7 Movie Scenes That Could ONLY Be Done On The First Take

4. The Leap Of Faith (GoldenEye)

James Bond GoldenEye opening scene dam leap of faith
MGM

The James Bond series is no stranger to insane action stunts, and these moments often end up being the standout parts of their respective movies.

This is certainly the case with 1995's GoldenEye, whose opening leap of faith stunt is easily one of the most pulse-pounding sequences in the film.

Performed by stuntman Wayne Michaels and his massive balls of steel, the scene required him to jump off the Contra dam in Switzerland, which stretches up to a dizzying 720 feet in height. Amazingly, he absolutely nailed it on the first take, and it's a good job he did too - because he wasn't exactly keen to do it all over again.

While the production could've re-filmed the stunt if something went wrong or it didn't look right, Michaels apparently told the crew that he was only going to do it one time, meaning that the leap had to be done correctly right away. And it was!

It's not at all difficult to understand Michaels' nervousness here, considering that jumping from this kind of altitude with nothing but a stretchy rope for support is a task that few people would be eager to do once - let alone twice.

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Danny has been with WhatCulture for over ten years, and is currently Doctor Who Editor and WhoCulture Channel Manager, overseeing all of WhatCulture's Whoniverse coverage. In 2022, he took charge of WhoCulture and has grown it into the biggest Doctor Who channel on YouTube, and one of the biggest Doctor Who communities on the web full-stop. He has been writing and video editing since his early teens, and first got a taste for content creation after making his own Doctor Who trailers, off the back of a burning obsession with the Matt Smith era of the show. Like many his age, he first got into Doctor Who with the 2005 revival, but has since gone back and fallen in love with the classic years too. If you need someone to recite every Doctor Who episode in order, or to give you a random factoid about the making of Gridlock, Danny is the person to ask!