New Release Review: Mission: Impossible - Fallout

Mission: Impossible - Fallout

(2018. Director: Christopher McQuarrie Starring: Tom Cruise, Henry Cavill, Rebecca Ferguson, Ving Rhames)

SYNOPSIS:

Secret Agent Ethan Hunt is tasked with his most dangerous adventure yet after a botched mission leads to three plutonium cores falling into the hands of the remaining members of The Syndicate. He now must reunite with former allies, and enemies, in order to prevent a potential global cataclysm.

There's an old joke, first said about the original Mission: Impossible TV series which asks how we can continue to describe the tasks undertaken by these heroes as 'impossible' if they manage to successfully complete them week after week. This question is even more applicable to the barely connected film series of the same name where the stakes keep getting raised, the odds ever more unlikely, and the risks taken even more ludicrous with every release. With each film, the 'Mission: Impossible' part of each instalment's title seems to refer less to the adventure that the characters go on than it does to the challenge of finding a danger great enough to trouble our protagonist, Ethan Hunt. There's a famously impossible philosophical question which asks what would happen if an unstoppable force was to run straight into an immovable object. At times the Mission: Impossible movie series feels like an endless futile search for an obstacle big enough to finally stop, or even slow down, the unstoppable force that is Tom Cruise.

Cruise is something of a contradiction. Since he first appeared on screen as a young man, his good looks, natural charm and intense charisma made him in instantly recognisable on-screen presence. By the time of the first Mission: Impossible movie, back in 1996, it felt almost as if he was perfectly designed in a factory somewhere for the sole purpose of being the flawless example of a modern day 'movie star.' However, in the years which followed, that metaphor felt a little too accurate as Cruise's onscreen 'perfection' started to feel somewhat artificial. As Cruise aged, his incandescent confidence ceased to be merely the cocksure attitude of youth and increasingly started to feel more like the vainglorious assuredness of religious fervour. (It's no coincidence that this perception began to take hold around the same time as Cruise's involvement in the Church of Scientology started to become a subject of public discourse.) He is still, obviously, a major star and commands the screen powerfully, but his attempts to continue playing loveable, everyman heroes increasingly fall flat while many of his best roles have been morally questionable supporting parts, if not outright villains (think Interview With The Vampire, Magnolia, Collateral, hell even Tropic Thunder). Directors of major action blockbusters aren't always sure exactly what to do with Cruise (the Mission: Impossible series alone has changed director, along with tone and style, no less than five times across six movies so far). However, the Mission: Impossible films have started to become increasingly beloved by critics and audiences. Despite varying wildly in their casts, plotting and the way in which they are executed, the Mission: Impossible films are all united in their fascination with the legend of Ethan Hunt. Often mistaken for a characterless cypher, Hunt is (as Alec Baldwin calls him in 2015 'Rogue Nation') the living manifestation of destiny. Hunt is a force of nature. Hunt is a fucking madman. But he's our madman. The trailers shouldn't say 'Tom Cruise is Ethan Hunt' because that would be redundant. Ethan Hunt is Tom Cruise.

And Cruise, as expected, gives everything to the role. The stunts in Mission: Impossible - Fallout are simply unbelievable. Cruise famously broke his ankle during production while jumping between rooftops (and completed filming the scene before getting medical help) but by the time that death defying stunt actually appears on screen it feels like a fairly regular, everyday occurrence compared to the utterly insane risks already taken in earlier (and later) scenes. It's not just surprising that Cruise managed to avoid injuring himself worse, it's simply staggering that he is still walking around, and breathing, after production on all this mayhem wrapped. The most jaw-dropping of these involves Hunt partaking in a HALO (High Altitude Low Opening) parachute jump to arrive covertly at a heavily guarded event. All credit must be given to (Camera Operator) Craig O'Brien, who had to to not only follow Cruise all the way to the ground, but keep him in perfect focus the whole time while careening towards the Earth at 180mph from the cruising height of a 747. The audience should be given oxygen canisters too just to keep them breathing while watching it.

