The first movie of this series, from 1996, was also the last motion picture from a big studio to be released on cassette, and its climactic train sequence took about six weeks to shoot. The scene was so impactful that in 2006 a helicopter successfully flew through a tunnel in Brazil inspired by it.

Even so, the movie kept below budget, with Tom Cruise doing all of the stunts. While filming the scene where he drops from the ceiling, for example, he kept hitting his head on the floor. So he had the idea to put coins in his shoes to counterbalance his upper body weight. It worked like a charm.