Jason Statham says a near-death experience on a film set made him “more appreciative” of life.

The action star, 52, who has a son Jack with his fiancée Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, almost drowned in 2013 while preparing a stunt scene for The Expendables 3.

In an interview with Red Bulletin, he described how he was driving a truck towards the sea when the brakes failed and he crashed over the wall. He tried to get out of the vehicle — which was in five to 10 metres of water — through an open window, but began to panic when his gun holster got stuck.

The actor, a former diver who competed for England at the Commonwealth Games in 1990, eventually managed to free himself.

Asked how the accident — which he described as “a nasty, nasty experience” — had shaped his life, he said: “It’s a real recalibration of everything. From that day on, I’ve been so appreciative of life and being able to walk on the ground. I think we all need [an experience] like that; one that puts things in perspective.”

At the film’s premiere in 2014, co-star Sylvester Stallone said Statham owed his life to his swimming s𝓀𝒾𝓁𝓁s, adding: “If anyone else had been in that truck we would have been dead because we were all wearing heavy boots and gun belts. But because Jason is an Olympic-quality diver he got out of it.”

Read the full interview in the October issue of The Red Bulletin, out with the Evening Standard tomorrow