Despite being the longest, and probably the most convoluted, in the franchise, it would be an understatement to say that Mission: Impossible - Fallout moves fast. Having already established most of it's main cast and their relationships in the previous movies, it barrels straight into action, stacking set pieces on top of each other and constantly moving forward at breakneck speed. There's also a certain confidence to the directing on show which no doubt comes from Christopher McQuarrie becoming the first director to helm a second movie in this series. Everything about this film is trying to be bigger, bolder and braver than it's predecessors. (Case in point, Fallout is not just the only film in the series to feature dream sequences but has Hunt vaporised by a nuclear blast, Terminator 2 style, in one of them.) Much like the fun, if more lowbrow, Fast and The Furious series, the Mission: Impossible films took until their fourth chapter to really feel like they'd found a voice they were comfortable with. McQuarrie clearly understands how to deliver it exactly as audiences expect. If there is a flaw to this it's that the lack of a new hand at the wheel has prevented the film from having anything resembling a unique style or character of it's own. Mission: Impossible - Fallout feels much more like a direct sequel to Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation than a mere installment in a larger series. Almost all of the main cast of that film return and this one resembles it in plot, character, theme and style. Apart from featuring a final sequence that combines explosive spectacle with ticking clock tension better than any of the previous climaxes, the biggest difference between Mission: Impossible - Fallout and it's immediate predecessor is that it doesn't have as many moments of lighthearted humour to balance the constant gloomy shadow of shady espionage and doom-laden terrorism.

Despite the twisty narrative: full of betrayals, warring agencies and double crosses; there are no real surprises here and most of the major reveals are more likely to inspire shrugs than gasps. There are nods to each of the previous films in the series though, and there is a sense in both of McQuarrie's releases that he is using these films to try and reconcile the first four movies (which often feel like they could come from parallel dimensions to each other) into one coherent timeline.

So what is new? Vanessa Kirby appears as a secretive arms dealer known as the White Widow, a kind of younger, sexier update to Vanessa Redgrave's 'Max' from the first movie. Angela Bassett plays Erica Sloane, the head of the CIA, becoming the latest great actor to bring extra gravitas to the series by playing a disapproving authority figure. But the new cast member who has gained the most press is Henry Cavill. He plays August Walker, a CIA assassin tasked with keeping tabs on Ethan and his team to prevent them from yet again going rogue in the line of duty. Cavill is yet to convincingly display the kind of onscreen personality required for roles like Superman (which he plays for the DC Extended Universe) but here he is mostly tasked with appearing like a massive human brick wall with a moustache. At that, he is perfect. He towers over most of the cast and he somehow appears to reload his arms before charging at opponents like a solid iron battering ram. Also, it is a luxurious moustache.

The violence in the film is one of it's strong points. The fight scenes are the best of the series so far and each punch or kick has solid weight behind it and lands with a visceral crunch. However, up until the film's (frankly brilliant) final chase/fight/bomb diffusion sequence, there isn't that much sense of real human peril. Sure, the action sequences are excellent, shot with clarity and vision and keep you on the edge of your seat with ingenious reversals of fortune. However, although you are often left wondering how the characters could possibly get out of their predicament, you never really feel that, this time, they simply might not. And that, ultimately, is the film's biggest weakness. There's a running joke throughout the film where character's are asked what their plan is and they can only reply "We're working on it" suggesting that they are simply winging things half the time and hoping that luck will carry them to safety. (By this point Ethan Hunt resembles the bumbling, overconfident, parody spy Sterling Archer as much as he resembles the suave James Bond type.) Unfortunately their confidence is contagious, leaving you with a certainty that things will somehow work out in the end.

Like it's lead characters, Mission: Impossible - Fallout is running at full tilt, creating startlingly smart and confident solutions as it goes. It's a ballsy, efficient and powerful piece of action filmmaking that understands how to build character and forward plot while on the move. It supplies truly outstanding white-knuckle thrills and just enough spy intrigue to keep things interesting in the downtime. However, it still can't quite complete the impossible mission of making you truly emotionally connect with these characters enough to fear deeply for their safety.

Review by The Mogul.