Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning, Part One

A previous review link suggested that, perhaps, this series’ prior outing might be the last of its breed, if only because Tom Cruise has been doing this for so long that the exercise can’t possibly maintain particular interest going forward. Well, I guess here’s the proof that I was, shall we say, dead wrong. Apparently, the man and his crew have an inexhaustible ability to wring entertainment out of this concept. The stunts—in many ways the raison d’etre of this franchise—are up to the usual level of audacity. The plot is relatively clear, and rather timely, even if it drags its concept to a certain outlandish extreme. As for the human elements, I admit that there have been so many personnel twists and turns so far in the series that I’ve forgotten quite a bit about who is whom among the crew, beyond the core members of the team—Ving Rhames and Simon Pegg inhabit characters who are indelibly well-defined—but that really doesn’t matter for enjoying this flick. The experience is about just letting all the hyperkinetic chicanery wash over you, appreciating the awesomeness of those stunts and the cleverness of the setups while relishing the laughs scattered throughout the not-taking-itself-too-seriously script. At that level, it’s no wonder the thing keeps working. MI is pretty much as immortal and unkillable as Ethan Hunt himself—there’s always some escape to be made, some new ledge to leap onto and keep the thing climbing or running or scrambling its way forward. That, the fact of this franchise’s eternally entertaining nature, is a mission—or at least an enticement—that moviegoers have long since learned to accept. The thing couldn’t self-destruct even if it wanted to.