Bushveld town in thrall as Tom Cruise choppers in

Wildlife photographer Gillian Soames has always been passionate about the leopards living around the Limpopo town of Hoedspruit. But they've taken a back seat to her new neighbour: Hollywood heart-throb Tom Cruise.

Cruise is staying at a private lodge in the luxury Hoedspruit Wildlife Estate, where Soames lives, while shooting the latest instalment of Mission: Impossible and commuting to filming locations by helicopter.

“We know all the choppers here, the air force, the private and the anti-poaching ones,” Soames told TimesLIVE. 

So when a black AS 350 Squirrel came clattering overhead and landed at a cleared area just outside the estate, Soames knew something was up. The chopper turned out to be piloted by Cruise, who is using the aircraft to travel to locations in the Blyde River Canyon and Swadini.

“He flies over our house every morning and night,” said Soames, who admitted to having flashed the helicopter as it approached for landing one evening.

“I was sitting on the deck when the chopper approached and I lifted my top. He saw a bra [and] the chopper’s lights flashed back. Whether it was at me or to signal to the lodge, I don’t know,” she said, adding that she didn’t want “the pilot to think that I’m this slapper”.

Cruise, who plays Impossible Missions Force (IMF) agent Ethan Hunt, is expected to stay at the private lodge on the estate for the next couple of months until shooting is completed. Cruise has played Hunt since the first movie 28 years ago.

Soames declined to give details about the actor’s lodgings, only that it was a few hundred metres from her house. Other residents on the 608ha private estate include pangolins, antelope and, occasionally, leopards.

The film, Mission: Impossible 8, will likely be Cruise’s last appearance and possibly the last of the franchise’s productions, according to industry magazine Variety. It is due for release in the US in 2024.

While the actor earned his fixed-wing pilot’s licence in 1994, he only qualified as a helicopter pilot in 2018 to perform a stunt in Mission: Impossible 6.

Meanwhile, the atmosphere in Hoedspruit — better known as a springboard for the Kruger National Park and nearby luxury lodges — is buzzing as filming gets under way. Along with the helicopter, two vintage Boeing Stearman biplanes have also been assembled at the local Eastgate airport. The aircraft will be used in wing-walking stunts carried out by Cruise.

“The buzz is electric,” said Soames. “And how cool is it? He chose us.”