“MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE-GHOST PROTOCOL”Based upon the television series “Mission: Impossible” created by Bruce Gellar
Screenplay Written by Andre Nemo and Josh Applebaum
Directed by Brad Bird
*** ½ (three and a half stars)
Tom Cruise is hungry again. Very hungry.
Now I don’t want for any of you to think that I have soured on Tom Cruise like so many others have…perhaps some of you as well. Despite his global fame and immense star wattage, I happen to think that Tom Cruise is a seriously underrated actor who deserves much more artistic respect than he is given. Honestly, this is a man who has commanded the respect of his peers in the filmmaking community. His joy for the art and craft of moviemaking is unquestionable. This is a man who has worked with no less than Oliver Stone, Martin Scorsese, Stanley Kubrick, Barry Levinson, Michael Mann, Paul Thomas Anderson and two times each with Cameron Crowe and Steven Spielberg. In his “Mission: Impossible” franchise alone, he has worked with Brian De Palma, John Woo and J.J. Abrams. No hack of an actor would ever have been able to claim those cinema giants as filmmaking collaborators at all. As an actor, I have always appreciated Tom Cruise’s passionate level of commitment. Whether you like, love or hate one of his films, I do not believe for an instant that his creative drive is less than visible upon the screen. And to date, I do not believe that he has ever given a lazy performance, or sat back and made a “paycheck movie” at the audience’s expense.
All of that being said, I still think that its sad that after jumping upon a couch and being the subject of tabloid fodder, audiences has grown to have a vitriolic aversion towards Cruise. Certainly, that terrible 2005 interview with Matt Lauer didn’t do him any favors. But please, did Tom Cruise really do anything approaching the level of what Mel Gibson did? Even so, his screen presence has suffered for several years now. Despite some good work in Robert Redford’s otherwise uneven and preachy “Lions For Lambs” (2007), where Cruise more than held his own against Meryl Streep, his most notable performance was the one where he was unrecognizable and covered in mountains of latex as the hysterical, profane and grotesque Hollywood agent Len Grossman in Ben Stiller’s wild satire “Tropic Thunder” (2007). It seemed obvious to anyone paying attention that Tom Cruise’s star was tarnished and beginning to dim.
With the release of “Mission: Impossible-Ghost Protocol,” the fourth installment in the series where he portrays super-spy Ethan Hunt, Tom Cruise is ready to make a grand return with a vengeance. To me, he seemed like the beleaguered prize fighter on the ropes but not down for the count just yet. He’s taken his hits. He’s licked his wounds. And now, Tom Cruise is coming out swinging with a performance of surprising aggressiveness. With this film, it feels as if Tom Cruise has something to prove. His fists are clenched and he is ready to rumble. While my favorite installment in the series still remains Director J.J. Abrams underseen (at the time of release) “Mission: Impossible III” (2006), this new chapter, the vibrant, triumphant, insanely creative first live action feature from Director Brad Bird (who helmed 2004’s “The Incredibles” and 2007’s “Ratatouille” for Pixar) comes pretty damn close.
As “Mission: Impossible-Ghost Protocol” opens, IMF secret agent Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) is captive inside of a Russian prison and is soon rescued during a prison riot by IMF field agents Jane Carter (Paula Patton) and the newly promoted technical expert Benji Dunn (Simon Pegg). Once on the Moscow streets, Ethan is given his latest mission. He and is team are to covertly enter the archives inside of the Kremlin to gather the identity and whereabouts of Kurt Hendricks (Michael Nyqvist), the nuclear strategist known as “Cobalt”, a sinister figure who believes that a nuclear holocaust, which he plans to unleash, will ultimately save humanity by providing the next evolutionary step in human kind. Of course, even the most impossible plans for the IMF team are made even more impossible to execute as the trio is discovered and narrowly escape the Kremlin, which is destroyed by a bomb.
As the Russian government calls the attack upon the Kremlin an act of war, Ethan and his team are informed that the President of the United States has enacted “Ghost Protocol,” a top secret operation which completely disavows the entire IMF team and holds them entirely responsible for the Kremlin’s destruction. Yet, the team, now joined by IMF analyst William Brand (Jeremy Renner) are allowed to flee the Russian government so they can still pursue “Cobalt” entirely on their own.
“Mission: Impossible-Ghost Protocol” firmly aligns itself with the previous three installments, as well as the classic television series, by placing our heroes in all manner of increasingly impossible situations and predicaments where duplicitous behavior, double crosses, disguises, globe trotting, wild futuristic gadgets, high speed chases and the fate of the world are all par for the course and presented in high style in this first rate production. What has made the “Mission: Impossible” film series stand out from the massive amount of action films that are released each year as well as the James Bond and Jason Bourne series is how Tom Cruise has fashioned the franchise to exist as a “Director’s Series.” Where Brian De Palma created a more classic Hollywood film noir with the debut episode, John Woo delivered something akin to a bullet opera for the second. As I previously stated, my favorite was the third installment helmed by J.J. Abrams as it made the story and adventures of Ethan Hunt more personal and emotional, which increased the overall tension and excitement during all of the action sequence pyrotechnics.
