies through dangerous mountain terrain

to stop a nuclear bomb.

Before shooting, Cruise worked 16 hours a day

to hit the required 2,000 hours of helicopter training.

There would be up to 13 helicopters

close to each other in the sky at once,

so Cruise and the stunt team carefully planned out

every little move in advance

using these toy helicopters.

And the actor needed all the preparation he could get,

as he would be acting, piloting,

and operating the cameras

mounted to the front of his chopper

all at the same time.

All that planning was crucial,

particularly for this 360-degree corkscrew dive,

a move that's challenging

even for professional pilots.

According to Matt Evans,

an instructor at the school where Cruise trained,

the stunt involves starting with a descent,

rolling into a turn,

and then holding the turn as you go down.

While that's happening,

the actor can never take his hands off the controls.

In "Mission: Impossible 2,"

Cruise's character jumps out of a helicopter,

but that scene was shot using a green screen.

In "Fallout," Cruise decided

to actually jump out of a plane

and became the first actor to do

a HALO jump on camera.

HALO stands for high altitude, low opening.

He jumped from a height of over 25,000 feet

but didn't open his parachute

until he was below 2,000 feet.

This military move allows a soldier

to jump into battle undetected.

The actor practiced in a giant wind tunnel

constructed on the set,

and then, according to stunt coordinator Wade Eastwood,

jumped out of a plane around 100 times.

And a trained stunt-camera operator

also had to jump out of the plane with Cruise

to get the shot.

To make sure every facial expression

was still visible on camera,

the crew developed a special helmet for Cruise

with a light in it,

allowing him to breathe properly while falling.

In the long-awaited sequel

to Tom Cruise's 1986 breakout film,

Cruise is back in the cockpit of a fighter plane.

The film was shot on real military aircraft carriers,

and Cruise flew in real planes.

A new camera system allowed the crew

to put six IMAX-quality cameras inside the cockpit.

In the original "Top Gun,"

one of the F-14s had three cameras

total mounted onto it.

But it wasn't just Cruise going solo --

the rest of the cast trained alongside him.

Cruise and the rest of the cast

needed to actually fly

for an even better viewing experience.

Despite the potential risks,

there are aspects of flying

one simply couldn't see if they used green screen,

like these distortions in the face.

What's your favorite Tom Cruise stunt?

Let us know in the comments.