Every year, a new blockbuster promises to deliver bigger, more outrageous, action-packed suspense.
More often than not, there's a professional stuntman swapping out the actor to make these moments happen. But occasionally, the actors take it upon themselves.
And that hasn't always ended well.
Here are 10 actors on the stunts that nearly killed them.
But first, watch the trailer for Matrix Resurrection. Post continues after video.
Image: Paramount Pictures.
It would be rude to start with anyone else!
Tom Cruise is known for performing all of his stunts, especially when filming for the Mission Impossible franchise.
He's learned how to fly jetplanes, skydive and hang off buildings in the name of action.
But when filming a scene for the 2018 film Mission Impossible: Fallout, Cruise had a particularly close call.
The actor was jumping between the roofs of two highrise buildings. Upon landing the jump, Cruise hit his leg on the wrong angle and broke a bone.
But that didn't stop him.
He finished the scene that ended up in the film, and you can see him limping away.
Image: Universal Pictures.
Arnold Schwarzenegger actually landed most of his major film roles because of his willingness to perform his own stunts.
But that came at a price when filming Conan the Barbarian.
During one scene of the 1982 movie, the former bodybuilder is getting chased by a pack of vicious dogs.
They jumped on Schwarzenegger from behind, causing him to fall down the rock he was climbing up to escape them and suffer a back injury.
"When you had the dogs chasing Arnold Schwarzenegger and he's running, he's actually running for his life because he knew those dogs were very dangerous," director John Milius said.
Image: Netflix.
During a scene in her Netflix series Santa Clarita Diet, Drew Barrymore's character latches onto the back of a man, before losing her grip and hitting her head on the concrete.
Paramedics were called and the actor spent the following two days in hospital being treated for her injuries.
"It was f**king terrifying," Barrymore told US Weekly.
"It was very serious. I’ve never had a feeling like that in my life."
Image: Paramount Pictures.
When filming Raiders of the Lost Ark, Harrison Ford did more than 75 per cent of Indiana Jones' stunts. But creating one of his most famous scenes could've killed him.
"The 12-foot rock which chases Harrison Ford in the cave sequence would have killed whoever it ran over – if it ever had," director Steven Spielberg wrote in a piece for American Cinematographer.
Spielberg said that the scene wouldn't have been as strong with a stunt double as his head would have been down, so Ford volunteered to do it himself.
"There were five shots of the rock from five different angles – each one done separately, each one done twice – so Harrison had to race the rock ten times. He won ten times – and beat the odds. He was lucky – and I was an idiot for letting him try it."
Image: Sony Pictures.
Casino Royale marked Daniel Craig's initiation into the James Bond franchise, and with that came an eagerness to perform his own stunts.
But there was one scene that could have ended his career.
At the beginning of the film, Craig chases a bad guy through a construction site. They continue to get higher and higher, jumping and climbing over equipment.
As the scene progresses, the two leap from a 200-foot-high crane.
If either of them made one wrong step, the scene could have had a very different ending.
Image: 20th Century Fox.
In Keanu Reeves' iconic 1994 film Speed, there's a scene where his character jumps from the top of a car onto the moving bus.
Director Jan de Bont originally said the stunt would be too dangerous, however, Reeves insisted he could land it.
Since then, the actor has continued to perform nail-biting stunts, telling Stephen Colbert in 2020 that he had to jump off a 46-story building 19 times to get the shot for The Matrix: Ressurrections.
Image: Golden Harvest.
One of Jackie Chan's most dangerous stunts to date was in the 1983 film Project A.
In it, the actor dangles from a clock tower before losing his grip, falling through two canopies and hitting the ground, before delivering a few lines.
The entire sequence was captured in one uninterrupted take, despite Chan breaking his neck performing it.
Image: Lionsgate.
Jason Statham is known for appearing in fast-paced action movies like Transporter, The Italian Job and most recently, The Fast and the Furious franchise.
But in the 2006 film Crank, the actor got quite a shock after filming one scene.
During the movie, Statham has a mid-air fight with the villain, Verona. To make sure it looked real to the audience, they filmed the scene in real-time, with only a small belt and wire holding them in place.
"The helicopter stunt was the most frightening stunt I've ever performed," Statham said told The Age in 2006. "The fear in my eyes was pretty real."
Image: Warner Bros.
Although there were many fight scenes in Batman Begins that left Christian Bale battered and bruised, it was his Sears Tower moment overlooking Chicago that could've killed him.
For the scene, the actor was told to stand on the edge of a 110-story building overlooking the cityscape. Although nearly deadly, he found the experience "comfortable".
"How often do you get a chance to do that in a Batman costume looking out on Chicago? One hundred and ten stories up looking over the edge straight down on the street? I’m not letting anybody else do that," he said according to Fandomwire.
"I’ll tell you, the thing that was kind of disturbing but enjoyable was how comfortable I felt."
Image: Universal Pictures.
In the 2012 action thriller Safe House, Ryan Reynolds shot several intense action fight sequences, including one inside a car.
Months after filming, the actor started to feel pain in his neck. After brushing it off and coping with a complaint here or there, the actor finally went and got an X-ray.
The doctor confirmed that Reynolds had broken his C5 and six vertebrates.
"You think you're an actor and the stunt guys do it all but you get beat up. So now I'm like, 'Let the stunt guy do it. I'm good'," he told AAP.
Image: Getty/Tri-Star/Netflix.
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