[MI 8] news update

juliezhou · Guru

[MI 8] news update

juliezhou · Guru

filming halted due to WGA strike

juliezhou · Guru

A source told The Sun: 'Tom had started to learn to fly a Boeing Stearman biplane earlier this year for a major stunt scene in Mission: Impossible 8.

'It's obviously a highly skilled task but as usual he has no plans to cut any corners or bring in a stuntman.'

The insider went on: 'Filming has only just wrapped on Mission: Impossible 7 but Tom has not given himself a break. And trying to film jaw-dropping scenes with an 80-year-old plane is particularly dangerous.'

The action man is renowned for doing his own stunts in his films, and it appears the eighth installment of the Mission Impossible franchise will be no be different.

Cruise holds a helicopter license and a fixed-wings pilot's license.

Mark: The mark was visible on Tom's cheek as he sat in the ****pit

Pilot: The star was in his element as he prepared to fly the plane in the UK

There he is: The star thoroughly checked out the plane before climbing aboard

Eyes on you: The star checked put the plane and chatted with crew members ahead of the stunt

In the air: The star was seen in the plane during the dramatic flight scene

Outfit: Tom was every inch the action man as he walked to the plane for the scene

Windswept: The star battled the element as he headed to set in Cambridgeshire

Wow: A second plane fitted with a camera was seen taking flight alongside Tom

Tandem: The planes looked magnificent as they took to the sky for filming

Coming in to land: The star looked focused as he came in to land at the air field

Look at that: The star checked out a camera rig as he prepared to film in the UK

Natural:Cruise holds a helicopter license and a fixed-wings pilot's license

juliezhou · Guru

juliezhou · Guru

Can Tom Cruise get audiences to care about Mission: Impossible 8?

The underwhelming box office of the seventh instalment has now been followed by a year-long delay for the next chapter

Stuart Heritage

Wed 25 Oct 2023 09.13 BST

Since 1996, the Mission: Impossible franchise has put Tom Cruise through the wringer. He’s scaled skyscrapers. He’s leapt out of planes. He’s broken bones. He did whatever the hell it was that Mission: Impossible II was about. And yet, despite this pathological desire to risk life and limb in the pursuit of mass entertainment, it’s starting to look like Cruise’s most difficult job yet will be to get anyone to see Mission: Impossible 8.

The most recent Mission: Impossible film, this summer’s Mission: Impossible C Dead Reckoning Part One, did not exactly proceed as anticipated. The movie was initially slated for release in 2021, only for Covid to shut down production twice. And then, when it did eventually make it to screen, people stayed away in bafflingly large numbers. Despite being a critically acclaimed orgy of giddy set pieces, the film struggled at the box office. As things stand, Dead Reckoning Part One is the second lowest-grossing entry in the franchise after 2006’s Mission: Impossible III, earning almost $50m less than 2018’s Mission: Impossible C Fallout. All in all, Paramount looks set to lose about $100m on the film.

And now, to make matters worse, the next one is going to be delayed as well. Although the plan was to release it one year after Part One, the effects of the Sag-Aftra strike have caused Paramount to shunt the film back. It will now be released on 23 May 2025. That is unless anything else goes wrong before that, which at this rate almost certainly will.

The task now facing Mission: Impossible 8 is, well, extremely difficult. Dead Reckoning Part Two isn’t just a normal M:I film, but a direct sequel that was made in the retrospectively wrongheaded belief that everyone would go bananas over its predecessor. And even the few people who did see that film will have waited so long for its sequel that they will have probably forgotten what actually happened in it. Not to be a downer, but at this rate you shouldn’t be surprised if Mission: Impossible C Dead Reckoning Part Two ends up making even less money than Mission: Impossible C Dead Reckoning Part One.

So now the question is what Mission: Impossible can do to reverse its fading fortunes? Obviously, my suggestion would be to do nothing at all. For those who saw it, Dead Reckoning Part One was likely to be one of the most intense cinematic experiences of their lives. It’s a relentless pounding of a film that exists purely to give a modern action audience what it wants in greater quantities than it can possibly handle. It is a magnificent film C one of the best in the series, even C and I would argue that its failure is more a symptom of the death of theatrical cinema than a rebuke against the quality of the film itself. My advice would always be for the franchise to keep doing exactly what it’s been doing, in the knowledge that its long-term legacy will outweigh contemporary gripes.

