Tom Cruise hints about the future of Mission: Impossible

Cruise was 34 when he first played super spy Ethan Hunt

Tom Cruise has no plans to stop playing Ethan Hunt anytime soon.

The actor, 61, has said that he wants to keep making Mission: Impossible films until he is Harrison Ford’s age, comparing his franchise with Ford’s Indiana Jones.

Cruise told the Sydney Morning Herald: “Harrison Ford is a legend. I hope to still be going. I’ve got 20 years to catch up with him.”

He continued: “I hope to keep making Mission: Impossible films until I’m his age.”

Cruise was 34 years old when he first played super spy Ethan Hunt in 1996’s Mission: Impossible. The character was two years younger than the actor.

In the years since, he has starred in seven sequels, the most recent of which – titled Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One – is out later this week.

In comparison, Ford was 38 when he played Indiana Jones for the first time in 1981’s Raiders of the Lost Ark.

He was 80 years old in the fifth and most recent addition to the franchise, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, which was released on 28 June.

Hayley Atwell and Tom Cruise in ‘Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One' (Paramount Pictures/Skydance)

Cruise now appears to have ruled out any notion that the forthcoming sequel, Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part Two – which is due for release sometime next year – will be his last outing in the role.

At 61 years old, Cruise appears to be in superb health. He continues to perform his own extreme stunts for the action franchise and does so also in Mission Impossible 7.

In the new film, Cruise is seen speed flying – a sport in which participants use a small paraglider wing to rapidly descend great heights, such as mountains.

Cruise spent years training for the sequence, which is described as one of the most dangerous the actor has ever undertaken. The crew were said to have watched him speed fly in “absolute terror”.

Elsewhere in the interview with Sydney Herald, Cruise addressed his recent social media post urging cinemagoers to watch two of his summer box office rivals: Barbie and Oppenheimer.

(© 2023 Paramount Pictures)

The two films – directed by Greta Gerwig and Christopher Nolan, respectively – are due for release on the same day (21 July).

“I want to see both Barbie and Oppenheimer,” he said. “I’ll see them opening weekend. Friday, I’ll see Oppenheimer first and then Barbie on Saturday.

“I grew up seeing movies on the big screen. That’s how I make them, and I like that experience; it’s immersive, and to have that as a community and an industry, it’s important.”

Initial reviews for Dead Reckoning are overwhelmingly positive. In a four-star review of the film, The Independent’s film critic Clarisse Loughrey writes: “The film is a mirror image of its star – a muscular, extravagant, thoroughly old-school work of ingenuity and craft.”