How Tom Cruise Reacted to Almost Having His Head Sliced Off Filming ‘The Last Samurai’
Actor Tom Cruise put plenty of hard work into the preparation of The Last Samurai. However, it’s impossible to expect everything on a movie set to go as planned, especially when it comes to action stuntwork. As a result, Cruise nearly had his head sliced right off filming The Last Samurai. Here’s a look at what he had to say about it when it was brought up during an interview.
‘The Last Samurai’ actor Tom Cruise put a lot of preparation into playing Nathan Algren
IGN attended a 2003 press conference for The Last Samurai and had the chance to speak with Cruise. He explained that he couldn’t even touch his toes when he started his preparation. However, he put on 25 pounds of muscle to manage pulling off the stuntwork while wearing 50 pounds worth of armor. Cruise recognized that there was some very known danger involving The Last Samurai stunts.
“I’m more concerned about not hurting someone else because when you’re moving those swords, even though at times they weren’t razor sharp, but they could still cut your finger off at the speed we were traveling and those swords coming in the way they were,” Cruise said. “And I have to say that the guys I worked with were excellent.”
Tom Cruise allegedly almost had his head sliced off filming ‘The Last Samurai’
Cruise told IGN that he wasn’t the only actor on The Last Samurai to fear hurting another actor with the weaponry. The interviewer noted that actor Hiroyuki Sanada previously said that a failure in the mechanical horse nearly caused some real harm. As a result, he almost sliced off Cruise’s head with the metal sword, but he managed to stop it just in time.
“Did they say that?,” Cruise asked. “That I almost got my head cut off? Did they really [Cruise laughs]? No, he stopped at my nose. Maybe when I wasn’t looking. Yeah. Yeah. It was an inch. It wasn’t in my neck.”
Fortunately, Cruise wasn’t injured and didn’t even seem to notice the near-fatal injury on The Last Samurai set. Nevertheless, the moment freaked out Sanada.
The actor expects everyone on his movie sets to work just as hard as he does
Cruise explained that there are a lot of factors that go into his choice of projects, such as The Last Samurai. Naturally, he always wants to make sure that the story is particularly impressive with a great character that sticks out to him. However, he also looks to the folks that are working on the movie around him. Understandably, Cruise enjoys a good challenge by pushing himself both physically and emotionally.
“When I work, I work very hard,” Cruise said. “So I look to work with people who have that level of dedication. And I depend on that from everyone. From the director to my crews that I work with.”
