Mission: Impossible III
Recently, I watched the Tom Cruise film Mission: Impossible III for the first time since its release. Upon seeing the movie again, my impression was not a very favorable one, as it hit just about every checkbox of a generic, cliche-filled 2000's action movie-- And I actually enjoyed the newer Mission Impossible movies quite a bit. I'd consider it a fairly cheesy, over-the-top action-thriller with a pretty flimsy plot, but with some very well-done scenes throughout. In addition, the film was full of very questionable physics; many scenes were head-scratchers in terms of scientific accuracy, but I'll only go over three today.
To start, I'll go over what's probably the scene that raises the most questions in its depiction of physics. In Shanghai, Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) has to capture the McGuffin of the movie, the Rabbit's Foot, from a laboratory under heavy guard by easily distracted mercenaries. To accomplish this goal, Hunt opts to swing from one building and land on top of the villain's building. Previously, the movie shows Hunt scribbling out apparently complex math problems to figure out if this is possible, so it's an interesting task to find out if it really would be in any form. To discern the accuracy of the movie physics, we need some facts and figures about the two buildings and Hunt's jump itself. We can easily find out the heights of the buildings, since it's actually said out loud in the movie: the building Tom Cruise needs to jump off of is said to be 226 meters in height, the villain's skyscraper is 162 meters tall, and the gap between the two buildings is evidently 47.66 meters across. Before Hunt can start swinging between the buildings, he has to jump and free fall for quite a distance. If the time shown in the movie is accurate, Hunt free falls for about 12 seconds, as well as for about 5 in slow-mo, which we can assume is more like 2 in real time. So after falling for around 14 seconds, Hunt swings on the rope for around 11 seconds before detaching, resulting in a total of 25 seconds between his initial leap and his release from the rope. We also, of course, can factor gravity into the equation, since Hunt is in free-fall until the cord he's swinging on is fully extended. This means his initial acceleration on the Y axis would be 9.8 m/s^2. We can also factor in the weight and height of Agent Hunt, which, if we assume them to be the same as the actor Tom Cruise's weight and height, would be around 67 kilograms and about 170cm. Using all these factors, we can form a basic equation to decide whether or not Ethan Hunt could realistically have swung across the gap.
The next scene I'll be looking at is the sequence shortly after the pendulum swing, when Agent Hunt has to jump back out of the same building to escape with the Rabbit's Foot. He jumps from the Bank of China Building, which is about 226 meters (741 feet) in height, but he jumps from a window somewhere below the roof. We can assume that Hunt's initial Y acceleration would be 9.8m/s^2 (gravity), but it would be much harder to factor in the wind resistance and how much his partially opened chute would help to slow his fall. If we use the time shown in the movie as accurate, Hunt is blown around while falling, somewhat slowed by his parachute, for about 24 seconds before he crashes through another window. He then is pulled back out of the window by the parachute, and falls for another 13 seconds. The lowest known possible height for a base jump is about 30m (100 ft), and we can assume that since he was fairly close to the top of the building when he jumped, Hunt probably had at least 500 ft (152.4 m). However, he falls a much shorter distance the second time he's blown out of the building, and seeing as Hunt's parachute never fully opens before he gets caught on a lamppost on the highway, it is pretty unlikely that he would survive this fall.
The last scene that I'll be going over is when Agent Hunt jumps across the gap made by the drone on the highway bridge during Philip Seymour Hoffman's escape sequence. Before his jump, Hunt throws a Heckler & Koch G36 rifle across the gap. From looking at the shot of the gun being thrown across the gap, we can make a very rough estimate that the space across would be about the length of 7 G36s (each 39.3 in [998.22mm] with stock extended), or about 6.99 meters across. The farthest distance ever jumped was 8.95 meters, so the leap would be feasible if Agent Hunt was a champion long jumper. We also need to factor in that there's no real angle on the jump, and Tom Cruise is only 170cm tall, so it would be even more challenging for him. All in all, since as far as we know, Ethan Hunt is not an Olympic long jumper, he probably wouldn't have made the gap. I have to give credit to the movie here, because he doesn't actually make it all the way, but it's still up for debate whether he could have even jumped far enough to grab onto the other side.
