These 12 actors held their breath underwater for a very very long time.
Esther Williams (Million Greenback Mermaid, 1952)
Esther Williams was a aggressive swimmer and actress beloved for a run of movies, beginning within the mid-Forties, that highlighted her capability to carry out gorgeously choreographed routines — usually underwater — in movies like Million Greenback Mermaid (1952) and Harmful When Moist (1953).
We don’t know precisely how lengthy she may maintain her breath underwater, however she clearly pushed herself to the restrict: She repeatedly ruptured an eardrum from the hours she spent in studio tanks.
She died in 2013 on the age of 91.
Ricou Browning (Creature From the Black Lagoon, 1954)
The director, actor, producer, screenwriter, underwater cinematographer and stuntman began out performing in water exhibits, then in underwater newsreels, and was supplied the function of Gill-man, aka The Creature From the Black Lagoon, after a movie crew requested him to indicate them round a location — after which to swim for the digital camera. He ended up starring within the movie’s sequels, as properly.
Browning instructed Florida’s Ocala StarBanner newspaper in 2013 that he may maintain his breath underwater for as much as 4 minutes, however solely in optimum circumstances: “Should you’re swimming quick or preventing, you utilize up a lot of oxygen, and it cuts it all the way down to, on the most, two minutes.”
Browning died in February on the age of 93.
Shelly Winters (The Poseidon Journey, 1972)
Shelly Winters reportedly discovered to carry her breath for as much as 4 minutes whereas making the ensemble-cast catastrophe epic The Poseidon Journey, about an getting older luxurious liner overturned by a tsunami. She was rewarded with an Oscar nomination for Greatest Supporting Actress.
Winters died in 2006 on the age of 85.
Val Kilmer (Prime Secret, 1984)
Prime Secret is an absurdist cross between a conflict film and an Elvis film, starring Val Kilmer as American singer Nick Rivers, who goes behind enemy traces and falls in love with a German lady preventing fascists.
Its many good set items — together with a scene shot backwards and a scene the place a station pulls away from a practice — construct as much as an underwater Western-style fistfight.
Administrators David Zucker and Jim Abrahams instructed ScreenCrush in 2014 that the actors within the scene held their breath underwater whereas they shot in 10 or 15 second increments, then returned to the floor.
“The toughest half was not laughing and working out of oxygen,” added Kilmer, who sadly handed earlier this 12 months.
Kurt Russell (Poseidon, 2006)
How lengthy did Kurt Russell maintain his breath for this Poseidon Journey remake? Long sufficient that he nearly fell unconscious.
“There’s a scene the place I’m underwater a very long time, which implies I needed to entrust myself to somebody to return in and provides me air at precisely the suitable second. That’s spooky stuff,” he instructed The Los Angeles Each day Information.
“I needed to see what the expertise was like, however, psychologically, that’s laborious to do . . . letting go and trusting that you simply received’t drown.”
Russell added: “The third time, when the man swam out and put the regulator in my mouth, I don’t keep in mind it. I used to be that near the sting.”
Jessica Alba (Into the Blue, 2005)
Jessica Alba took up free diving when she labored on the late ’90s TV present The New Adventures of Flipper, and carried her expertise over to Into the Blue, a heist thriller by which she co-starred with the late Paul Walker.
“Free diving is like an excessive sports activities model of snorkeling,” she instructed CBS Information in 2005. “That’s about 50 ft deep. And principally what you do is you maintain your breath and also you put on a weight belt and go down as quick as potential and maintain your breath for minutes at a time. “
Alba mentioned she and her fellow actors would compete at it: “I feel I had the longest breath-hold. It was like one minute, 20 seconds,” she mentioned.
Tom Cruise (Mission: Unattainable — Rogue Nation, 2015)
Tom Cruise defined in an Entry Hollywood video when Mission: Unattainable — Rogue Nation was launched that “usually in underwater sequences, folks maintain their breath for 10 seconds, 15 seconds max.”
However he says he in fact discovered to carry his breath for six minutes for a sequence by which his super-spy Ethan Hunt has to infiltrate a place to get a factor and naturally can’t put on any scuba gear, as a result of.
Long story brief, there’s nothing Maverick received’t do to indicate up Iceman. (Kilmer, in fact, performed Iceman reverse Cruise’s Maverick in Prime Gun, launched in 1986.)
Cruise is again to his previous underwater tips in Mission Unattainable — The Last Reckoning . However a minimum of Ethan Hunt will get to put on a respiratory equipment this time round.
Sigourney Weaver (Avatar: The Method of Water, 2022)
Sigourney Weaver defined on Reside With Kelly and Ryan (above) that she discovered to carry her breath underwater for a six-and-a-half minute “static breath maintain,” whereas making the huge hit Avatar: The Method of Water.
Kate Winslet (Avatar: The Method of Water, 2022)
Hollywood’s champion of actors who can maintain their breath for a very long time, Kate Winslet clocked 7 minutes and 14 seconds whereas making Avatar: The Method of Water, utilizing the identical strategies as Sigourney Weaver.
All of us have the identical query, proper? Which is…
Wait, Why Did Kate Winslet and Sigourney Weaver Must Maintain Their Breath for Avatar: The Method of Water?
The entire film is CGI, proper? Did they even must go within the water?
The movie’s director of images, Peter Zuccarini, says sure — the actors wanted to look underwater with a view to make their CGI photos look good, however air bubbles from scuba gear acquired in the way in which of the small markers on the actors’ faces and our bodies that permit James Cameron so as to add CGI later in post-production.
Okay, again to No. 10 on our record…
Mabel Cadena (Black Panther: Wakanda Without end, 2022)
Cadena, who performs Namora within the Black Panther sequel, mentioned in an interview with Display screen Rant that she nearly broke Kate Winslet’s file for holding one’s breath underwater.
“My first immersion was round 30 seconds, and the identical day I [was able to do] six minutes and thirty-five seconds,” Cadena said. “The coaching was superb, as a result of in the identical day I can have a large distinction [from] my first immersion to my second immersion. I’m very aggressive, so Chris, my coach, instructed me, ‘Kate Winslet has the file, so if you wish to be the winner, you might want to study a lot of issues.’”
What Is the File for Holding Your Breath Underwater?
It isn’t held by Kate Winslet, Sigourney Weaver or Tom Cruise, however fairly by a skilled diver: Budimir Šobat’s holds the unbelievable world file of 24 minutes and 37 seconds.
Preferred This Checklist of Actors Who’ve Held Their Breath Underwater for an Extremely Long Time?
In that case, we suspect you’ll additionally like this gallery of All 8 Mission: Unattainable Films Ranked.
Principal picture: Jessica Alba in Into the Blue. Sony.
Editor’s Observe: Updates Prime Secret merchandise.
