Practical stunt-work is an intense part of filmmaking.
It’s physically stressful, and downright dangerous, and that’s why most actors leave it to professional stuntmen.
However, these six stars do it themselves.
From different martial arts to extreme sports and crazy jumps, who are six most daring actors in Hollywood?
6. Daniel Craig
Unlike previous 007 Agents, Daniel Craig has done most of his own stunts.
He’s walked on the edge of a tall building, jumped from a roof to a balcony and even parkoured down a subway escalator.
One of his most impressive stunts was the train fight in Skyfall.
It was shot on a real train traveling at 65 km/h (40mph) and even the fight on the roof of the train was done for real.
Gary Powell, stunt coordinator for Daniel Craig’s Bond movies, said the actor was super professional when it came to his stunts.
“He was in early, way before production started,” Powell said. “Even though he didn’t love heights, he was up there [on the crane for the parkour scene, ed.], doing it.”
5. Tom Holland
Some of you may not know that Tom Holland is actually a a trained gymnast, which helped him a lot while filming Uncharted and Spiderman.
In previous films, Spiderman’s swings were entirely computer generated.
However, because of Holland’s acrobatic abilities, they were able to film a lot of practical jumps and swings.
In the scene where Spidey climbs up the Washington monument, they had Holland climb up part of a replica with safety ropes before performing a backflip assisted by wires.
4. Jason Statham
Jason Statham is a former professional diver, and he also excels at kickboxing and Brazilian jiu-jitsu.
As you can imagine, he does his own stunts.
One of his best stunts is the helicopter fight scene in Crank.
After rehearsing the fight on the ground, Jason went up on the helicopter, hung outside, and did it for real.
3. Keanu Reeves
Keanu Reeves is extremely committed to doing his own stunts, and that includes jumping off a 43-story skyscraper in The Matrix.
What’s most impressive about him are the months of training he’s put in at the John Wick Bootcamp.
He’s famous for being able to pull off long action takes, which comes from the stamina he’s built from his intense martial arts training.
In fact, got so proficient at judo and jiu-jitsu that he earned an honorary black belt from the International Judo Federation.
For the John Wick franchise, he even learned how to shoot while horse-back riding.
2. Tom Cruise
Tom Cruise’s stunts are some of the biggest in Hollywood.
In Top Gun: Maverick, he flew in an F/A-18 fighter jet, and because of his G-Force training, he managed to not pass out on camera like the others.
And then of course we need to talk about the stunts he did for the Mission: Impossible saga.
In Rogue Nation, he trained with an expert freediver who taught him how to hold his breath underwater for 6 minutes.
For Fallout, Tom learned to fly a helicopter and performed a Halo jump, which is only ever done by the military.
Stunt coordinator Wade Eastwood says working with Tom Cruise on stunt sequences is the best thing that can happen to action directors.
“He’s very naturally talented as a stuntman,” Eastwood said. “He puts the prep time ahead of the actual stunts, so that we don’t get injuries.”
His biggest stunt ever was in Dead Reckoning.
To prepare for it, he had to learn three skills: skydiving, speed flying and motocross – and it all came together in this credible motorcycle base jump off a cliff.
1. Jackie Chan
Jackie Chan is a martial arts experts, and he choreographs most fight scenes himself.
However, what earns him the number one spot are the wild stunts he’s done on his own since the 1970s.
The craziest stunt was the slide down the skyscraper in Who Am I.
It took him 2 weeks to build up the courage to do this and it was shot in two parts.
First, Jackie slides down the outside of the building without safety wires and you can see the relief on his face when he stops at the edge of the slope.
And then second, he stands up and clings to the side.
