The video above may not be available in some regions.
With his body securely fastened to a cable, of course, Tom Cruise threw himself off the roof of the Stade de France on Sunday night, to the delight of the 71,500 spectators, adding a dash of Hollywood glitz to the closing ceremony of the Olympics in Paris.
After rappelling all the way to terra firma to the Mission Impossible soundtrack played by Grammy-winning R&B artist H.E.R , the movie legend grabbed the Olympic flag, jumped on a motorbike, and raced out of the stadium. Then, in a masterfully choreographed action scene, viewers worldwide were treated to Cruise racing through Parisian streets, jumping straight onto an airplane, and parachuting into Los Angeles, the site of the 2028 Olympics, all before he handed the flag to American mountain biker Kate Courtney.
The Olympic tradition involves the current host city passing the flag to the next one, so it made perfect sense for the Games to be held in a Hollywood-based city, with Cruise as the representative. The sixty-two-year-old is no stranger to performing his own stunts, like this insane one from Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation, and the closing ceremony offered him a great chance to add another one to his repertoire.
Along with the caption, “Thank you, Paris! Now off to L.A.”, the movie star also uploaded a picture of himself at the Olympic stadium.
The closing ceremony of the Paris Olympics was held inside a stadium, following a more conventional format from the opening ceremony last month, which was held outdoors for the first time in the history of the athletic extravaganza. While the athletes and the assembled spectators were drenched by the rain during the opening event, Sunday night’s closing ceremony featured fair weather and appeared to be an exciting evening of entertainment.
