20 Things You Didn't Know About Mission Impossible 2
11. A Knife In The Eye
Free soloing is one thing but nearly losing your eye is something else entirely. That's what nearly happened during the filming of MI2's climatic fight.
At one point in the scrap, Ambrose pulls a knife on Hunt and comes perilously close to stabbing him in the eye but Hunt just about keeps his vision intact. You could be mistaken for thinking that the knife was a clever bit of CGI but in fact it's the real thing.
Cruise, against Woo's wishes, demanded they use a real knife and that Scott should use all of his strength in the fight, despite being physically stronger, for authenticity's sake. They attached the knife in question to a cable that was measured to stop the knife less than a centimetre away from Cruise's eye.
The stunt makes for an awesome shot that I'm sure everyone on set must have dreaded filming.