Brace yourself. This is real cliff hanger from beginning to end and may be the best in the series yet. Writer/Director Christopher McQuarrie successfully handles the script’s counter intelligence flips while Tom Cruise handles the physical flips running, motorcycle riding, flying and skydiving to the extreme. His antics leave you, as well as Cruise himself, breathless.
It’s the 6th film in the franchise with the story going forward a couple years from Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation. McQuarrie is the first director to do two MI’s, and in a row, so there’s some continuity. Cinematographer Rob Hardy and Editor Eddie Hamilton are back proving they know exactly what their doing keeping pace with extreme action-packed scenes. There isn’t as much gunplay, but much more hand-to-hand combat. The sound effects landing the punches kept the sound department very busy. And there are amazing chases at break neck speed in locations including Paris, London, other places in the UK, New Zealand, Norway and Dubai.
As that familiar Mission Impossible theme swells, you’ll realize it’s been updated with a heavier tone. Scottish music producer/composer, Lorne Balfe took the theme and ran with it, adding what sounds like more blaring trombones along with the trumpets. His score adds suspense, then excitement when the action ramps up.
A huge cast of heroes and villains get in on the action. Simon Pegg, Rebecca Ferguson, Ving Rhames, Alec Baldwin, Michelle Monaghan and Sean Harris are back. But there are new ones, including Henry Cavill (Superman) as a mean CIA agent and Vanessa Kirby (The Crown) as the tantalizingly attractive cold White Widow. Even Wolf Blitzer gets a cameo.
This film takes off even before the opening credits. Ethan Hunt is having nightmares. This film starts with a dream sequence showing he and his love Julia (Michelle Monaghan) reciting their marriage vows, but it isn’t long before there’s interference. Ethan is still bothered by Solomon Lane, (Sean Harris) who he knows he should have killed in the last film and thinks he could still show up.
The action starts in Paris with Ethan’s IMF boss Alan Hunley (Alec Baldwin) who is underused, and CIA head Erica Sloan (Angela Bassett is stern and stunning in amazing closeups), giving Ethan his Mission. He’s to find out who a man named John Lark is and find him. Lark is working with The Apostles. They are a group of terrorists trying to get their hands on plutonium cores for a nuclear attack on the religious capitals of the world to be detonated all at once. Can they collect the cores before these terrorists get their hands on them?
No matter the circumstance, Ethan gets in action mode, taking to the street, sky, underwater and it just doesn’t stop. Cruise is obviously a thrill seeker. At 56-years-old, he will do as many of his own stunts as the filmmakers’ insurance company will allow. There’s no faking it here. He’s in unbelievably good shape and he doesn’t even have to take his shirt off to show it!
Cruise actually broke his ankle jumping from one building to another in what, he laughs, was the easiest stunt for the film. But the incredibly shot skydiving scene, where he’s falling at 200 mph took 106 takes. That’s dedication and a workout. It’s a long scene, 3 minutes, shot at many angles, you may start moving around in your seat trying to lean, as he does, to get to rival agent, August Walker, who is unconscious after being hit by lightning mid air.
Walker is a CIA assassin played by Henry Cavill. Here, you get to see the mustache he was not allowed to shave off when he was shooting this film and DC’s Justice League at the same time. They used CGI to eliminate it (not well) while playing Superman. In this film, he plays a crusty, tough CIA agent. Neither Ethan nor Walker are happy about having to work together. But they work almost too well in a brutal fight scene in a bathroom that goes on forever beating and being beaten on by one of the baddies. It’s blow after blow using what ever they have, even pipes pulled out of the wall. Cavill said the scene was scheduled to be shot in 4 days but took 4 weeks because the stunt trainers wanted it to be perfect.
Ilse (Rebecca Ferguson) is fearless joining Ethan’s buddies, Benji (Pegg) and Luther (Rhames) on the mission. When they meet to make a deal for the plutonium, the Apostles show up and it all goes wrong. It’s off to the races.
The motorcycle chase through the beautiful, busy, narrow, winding streets of Paris is shot so impeccably, it might remind you of the chase in Bullitt. It is another tour de force for Cruise and for director McQuarrie. The twists and turns at top speed around the Arch of Triumph and through the arched sidewalks at Galerie and Rue de Valois will have you clutching your seat. How Cruise, let alone Ethan, survive is nothing short of a miracle. He is totally committed or should be. The way the stunts and locations are set up and the camera work following every turn is top notch.
Ethan always seems to get into trouble and if he messes up, he seems to get in even more trying to fix it. There are many times when they hit a snag, and Ethan says “I’ll figure it out” seeming to buy time. That phrase runs throughout. Not sure if that’s supposed to be funny or just a device to keep you in suspense. A little repetitive. Could be a quotable catch phrase.
But it’s mind boggling and thrilling to see Cruise in stunt after stunt. Seeing him running full out on a strip of metal on top of a glass roof in Paris is like watching a human machine. His form is Olympic quality. And he never quits!
There are more chases in helicopters and climbs up seeming unscalable cliffs leading up to the climax where everybody gets into the act. Old characters show up where you least expect them, all tied into the plot as time is running out to find the three plutonium cores to stop world annihilation by nuclear attack.
Simon Pegg and Ving Rhames have a lot more to do than in Rogue Nation. Pegg brings quips that will make you laugh. Rhames and Monaghan bring emotion. And Cruise gives it all he’s got. You’ll wonder if he’s running, jumping, chasing, climbing and diving just so he can prove he still can, while flashing that big, irreverent smile as Ethan. It all seems so impossible, but Cruise is impressive and so is this film. It’s exhausting as much as it is smart and entertaining.
Paramount Pictures 2 hours 27 minutes PG-13 Reviewed July 25, 2018
