It seems like everyone in America saw this movie already this weekend (who knew Tom Cruise could still pack houses like that?) but for those that didn’t…let me muddy the waters of if you should go or not by saying this is a solid B movie. If you like cartoonish action movies (I prefer darker franchises like the Jason Bourne movies or even the recent, realistic James Bond movies) with no depth whatsoever, this movie is absolutely as good as they come. I know that sounds like a back-handed compliment, but I am being sincere in saying this is the best movie Will Smith never made.
What Works: Some of the sequences are amazing. Tom Cruise has a pair of fights scenes in a prison and later in a car factory that have a surprising amount of humor (it’s as good and inventive as any fight in a Jackie Chan movie). And there’s a flat-out great 15 minute stretch of the movie set in Dubai in which Cruise scales the world’s tallest building (this sequence is filmed in a way that my palms started to sweat) followed by a car chase through a sandstorm which I’ve also never seen before. Also, and attention must be paid to this, Paula Patton looks incredible. She really could be the next Jennifer Garner if she keeps picking good showcases like this one.
What Didn’t Work: Tom Cruise’s Ethan Hunt remains one of the most uninteresting lead characters a franchise has ever been built around, and as much as I like Cruise’s fearless stunt work, Jeremy Renner blows him away in the charismatic acting department every time he’s on screen. [Hunt is an “edgy” lead character without edge, a spy who never actually seems to kill anyone. Someone who can climb tall buildings but never really gets his hands dirty.] Also, the movie’s bland, stock-European villain is piss-poor (why the traditional European villain trying to destroy the world instead of a Chinese villain trying to own it?). It’s a step down from Phillip Seymour Hoffman’s towering bad guy in the third movie (the highlight of that forgettable flick). Plus, I liked seeing Paula Patton have a white love interest–Hollywood desperately needs more interracial couples in movies and TV–but dismayed that that love interest is literally (and typically) killed in the first minute of the movie (from Firefly to Alias, an interracial couple can’t seem to get together without one of them getting killed). And as I mentioned before, the movie is about as deep as a bath tub…the sequences have real pop and humor, but the plot isn’t half as cerebral as the first mission impossible film which is easily one of my favorite action films of all time.
What I Would Have Done Differently: All of the Mission Impossible films are slightly different but there really hasn’t been one since the first that has had a cerebral, complex (but not convoluted) plot that required you to actually pay attention. I’m not saying these movies have to require a Bachelor’s Degree, but something a little more complicated or inventive than “A bad guy is doing something…we have to do this to stop him” would be terrific.
Great review
Good one.
Paula was good but her acting needs work.
I agree with your review. An action movie needs to have a plot plus the action. Great review.