Narrator: This isn't a stunt double.
This is actually The Rock holding his breath underwater
for a scene in 2015's "San Andreas."
He filmed each take in 10- to 15-second increments
and even learned CPR
so he could perform it accurately on camera.
This sinking building where it all happens
was a five-story-tall set built on hydraulic legs,
allowing it to sink into a massive water tank in Australia.
This is just one example of how Dwayne Johnson
has pushed the limits of what he and the stunt doubles
and VFX artists he works with can do,
and making action sequences that seem implausible
into a reality.
The "Jumanji" stunt team had to handle The Rock's character
leaping off a real motorcycle, flying in a perfect arc,
and landing exactly on target, all in one smooth motion.
For this incredibly complex move,
second unit director Jack Gill
and the stunt team built a 130-foot-tall head
and then broke up the stunt into multiple parts,
doing as much as possible in camera.
First, a stunt motorcyclist rode the motorcycle
about halfway up the statue.
When the character swings around the nose
and lands on it while jumping off the bike midair,
the team relied on cables.
The performer and the motorcycle were both attached
to cables that were connected to two separate winches,
which allowed the stunt team to pre-program these moves.
That way, they would end up
in the exact same place each take.
Knowing the exact speed and trajectory
meant that Jack could plan exactly when the camera
should go up and get the shot.
And for the motorcycle,
the winch suspended it from the ground,
so the bike would remain undamaged from extra takes.
These shots were all from far away,
but here, Jack needed a hero shot of The Rock
launching the grappling hook.
So The Rock rode the motorcycle on a motion platform.
That bike was about 5 feet off the ground
and anchored in from the bottom,
so its wheels could move freely.
And when he starts separating from the motorcycle,
the actor was then pulled up in the air by a wire.
In this scene from "San Andreas,"
The Rock had to save a driver
whose car was hanging off a cliff.
Once again, that's really The Rock you see in the action,
but the cliff is actually fake.
To ensure the actor could safely pull off this stunt,
the crew built a cliffside replica on a studio backlot,
and that helicopter was actually missing its rotor blades.
It was held up by a crane
so The Rock could safely rappel 150 feet.
The actor's training went beyond just working out.
He spent time learning from first responders
and LA Fire Department search-and-rescue pilots
and participated in air-rescue drills.
Here, you can see him learning
real helicopter-rappelling techniques.
In the action-comedy "Central Intelligence,"
The Rock gets hit in the face by this motorcycle.
The final shot you see here
is actually composed of several different ones.
In one shot, this motorcyclist does a flip off this ramp.
In another shot, Tanoai Reed, The Rock's cousin
and longtime stunt double, gets ratcheted back.
Because the camera was locked off
in the exact same position,
both shots could be combined seamlessly
using visual effects.
But for this shot, that really was The Rock
barely dodging the motorcycle.
While it looks like the motorcycle is coming down first,
in reality, The Rock made the first move.
The rider waited for him to turn and roll
before placing his tire a safe distance away.
The torpedo you see cruising on the ground in this shot
isn't CG, but a prop version made to slide on ice.
According to stunt coordinator Andy Gill,
it was 10 feet long and weighed about 150 pounds.
Then, to keep Hobbs' Dodge Ram
from sliding around the ice,
the special effects team replaced the tires with Mattracks,
allowing it to safely drive at 50 miles per hour.
The torpedo was attached to a 50-foot-long cable
and dragged by a vehicle going about 40 miles per hour.
The 35-pound sandbag seen here
helped to stabilize the object.
The Dodge Ram was slowed down to the same speed
so a stunt performer could lean out of the car.
That performer was attached to an overhead cable
to support his weight, while his feet slid on the ground.
The shots where you can see The Rock
were filmed against a blue screen.
And because the torpedo wasn't actually functioning,
Andy and his team had to blow up this vehicle
by filling it with explosives
and towing it without a driver.
In this shot, the torpedo was added with CG
at the moment the explosion occurs.
In "Skyscraper," The Rock plays a Marine veteran
who loses his leg.
He wanted to make the stunts as real as possible
to show how much his character is capable of.
So he worked with Paralympian Jeff Glasbrenner,
who was the first amputee
to climb to the top of Mount Everest.
Jeff helped The Rock master walking and running
with the correct step pattern,
like here, when his character sprints and jumps off a crane.
