Tom Cruise surprised attendees at a Cannes masterclass on May 14 by stepping in to celebrate Christopher McQuarrie, the writer-director behind 11 Mission: Impossible films. McQuarrie began by recalling he planned to leave filmmaking before meeting Cruise. “Tom arrived as a student,” he said. “He studies every element and lifts the vision around him.”
Cruise praised McQuarrie’s writing for its precision. “You can hear the filmmaker’s mind,” he said. “Chris crafts each beat so the actor’s voice shines through.” He compared their collaboration to a finely tuned mechanism, where every character moment and stunt sequence fits perfectly.
McQuarrie described how a TikTok clip inspired a custom gimbal rig, built over two years. The team tested it on a single set and captured unpredictable physics when it first powered up on Mission: Impossible – Final Reckoning. That sequence arrives tonight in Cannes competition.
Attention turned to the film’s biplane stunt, in which Cruise flew solo at 10,000 feet, braved 140 mph winds on the wing and returned to the cockpit with seconds of fuel left. “No one else on Earth can pull that off,” McQuarrie said.
Both men warned that streaming services threaten theatrical releases. McQuarrie criticized the industry’s competitive streak, noting that Cruise measures success by his own standards. “He’s his only rival,” McQuarrie said. “When his work succeeds, it raises the bar for everyone.”
Mission: Impossible – Final Reckoning premieres out of competition tonight and opens worldwide on May 23.