But I said that when it came out, and everyone stayed at home anyway, so it just goes to show what I know. So maybe Mission: Impossible does need to course-correct a little to remind audiences what they’re missing. We could, of course, start with the obvious. Saying (and typing) “Mission: Impossible C Dead Reckoning Part One” is an almighty pain in the bum, and the title hints at the sort of bloat that is bound to affect an almost 30-year-old franchise. Maybe for the next one, just give it a one-word subtitle. Mission: Impossible C Pow, maybe, or Mission: Impossible C Oi.

Also, as much as that video of Tom Cruise jumping off a motorbike on a mountain cheered us all up in the depths of Covid, there might also be a lesson to learn here. Why on earth would any film choose to lead with repeated shots of the film’s biggest stunt being executed? By the time the actual film came out, everyone assumed that they’d already seen the best bit for free on YouTube. Next time, Mission: Impossible should try saving some excitement for the actual film.

Next we should probably look at the films that actually did make money this summer. M:I was far from alone in underperforming, with fellow presumed dead certs like Indiana Jones and The Flash also tanking. The two big shining lights of the summer were Barbie and Oppenheimer. Were they perfect films? No. But they got audiences hyped up beyond all recognition anyway. The day that Barbie came out, for instance, my local cinema was decked out in bright pink, with many of the staff coming to work dressed in Barbie costumes. Is that something that Mission: Impossible could attempt? Would the promise of being shown to your seats by someone dressed as Simon Pegg be enough to turn things around? Actually, probably not.

In the end, Hollywood is an industry ruled by the bottom line. And if the Mission: Impossible films are going to make money again, this can only mean one thing: they need to become a lot cheaper, and fast. There are ways to scrape away at the edges of the budget, of course. They could make the next one in fewer locations, and pare down the cast to its bare bones. But the big money-suck on the Mission: Impossible films are the stunts. I hate to say it, but these might need to be trimmed back. This isn’t the end of the world, though. I firmly believe that you could centre a very good Mission: Impossible movie around a sequence where Tom Cruise gets pushed down a concrete staircase in a shopping trolley. If anyone needs me to write it, I’m right here.

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2023/oct/25/mission-impossible-8-dead-reckoning-tom-cruise

juliezhou · Guru

BBC report:

====

Pictures appear to show Tom Cruise filming in Derbyshire

By Jude Winter, Isaac Ashe and Jacob Waters

BBC News, Derby

5 March 2024

Hollywood star Tom Cruise appears to have been pictured in Derbyshire, fuelling excitement about another Mission: Impossible film.

Tom Cruise

Cruise was apparently snapped driving a jeep in an apparent stunt scene at Middleton Mine on Monday.

Film crews have set up at the location and told villagers it was being used to record a car chase.

Cruise has starred in the blockbuster franchise as Impossible Mission Force (IMF) agent Ethan Hunt.

Middleton Community Primary School reportedly hosted an assembly where a production team revealed the scene was being filmed at Middleton Mine.

Mission: Impossible shot a train stunt at another Derbyshire quarry in 2021.

Tarmac, which owns the site near Matlock, offers it as a filming location for production companies but was unable to confirm to the BBC if Mission: Impossible was shooting there currently.

Tom Cruise

The school did not confirm the production team had visited but a seven-year-old pupil told BBC Radio Derby: "We went in for assembly and there were four people from Mission: Impossible.

"They spoke about a car chase and that two people rode in a car through the mines.

"It was really fun because we could ask them questions. I asked them what their favourite movie was. They said they liked lots of movies and asked me what mine was."

Simon Pegg, who plays field agent Benji Dunn, shared a picture on Instagram of himself and fellow cast members outside the nearby Castle Inn in Bakewell.

Hayley Atwell, who starred in the previous Mission: Impossible film as thief-turned-agent Grace, also shared a photograph atop Bamford Edge in the Peak District on her account this week.

Mission: Impossible films Derbyshire quarry train crash

The scene involving the locomotive crash for Mission: Impossible Dead Reckoning, was filmed at Darlton Quarry in Stoney Middleton, near Eyam, in August 2021, which was followed by another stunt involving a train carriage.

Tom Cruise was spotted at the quarry during the filming of the stunts three years ago but the film franchise's star has not been spotted this time around.

Steve Thomas, landlord of The Rising Sun pub in Middleton, said members of the production team coming into his pub had confirmed the rumours that Mission: Impossible filming had returned to the county.

"It is more than rumour, it is actual fact - although I've not seen Mr Cruise just yet," the 57-year-old said.

"A number of people from the production offices have come into the pub recently.

"There is a mine nearby and they said they are doing car chase sequences through the galleries in there, so it's an open secret shall we say."

