Tom Cruise has thrown down the gauntlet to his action movie rivals.

The actor told Cover Media at the UK premiere of his new movie Mission: Impossible Ghost Protocol tonight, that his character in the hit movie franchise is best equipped for saving the planet.

When asked who would be the greatest man for the job out of his character Ethan Hunt, James Bond or Jason Bourne should Earth be in danger, he was unreserved in his response.

"Of course Ethan!" he exclaimed. "I don't know what to say. I'm a fan of all that. I'm a fan of Bond and I'm a fan of Bourne, but Ethan's different. It's a different experience."

Tom has never been shy about doing his own stunts but even by his standards he undertook an amazing feat by scaling the Burj Khalifa for the film.

The skyscraper in Dubai is the tallest building in the world.

"We were training for months beforehand," the Hollywood star explained. "We were worried about the temperature of the building because the sun was hitting it. There were a lot of different elements. It's not just one take - its eight or hours a day. It was a great challenge.

"The first time I was out, I had to test to fly off the building and that's something I couldn't train for I just had to figure it out!"

Jeremy Renner plays Brandt, another hard-hitting agent in the film, but Tom says he wouldn't want to go up against him in a fight but it's not because he would be afraid.

"Why do you want to see a fight? You like conflict, ok, you like fisticuffs?" he teased. "I wouldn't fight Jeremy anyway - he's my friend."

Tom revealed that there were some light moments on set with Simon Pegg, who plays an IMF technical field agent that's part of Hunt's team. Although the British star was a bit of a joker to work with, Tom said the whole team got along well.

"It was all of us [cracking jokes]. It was really fun when we all got together. Brad Bird [the Director] is very funny also," he shared.

The 49-year-old is married to actress Katie Holmes and they are parents to five-year-old daughter Suri Cruise. Tom also has teen children from his marriage to Nicole Kidman; Bella and Connor, and says he's looking forward to the holidays so he can spend some quality time with his loved ones.

"Just with the family. We're gonna hang out and play lots of games. Watch lots of movies and chill out," he said of his Christmas plans.