In “Barry Seal: American Traffic”, broadcast this Tuesday evening on France 2, Tom Cruise displays the same perfectionism as in the recent “Top Gun: Maverick”. In what specific area? We reveal it to you!
The feature film Barry Seal: American Traffic, broadcast this Tuesday evening on France 2, tells the true story of a scam pilot unexpectedly recruited by the CIA to carry out one of the biggest secret operations in the world. United States history. In the main role, we find Tom Cruise, who is as perfectionist there as in Top Gun: Maverick when it comes to taking control of a plane!
In Maverick, Tom Cruise and the other actors, for the sake of credibility, have learned to fly F/A-18s and are actually present in the planes. Through intensive five-month training, they have become accustomed to the fundamentals of flight and G-force, a unit of acceleration corresponding to the acceleration of gravity, but they are not the ones piloting the devices.
The actors, on the other hand, had to take the place of the director in the cockpit, act out their dialogues and film in full flight, thus having to learn how to film and frame for the occasion. Tom Cruise’s work on Top Gun: Maverick was impressive, but what about his approach to Barry Seal?
Confirmed and passionate pilots, Doug Liman, the director of Barry Seal, and Tom Cruise, the hero of the film, were particularly attached to the place and the use of the planes in the film. The skill of the star greatly impressed his director. “Tom did all the flight scenes himself, he even flew one of our planes to Colombia”says the American filmmaker with admiration.
“These are small planes, and you might think, ‘You’re talking all of a sudden!’ But those are just the kind of planes Barry was flying”he continues. “He was doing 10-hour flights in small cuckoo clocks. Barry was leaving with fuel reserves. Tom himself made stops to refuel. Not me, I took a Delta flight!”
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Frederic North, aerial coordinator on Barry Seal, confirms how impressive it is to work with someone as dedicated as Tom Cruise. “It was a new experience for me to work with a lead actor who has such expertise and passion for aviation”he says. “Tom was well aware that Barry Seal had a habit of flying at low altitudes, and he was more than up to the challenge.”
For aviation fans, it should be noted that in Barry Seal: Amerian Traffic, Tom Cruise pilots a six-seater Aerostar 600 and a Cassna 414 containing up to 8 passengers, always with Doug Liman as co-pilot. But the real star of the film is the Fairchild C-123, nicknamed the “fat lady” and loaned by the museum of aviation in Beaver County, Pennsylvania. This device, also nicknamed the “thunder pig”, weighs 16 tons when empty and can fly at a maximum speed of 367 km/h. It was withdrawn from circulation in 1981.
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