Mine

Multiple vehicles spotted at Middleton Mine

Mission: Impossible's eighth instalment is scheduled for release in May 2025.

The as-yet unnamed film's production company Skydance Media has been approached for comment.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-derbyshire-68472142.amp

juliezhou · Guru

Tom Cruise's latest Mission: Impossible is to beat M25 closure: Star has helicopters on standby to fly crew over closed motorway to keep filming of his latest action blockbuster on schedule

A five-mile stretch of the motorway has been shut in both directions in a planned closure near Surrey, while a bridge is demolished and a new gantry is installed in a 317million upgrade project.

Motorists have been warned not to travel at all over fears of severe weekend chaos for the surrounding areas, amid forecasts of five-hour queues.

Hollywood A-lister Cruise, 61, is filming his eighth Mission Impossible movie near the stretch of road between junctions 10 and 11 that shut at 9pm on Friday night and will remain closed until Monday.

He is reportedly using a helipad in Battersea, southwest London, to fly the cast and crew of Mission: Impossible 8 to Surrey's Longcross Studios.

'The M25 closure is a headache for most people but not for Tom,' a source told The Sun.

'Staff on the movie or stars who are needed for filming have been told if they can't get to Longcross because of the M25 closures they'll be flown in by chopper.

'It's a feat that is just like a scene out of one of Tom's films.'

It is the first planned daytime closure of the motorway - which encircles London - since it opened in 1986.

An 11.5-mile diversion route has been created to direct motorway traffic along A roads.

The M25 looked eerily quiet last night as it was deserted but remained lit up by the amber overhead lights.

With cars set to be redirected through small villages, residents who live in the likes of Byfleet, Ottershaw and Woodham are concerned about the impact on local life.

A five-mile stretch of the M25 has been shut in both directions in a planned closure near Surrey

The closure was planned so that a bridge could be demolished and a new gantry installed in a 317million upgrade project

The photos show miles of deserted road, still lit up by the amber overhead lights

With cars set to be redirected through small villages, residents who live in the likes of Byfleet, Ottershaw and Woodham are concerned about the impact on local life

Motorists have run out of time complete their journeys today before the motorway is closed for the weekend, as locals living on the diversion route stockpile groceries

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13204155/Tom-Cruises-latest-Mission-Impossible-beat-M25-closure-Star-helicopters-standby-fly-crew-closed-motorway-filming-latest-action-blockbuster-schedule.html

juliezhou · Guru

MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE 8's Budget Continues To Spiral Out Of Control After A Submarine Stunt Goes Wrong

We've already heard rumblings about Mission: Impossible 8's budget ballooning to as much as $400 million, and the production just suffered another setback thanks to a submarine mishap.

By JoshWilding - May 27, 2024 02:05 PM EST

Source: The Mirror (via ActioNewz.com)

Original plans called for Mission: Impossible 8 to be shot back-to-back with Dead Reckoning - Part 1; however, the eighth instalment was also originally titled Dead Reckoning - Part 2, only for that to change when the first half underperformed at the box office.

The sequel has since suffered a series of setbacks. Shooting began in March 2022 and was halted last July as a result of the SAG-AFTRA strike. Work resumed this March and, right now, the idea is for Mission: Impossible 8 to be released next May.

However, according to a new report from The Mirror (via ActioNewz.com), the movie has been hit by further delays courtesy of...a malfunction with a submarine that's cost the production a whopping $23 million.

According to the site, "Sources say the gimbal, which is used to lower the 120ft-high structure, jammed under its weight and had to be repaired. This has put filming back weeks and bumped up costs. A source said: 'They’re not happy as it puts production behind, which costs a lot of money per day.'"

"Production hit problems once they started adding fittings and stairwells to the empty sub shell and realised the contraption holding it could not tolerate the weight," the report adds. "Insiders say the repairs are ongoing."

There have already been reports about the budgets for both Dead Reckoning and the untitled eighth movie running out of control, so we're sure Paramount Pictures won't be happy about this. In fact, Tom Cruise is thought to have clashed with the studio so often that he's moving on from them after spending the past 31 years of his career there (he's since signed a deal with Warner Bros.).

Various gossip sites are also running reports that Cruise is getting majorly stressed while attempting to get this next movie across the finish line.

In Mission: Impossible 8, Cruise will reprise his role as Ethan Hunt alongside returning stars Ving Rhames, Henry Czerny, Simon Pegg, Vanessa Kirby, Esai Morales, Hayley Atwell, Shea Whigham, and Pom Klementieff.

New additions to the franchise include Janet McTeer, Hannah Waddingham, Lucy Tulugarjuk, Katy O'Brian, and Tramell Tillman.

