Mission Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One

When the world is in trouble, there’s only one man the government is willing to secretly asks whether or not he’s interested in trying to save us… and that man is Ethan Hunt.

The Mission Impossible franchise wheezes on toward its inevitable end with this, the penultimate entry in this decades old franchise. Much like the Transformer series, or the Fast and the Furious movies, I’m pretty sure I’ve seen all the Mission Impossible films, but I couldn’t tell you what specifically happened in any of them, what the plots were, who the bad guys are, or why exactly America’s favorite celebrity cult member is running his little heart out so much. All I can really tell you for sure are two things…

1.      Philip Seymour Hoffman was the best part.

2.      Red light! Green light!

I will say this, there’s one thing you can always count from ol’ Tommy boy when it comes to these Mission Impossible movies, and that is some incredible stunts. That, and there will also be multiple instances of people suddenly pulling their faces off in the shocking reveal that what you previously assumed was their actual face is really just a mask.

It gets me every time!

This time out, the story goes like this, after a mysterious and potentially world-threatening cold opening, Ethan Hunt gets asked the classic question… will he accept his impossible mission? SPOILER: He does.

So, Ethan and his team get ready to do another round of the ol’ Mission Impossible razzle-dazzle. But Ethan has a problem. Once again, the suits in the US government think Ethan is a rogue loose cannon, ignoring how often he gets results, but, oh shit… Ethan interrupts their meeting with knockout gas! Why? I don’t know! You’d think that this would just make things worse, but, well, shit… I guess he was there the whole time! Wearing a mask too! Son of a bitch! I never would’ve guessed… Anyway, the suits are super mad about the whole knockout gas thing, so they send a couple of Jack Webbs to doggedly nip at Ethan’s heels while he’s busy saving the world from a Cold War/Cyberpunk Apocalypse.

Besides the stunts, and the masks, there’s one thing you can count on when it comes to Impossible Missions… Exotic Locales! First stop? Abu Dhabi. There, we meet the new bad guy, a ghost from Ethan’s past come back to haunt him. We also meet Grace, the Catwoman to Ethan’s Batman. Between these two wild cards, the Jack Webbs, and Ethan and his team, all the pieces are in place, so let the games begin. Unfortunately, these initial encounters with the mysterious new enemy is also where Ethan and the team realizes they have severely underestimated their target, and the proverbial shit hits the proverbial fan!

Run, Forrests, run!

Rome is the next exotic locale, where we find Grace and Ethan are doing a preliminary mating dance, but… oh no, it’s an ambush by the Jack Webbs! But Ethan is ready with more knockout gas! I guess he was wearing the same jacket from the last time and still had some leftover. But the Jack Webbs recover quickly and get after him! Time for a chase sequence! Oh shit… evil henchmen show up too! This is gonna get rough. Ha! Ethan has to drive a silly car in order to get away! Get outta the way, customers on the patio of that coffee shop! After the chase, Ethan realizes that this impossible mission has just gotten impossible-er.

Later at a European Dance Party in Venice, the myriad opposing forces gather to parlay, and then threaten, and to just generally say some mean things to each other while enjoying the club’s VIP Bottle Service. Things get heated, until the fisticuffs can be denied no longer.

Time for another chase sequence! And fisticuffs! Fisticuffs galore!

And a death… one of the team doesn’t make it. Shit, that wasn’t part of the plan. Now comes the regrets. Why, God? Why must everyone that Ethan loves die in some really ludicrous way like, say… in a midnight cane sword duel on a bridge over a Venice canal?

Why!?!?

Gosh, Ethan looks so sad now, standing at the balcony of his villa, in his Tom Ford blue suit, his head bowed. So sad. Everyone’s so sad. Poor what’s her face, we’re all going to miss her ass-kickery. This is a low moment for the whole team. Will they recover in time to save the world? Do they even have a plan? What? They do? What the shit? It’s another mask? You wily sons of bitches…

Gets me every time!

Smash cut to another exotic locale! The Orient express? That’s the most exotic locale of all! And everyone is there too! Ethan! Catwoman! The Jack Webbs! Ethan’s team. The suits! The Ghost from Ethan’s past! I think we all know what that means… it’s climax time, and it’s another fisticuffs spectacular! But this time, it’s personal! Oh, the stunts! Oh, the quips! Oh, the running and the jumping! Oh, the parachutes, the secret ploys, the bluffs, and the near misses! Oh, the double crosses, and redemptions! Oh, the thing where they have to climb up the dangling train cars like in Tomb Raider or the Uncharted video games, or that movie Wanted, or in Jurassic Park 2…

What happens next?

To find out, your mission—should you choose to accept it—is to wait another year or two to see the sequel to the film that made less at the domestic box office than Ant-man 3 Quantumania!

Will you accept?

I’m sure I will, eventually. In the meantime, I have to admit, even though these films are obviously not really my thing, this one felt like more of a chore than usual.

Bombastic. Stilted. Obvious. Surprisingly stiff action. Tom Cruise truly has zero chemistry with any of his leading ladies, even when they give him two. The big car chase sequence in Rome wasn’t anywhere nearly as spectacular as the Paris chase in the Bourne Identity, which feels like the bar you have to shoot for, and also, it weirdly happened at the same locale as one of the chases in the recent penultimate Fast and the Furious too. That’s not bad, perse, it’s just… odd. Anyway, at 2 hours and 46 minutes, especially for being a part one, this film was just way too long, with way too many obvious and expected action movie beats. I do like the classic William Gibson Wintermute bad guy idea. Much like the later seasons of Westworld, I think it’s a fun idea with lots of potential, but this in no way helped to make this film to be anything other than a cliched and lackluster example of a rote “cinematic extravaganza.”

Meh.