While the background and building you see aren't real,
both the crane itself and the jump are.
Jeff's insights were also helpful
for when the character has to scale the building.
His advice: Never step down with your prosthetic leg first.
In this scene in "Rampage," The Rock's character
escapes a crashing C-17 plane.
Making all this look real
involved some gravity-defying wirework.
First, real plane engines created
intense air pressure to blow wind throughout the set.
But that wasn't enough to send the actor flying,
so he was also harnessed into this wire rig,
designed to drag the actor backwards
when he loses his grip here.
Once The Rock and actor Jeffrey Dean Morgan
fall out of the plane, the scene switches
to footage of professional skydivers in the air,
as the stunt was too dangerous
for them to perform themselves.
And yet, you can see The Rock's face clearly.
That's because director Brad Peyton
used facial-swapping technology
to place The Rock's face on the stunt double.
In "Red Notice," The Rock's character
gets attacked by a bull mid-fight,
which would've been too dangerous to do for real.
So for this move, Tanoai was strapped into cables
powered by an air-pressured cylinder.
The more air pressure they applied,
the farther and more aggressively he was yanked.
Tanoai estimated he was pulled about 20 feet in the air.
In the end, the cable was removed from the shot
and a CG bull was added in.
One memorable action sequence from "Hobbs & Shaw"
has The Rock scaling a CIA building
while fighting Idris Elba's character.
[yelling]
[crashing]
Making this look real and intense
involved a lot of moving parts, literally.
Here, The Rock ran on a track
while strapped into the stunt performer.
You can also see him throwing punches
and then swinging on a rope in front of a blue screen.
But The Rock couldn't take all the hits by himself.
That's Tanoai involved in a complicated maneuver
known as a hand pull.
Tanoai was connected to a cable,
which was run through a pulley.
All of that was connected by a rope
held by two stunt riggers standing on ladders,
whose bodies acted as counterweights.
Once they jumped down, that yanked Tanoai
through the air and into the car.
But this was all just warm-up
for the film's epic finale in Samoa.
This sequence was deeply rooted in fighting styles
from Polynesian cultures, which emphasize stick fighting,
knife fighting, and delivering strong, powerful blows.
So real contact between The Rock
and his enemies was crucial.
Let's go old school.
Narrator: That contact still needed to be safe.
So this weapon you see The Rock holding
is completely fake.
The props team designed it
to be soft enough to sell the hit,
but not so soft it would appear fake on camera.
The impact of those hits was also exaggerated.
Right here, this stunt performer was actually
attached to a ratchet that pulled him back
to accentuate The Rock's blow.
[yelling]
And one of the most physically challenging elements
of the Samoa scenes was the Siva Tau ...
[In Samoan] Rise!
Narrator: A traditional Samoan war dance that The Rock
and his crew perform as they prepare for battle.
The Rock told director David Leitch
that because a Siva Tau is so emotionally intense
and physically draining, they only had a few takes
to get it right and give it his all.
In "Black Adam," The Rock spent
a lot of time floating in the air.
So the special effects team built motorized carts
to both lift and move the actor while he stood in place.
Each cart was powered by an electric motor
and consisted of four omnidirectional wheels
that could spin the cart and move it left,
right, backward, and forward.
With all the movements programmed on a computer,
the crew could use the rigs
for a wide range of distinct flying motions
while making his flight look as smooth as possible.
When it came to him lying flat while in flight,
like when he took on the Intergang,
The Rock was clamped into a 12,000-pound robotic arm.
As Hercules, The Rock needed to shape his body
into a demigod's for battle scenes like this one.
So over the course of six months,
he embarked on one of the most intense
training regimens of his career.
He worked out six days a week.
Each session started with 50 minutes of cardio,
followed by working out a specific muscle group,
making sure he fit in leg exercises more than once a week.
He also adhered to a strict diet.
While he followed a 14-week diet
for 2013's "G.I. Joe: Retaliation,"
"Hercules" required a 22-week diet
that was high in proteins, fats, and carbs,
such as egg whites, filet mignon,
asparagus, and baked potatoes.
Alongside this, The Rock also went through
eight months of weapons and fight training
with a team of specialized weapons experts
so he could accurately portray how Hercules yields
and fights with his club
when he takes down his opponents here.