To start, I'll go over what's probably the scene that raises the most questions in its depiction of physics. In Shanghai, Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) has to capture the McGuffin of the movie, the Rabbit's Foot, from a laboratory under heavy guard by easily distracted mercenaries. To accomplish this goal, Hunt opts to swing from one building and land on top of the villain's building. Previously, the movie shows Hunt scribbling out apparently complex math problems to figure out if this is possible, so it's an interesting task to find out if it really would be in any form. To discern the accuracy of the movie physics, we need some facts and figures about the two buildings and Hunt's jump itself. We can easily find out the heights of the buildings, since it's actually said out loud in the movie: the building Tom Cruise needs to jump off of is said to be 226 meters in height, the villain's skyscraper is 162 meters tall, and the gap between the two buildings is evidently 47.66 meters across. Before Hunt can start swinging between the buildings, he has to jump and free fall for quite a distance. If the time shown in the movie is accurate, Hunt free falls for about 12 seconds, as well as for about 5 in slow-mo, which we can assume is more like 2 in real time. So after falling for around 14 seconds, Hunt swings on the rope for around 11 seconds before detaching, resulting in a total of 25 seconds between his initial leap and his release from the rope. We also, of course, can factor gravity into the equation, since Hunt is in free-fall until the cord he's swinging on is fully extended. This means his initial acceleration on the Y axis would be 9.8 m/s^2. We can also factor in the weight and height of Agent Hunt, which, if we assume them to be the same as the actor Tom Cruise's weight and height, would be around 67 kilograms and about 170cm. Using all these factors, we can form a basic equation to decide whether or not Ethan Hunt could realistically have swung across the gap.
The next scene I'll be looking at is the sequence shortly after the pendulum swing, when Agent Hunt has to jump back out of the same building to escape with the Rabbit's Foot. He jumps from the Bank of China Building, which is about 226 meters (741 feet) in height, but he jumps from a window somewhere below the roof. We can assume that Hunt's initial Y acceleration would be 9.8m/s^2 (gravity), but it would be much harder to factor in the wind resistance and how much his partially opened chute would help to slow his fall. If we use the time shown in the movie as accurate, Hunt is blown around while falling, somewhat slowed by his parachute, for about 24 seconds before he crashes through another window. He then is pulled back out of the window by the parachute, and falls for another 13 seconds. The lowest known possible height for a base jump is about 30m (100 ft), and we can assume that since he was fairly close to the top of the building when he jumped, Hunt probably had at least 500 ft (152.4 m). However, he falls a much shorter distance the second time he's blown out of the building, and seeing as Hunt's parachute never fully opens before he gets caught on a lamppost on the highway, it is pretty unlikely that he would survive this fall.
The last scene that I'll be going over is when Agent Hunt jumps across the gap made by the drone on the highway bridge during Philip Seymour Hoffman's escape sequence. Before his jump, Hunt throws a Heckler & Koch G36 rifle across the gap. From looking at the shot of the gun being thrown across the gap, we can make a very rough estimate that the space across would be about the length of 7 G36s (each 39.3 in [998.22mm] with stock extended), or about 6.99 meters across. The farthest distance ever jumped was 8.95 meters, so the leap would be feasible if Agent Hunt was a champion long jumper. We also need to factor in that there's no real angle on the jump, and Tom Cruise is only 170cm tall, so it would be even more challenging for him. All in all, since as far as we know, Ethan Hunt is not an Olympic long jumper, he probably wouldn't have made the gap. I have to give credit to the movie here, because he doesn't actually make it all the way, but it's still up for debate whether he could have even jumped far enough to grab onto the other side.
First off, you didn’t clearly pose what questions you were attempting to answer in each scene. Without this clear goal to guide you, it’s not surprising that you actually went a little overboard in estimating quantities, by which I mean you included things that weren’t actually necessary. No harm, except the goal of the exercise wasn’t to estimate everything possible; it was to identify and then estimate only those quantities that you needed. Good job using the gun to estimate the length of the bridge gap!
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