Waddingham recently spoke out in defence of Cruise when she said, "I have to say, I have a real problem with anybody that goes at [Tom Cruise] now. Having met him and having spent five days intensely. He is without doubt one of the loveliest and encouraging, positive and inspiring human beings I have ever met. Isn’t he gorgeous? I have no time for anyone saying anything about him."

https://comicbookmovie.com/action/mission-impossible/mission-impossible-8s-budget-continues-to-spiral-out-of-control-after-a-submarine-stunt-goes-wrong-a211188#gs.9gxot3

juliezhou · Guru

Even now, they are still doing reshoots which involve “fleshing out scenes or changing things around. They’re always tinkering and looking to make things better. So even while [working on Much Ado], I can get a call at any time.” Working with Cruise has been a delight: “When I started, I was very aware of the rarefied air around him and how there is no one like him. And there never will be because actors aren’t made like him any more. He is a one-man studio and, to me, very kind, very professional. And because of that, I felt I was able to try lots of different things. There was never a risk of failure or being unsafe. Tom really likes people to thrive on set.”

You can see why Cruise and Atwell work well together: both have a fierce work ethic and take their art incredibly seriously. Unusually for an action movie, there is no script when Mission: Impossible starts shooting and improvisation is actively encouraged (it was Atwell’s idea that Grace should be a pickpocket). “There’ll be Tom going: ‘From five years old I’ve always wanted to jump from a cliff on a motorbike’, and realising his dream. But with the rest, they’re kind of making it up as they go. When I auditioned, they were clear they were looking for someone who likes to work in this way, and that it’s not for everyone. I also had to be prepared for five months of full-time physical training and to be dynamic enough to learn fight sequences, to drift in a car with Tom, to be able to shoot a gun and work with knives.” Can Atwell confirm that this is the last film in the franchise? She pauses. “I mean, look, they called it The Final Reckoning. On the other hand, ‘Tom Cruise’ and ‘final’ are oxymorons, so I wouldn’t be surprised if he goes: “Wait, maybe …’ Although he has so many things he is working on, so I can’t see how another Mission would fit into that.”

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/feb/01/hayley-atwell-marvel-mission-impossible-much-ado-interview

juliezhou · Guru

‘Mission: Impossible 8' Cut Screened Was 3 Hours

March 5, 2025 Jordan Ruimy

Christopher McQuarrie’s “Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning” test screened on March 1, and very positive reactions have come out of that screening. To be clear, two slightly different cuts were screened in different rooms that evening.

The cuts shown clocked in at around 3 hours, and the film’s best set-piece seems to universally be the main stunt shown in the trailers, which has Cruise dangling up side a biplane. That’s apparently the sequence McQuarrie had been referring to when he recently stated that one audience member “almost had a heart attack” watching it.

Also, there had been rumors that the film features flashbacks of a younger Ethan Hunt, and that is indeed a small subplot in the film. As for whether they end up killing off Hunt, I won’t spoil it, and it should be noted again that two different cuts were shown, so there’s nothing set in stone at the moment.

McQuarrie recently stated that ‘Mission: Impossible 8’ featured "the most difficult thing" the production and Tom Cruise have ever filmed in the franchise, though he did not specify what it was. One look at the teaser, and it’s probably Cruise dangling on that biplane.

Cruise has described ‘Final Reckoning’ as “an epic, emotional journey of the entire franchise,” an odyssey of sorts. “It’s Homeric,” he told Empire Magazine. Though rumors have pointed towards that direction, no word yet on whether this will be Cruise’s last hurrah as Ethan Hunt in the ‘Mission: Impossible’ franchise.

There have been reports that ‘Final Reckoning,’ which had been plagued by delays and had an 18 month production, cost close to $400M. No matter, bring it on. ‘Mission: Impossible’ has been one of the most consistently entertaining franchises in Hollywood.

In addition to Cruise, ‘Final Reckoning’ also stars Hayley Atwell, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg, Vanessa Kirby, Esai Morales, Pom Klementieff, Mariela Garriga, Henry Czerny, Holt McCallany, Janet McTeer, Nick Offerman, Hannah Waddingham, Angela Bassett, Shea Whigham, Greg Tarzan Davis, Charles Parnell, and Frederick Schmidt.

“Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning.” will be released in theaters nationwide on May 23, 2025. You can also expect it to premiere beforehand, in May, at the Cannes Film Festival.

https://www.worldofreel.com/blog/2025/3/5/mission-impossible-8-cut-screened-was-3-hours