As Abrams serves as a Producer alongside Cruise for this fourth episode, some of that human element thankfully remains but it is in short supply to the grandly designed, gorgeously filmed, expertly staged, choreographed and presented set pieces that Brad Bird has devised for Ethan and his team to get themselves into and out of. What results is Bird’s furiously paced film that contains one white-knuckle event after another and believe it or not, there were a few points where the intensity and velocity of the action made me recall the classic one-two punch of the airplane fight sequence and subsequent truck chase from Steven Spielberg’s “Raiders Of The Lost Ark” (1981)! No joke, dear readers. Brad Bird has shown so confidently that he is indeed as madly inventive with live actors and real world settings as he is with animation and I am happy to say that he has essentially created some of the very best sequences in the entire “Mission: Impossible” series.
Much has already been written about the Dubai section of the film, which includes a truly edge-of-your-seat and vertigo inducing sequence where Ethan Hunt is scaling the side of the Burj Khalifa tower (the world’s tallest building, of course) only with a pair of technically faulty electronic suction gloves. It is an astonishing piece of film, masterfully executed with drama, excitement, tension and well placed humor. I also loved the film’s opening prison riot sequence, which is simply pounding. A visual slight of hand moment as Ethan Hunt and Benji enter the Kremlin is a delight. A ferocious chase through a Dubai sandstorm is another stunning highlight. And the climax, which features Hunt and Hendricks battling, scraping, kicking, pummeling, beating, rising and falling throughout a multi-level garage as they each try to retrieve a briefcase that contains the launch codes that with either initialize or cancel an impending nuclear holocaust of epic proportions is fantastically breathless.
Yet, what makes all of those sequences plus so many other fight sections work are the rich tapestry of performances that keeps everything grounded with a certain gravity while also acknowledging how wild and preposterous some of their situations happen to be. Jeremy Renner makes for an excellent addition to the IMF team as he almost functions as a audience stand-in as he has the chance to marvel in disbelief at all of the absurdly outrageous adventures the team finds themselves engaged in. Thankfully, he also is able to weave in a level of self-doubt, dark mystery and sorrow which enriches the material and the relationship between himself and Ethan Hunt.
Paula Patton showcases her obvious attractiveness of course, but unlike someone like Angelina Jolie, a veteran of action films but who increasingly does not appear to have the body strength to hold a gun or run a block, Patton is completely convincing as a field agent ready to strike within a split-second notice. Simon Pegg, provides the requisite comic relief but also showcases his talents as someone who could realistically exist within this crazy spy thriller universe. And then, there’s Tom Cruise, who is seemingly weaving in the turbulence of his personal and professional battle scars into the mythical history of Ethan Hunt, a tactic that provides the hero with new, darker, tougher, more difficult layers.
With “Mission: Impossible-Ghost Protocol,” the image of Ethan Hunt as the thrill seeking, cocky Boy Scout is nowhere to be found. That trademark smile of his is barely seen. This time around, Hunt is a full-blooded adult hardened by internal tragedies, wrestling with personal demons and is filled with ferocious, tenacious, relentless rage. That brightness in his eyes has been replaced by a haunted coldness, combined with a clenched jaw and wiry frame ready to strike, pummel and punish. Ethan Hunt’s attitude is one of impatient frustration, and a near lack of compassion towards faulty technology, the duplicitous world in which he exists, an increasingly insane criminal element that forever returns like seasonal garden weeds, and even, at times, towards his team mates.
While he has presented a certain laser focused intensity to his work throughout his career, with “Mission: Impossible-Ghost Protocol,” I can say that I have never seen Tom Cruise quite like this before. It is a performance of raw, tightly coiled, and incredibly unforgiving physicality. He is a lone wolf who happens to be saddled with a team, which he, of course, will grow to appreciate but for the bulk of the film, they are brutally tested to keep up with him. (In fact, the movie feels as if it has to keep up with him too!) As Ethan Hunt famously stated in the first film to a former ally turned adversary, “You haven’t seen me very upset!” Well, in this fourth installment, we do and the uncompromising and almost machine like fury is exhilarating.
If I had even one quibble with the film is that perhaps there are maybe a few too many scenes of exposition that tended to dial down that personal quality I loved so much in the third film. Plus, it also tended to slow the film’s momentum a bit and just at the points the film needed to keep pushing further. But, those feelings were so minor once that stakes of the spy game kept growing higher and higher.
As I stated at the beginning of this review, I think that Mr. Cruise is hungry again. And based upon reports that this installment, which has received stellar critical acclaim, the best box office of the entire “Mission: Impossible” series and finally, even Tom Cruise’s entire career, that hunger has served him and all of us extremely well.
“Mission: Impossible-Ghost Protocol” is sensational entertainment, a perfect popcorn movie that more than delivers the goods. Based upon this episode, I am already anxious for the next one!
No comments:
Post a Comment