Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning

Run, Ethan run!

Gotta hand it to Tom Cruise: he took a nifty little TV series about a group of low-key intelligence operatives that work together as a team to solve near-impossible problems and turned it into a gigantic one-man showcase where a star-producer reportedly risks his life again and again on bigger more elaborate stunt setpieces, in gargantuan productions that, y'know, celebrate the beauty of self-sacrifice and teamwork. 

And the running, always the running. Cruise can sprint, I'll give him that; last time I went after a kid gone AWOL was the first time I found I had bone spurs-- and I'm years younger than this movie's lead. He doesn't have to rub it in my face every chance he gets, tho. 

My favorite MI will always be the original TV show; my favorite feature is the first with its clever Robert Towne script and stylish Brian de Palma direction-- a lot of sensual gliding shots, a handful of choice suspense setpieces (one stolen off Topkapi-- if you must, steal from the best), a minimum of digital effects. The second has been pissed on by most every movie critic and TikToker I know but is in my book the most underrated, with its operatic John Woo visual style and cool Hans Zimmer score (no the script doesn't make sense but film is Mission Impossible not Mission Absolutely Realistic). The third with JJ Abrams-- eh. Philip Seymour Hoffman made for a nifty villain. The fourth with the addition of Jeremy Renner and Simon Pegg was a fun mix of comedy and suspense. 

The succeeding movies I don't really remember save they were directed by some screenwriter promoted to director and the stunts got bigger in direct proportion to the budget. The auteur is and has always been Cruise, of course; De Palma just happened to sneak in a few subversive notes back when Cruise was only starting to flex his producer's muscles, and Woo was coming off the success of Face/Off (besides Woo has been known to riff off flimsier scripts). With Christopher McQuarrie Cruise presumably has the gun-for-hire he wants, someone to carry out instructions to the letter: basically more stunts, more closeups, more running.

On the stunts-- granted they're not exactly a walk in the park but hard to believe any insurance company will underwrite anything really dangerous, at least nothing that can't be digitally erased in post-production. If you want an honest-to-goodness action star who takes risks, look at early Jackie Chan-- not only did most of his stunts under the kind of sketchy safety conditions Hong Kong filmmaking can afford, but you can see when the stunts go wrong, in the outtakes attached to the closing credits-- blooper reels where Chan fumbles or fails and half the time is carried out in a stretcher. Been said the man has broken every bone in his body for his movies; not sure Cruise shows anywhere near that level of commitment. 

This one is maybe two hours of exposition and callbacks to the best of the previous missions, a kind of glorified clip show/recap, then a rehash of the submarine salvage and deep-dive sequences in The Abyss only not as dangerous-looking (because McQuarrie isn't nuts like James Cameron used to be); an admittedly nifty biplane fight that takes a bit too long, with moments borrowed from Chuck Yeager's skydive in The Right Stuff; some presidential War Room drama from Dr. Strangelove with much of the tension and all of the wit drained away; and a briefcase lifted from of all things Pulp Fiction, which in turn purloined said baggage from Kiss Me Deadly-- a far far better picture than either this, The Abyss, OR Pulp Fiction combined.

Don't get me started on the script (When Cruise wakes in a decompression chamber dude beside me quipped "You're not Nicole Kidman!"-- Cruise should have hired him for additional dialogue). The big bad now is The Entity, a sort of HAL 9000 without the teasing personality or sly humor, who controls not just nuclear arsenals but reality itself; Cruise's Hunt isn't just fighting for democracy but for humanity-- literally the savior of the world. 

What's hilarious is that Cruise tries not to make too big a deal about it. "You're about the survival of your team" villain Gabriel (Esai Morales) notes; Cruise as Hunt later claims "I'm expendable." Yeah right-- that's not Simon Pegg's name on top of the poster, or Hayley Atwell's giant closeups, or Ving Rhames' running getting all that screen time. When Hunt talks with Grace (Atwell) about trapping and maybe controlling The Entity, Hunt asks "Who'd you trust with all that power?" Grace looks at him meaningfully.  A sly wink at a possible presidential run? God I hope not-- last thing this world needs is yet another celebrity in the White House.