Since 1996, when the first film in the hit Mission: Impossible franchise launched, star Tom Cruise has performed many death-defying stunts.
Who can forget when he walked sideways across the Burj Khalifa exterior 518 metres in the air for that scene in Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol?
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But getting the seventh instalment of the globe-trotting spy saga to the cinemas has proven to be one of the most challenging for Cruise.
First announced in 2019, Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One has been marred by multiple delays owing to the Covid-19 pandemic. While production began in Norway in 2020, pandemic restrictions caused multiple changes to production schedules and even a change of cast members, as filming moved from the UK to Italy and Abu Dhabi in the UAE.
It also led to the usually amiable Cruise having a rare meltdown in 2020 when he shouted at crew members, which was heard around the world.
Now, four years after it was first announced, Cruise's Ethan Hunt and his team of super spies are set to give fans a summer blockbuster like they've never seen before.
Setting off on “their biggest mission yet”, according to Cruise, the seventh instalment's scope was so big it had to be split into two films.
After its world premiere in Rome last week, Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One's cast and crew, including Cruise, will head to Abu Dhabi for its Middle Eastern premiere on Monday.
What is the release date for Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One?
Fans in the UAE will get to experience the film earlier than their US counterparts. The film will be released in the Emirate on July 9, three days before its US and global rollout on July 12.
What is it about?
According to the film's synopsis, Cruise's Ethan Hunt and his team from IMF or Impossible Missions Force will embark on their most dangerous mission yet as they race against time to track down a new weapon that threatens humanity before it falls into the wrong hands.
“With control of the future and the fate of the world at stake, and dark forces from Ethan's past closing in, a deadly race around the globe begins,” it reads. “Confronted by a mysterious, all-powerful enemy, Ethan is forced to consider that nothing can matter more than his mission – not even the lives of those he cares about most.”
Who's in the cast?
Cruise reprises his role as Ethan Hunt, the leader of the IMF along with returning cast members: Ving Rhames as Luther Stickell, Simon Pegg as Benji Dunn, Rebecca Ferguson as Ilsa Faust, Vanessa Kirby as Alanna Mitsopolis, Frederick Schmidt as Zola Mitsopolis and Henry Czerny as Eugene Kittridge.
Esai Morales will play Gabriel, a powerful terrorist, while Marvel star Pom Klementieff will play Paris, a deadly assassin. Another Marvel star Hayley Atwell has also been cast as Grace, who has said her character's loyalties in the film were “somewhat ambiguous”.
Top Gun: Maverick star Greg Tarzan Davis joins the cast as Degas along with Shea Whigham, who plays Jason Briggs.
Why are there two parts of Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning?
Director Christopher McQuarrie, who shares writing credits with Erik Jendresen, says he and Cruise came up with the idea to “blow it out” in scale while filming Tom Gun: Maverick, for which McQuarrie served as co-writer.
“We knew that if we were going to make a big, two-part adventure, these instalments would have to swallow the rest of the franchise whole. That was the level we were looking at,” McQuarrie recalls in the film's production notes.
For Cruise, it was an opportunity to try something new.
“We were shooting Top Gun: Maverick and we started to talk about Mission. McQ said, ‘We have to make a back-to-back.’ And that really got me,” Cruise says. “Because I’ve never done a back-to-back and I like learning new things. So, when he said that it was very much like, ‘Yes, OK.’
“This is the first time we’ve ever split a Mission: Impossible story over two movies. It’s something we’ve never attempted before because of the complexity of these stories. The scale of these two movies is epic in every sense,” adds Cruise.
Mission Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part Two is scheduled to be released in June 2024.
Filming in Abu Dhabi
This is the third time the film franchise has come to the UAE. The first was for Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol. Released in 2011, the box office hit features what is arguably Cruise's most famous stunt, where he scales Dubai's Burj Khalifa.
Cruise later returned to Abu Dhabi to film a scene where he performed a Halo (high altitude low opening) jump over the dunes for 2018's Mission: Impossible – Fallout.
Filming for Dead Reckoning took place in the UAE capital over 15 days in 2021, with locations in the Liwa desert and at Abu Dhabi International Airport’s Midfield Terminal.
McQuarrie praised Abu Dhabi for its hospitality after filming wrapped in February 2021.
“What makes the desert beautiful is that somewhere it hides a well,” McQuarrie, quoting French poet Antoine de Saint-Exupery, added, alongside a behind-the-camera shot taken during filming in the emirate's dunes.
“Grace and graciousness, magic and majesty, hospitality and hope. Of the many challenges we’ve faced on our journey, none will be greater than outshining the gifts Abu Dhabi has given us. Thanks to our extraordinary local cast, crew and the very fine people of Abu Dhabi. We shall most sincerely miss you until we see you again.”
