At the airport, Ethan also passes a pickpocket named Grace (Hayley Atwell) who is caught up in this world-changing madness. Shea Whigham and Greg Tarzan Davis are spectacularly outraged, with several agents trying to hunt down the villainous Ethan. The silent assassin, impressively sketched by Pom Klementieff, is also essential for some of the action scenes. And Vanessa Kirby returns as arms dealer White Widow, but if there’s a weakness in this ensemble, it’s that Kirby’s performance is missing. She failed to deliver the “power player” in these films the way it should have been.
But people aren’t here for a White Widow backstory, so that doesn’t matter. They want to see Tom Cruise run. When most people think of “Mission: Impossible,” the stretched-legged, arm-waving Mr. Cruz probably comes to mind. He does the same thing over and over here, but the momentum of that image seems to be the artistic force behind this whole movie. “Dead Reckoning Part One” prioritizes movements such as trains, cars, and Ethan’s legs. It’s an action movie about speed and urgency, something that’s been lost in an era when CGI’s stakes have declined. A runaway train has always had more intrinsic power than a wave of animated villains, and McQuarrie knows how to use it sparingly to make an action movie that’s both modern and old-fashioned at the same time. . These movies don’t rely too much on his CGI, so you can see that it’s really Mr. Cruise jumping off the motorcycle.When punches connect, bodies fly, cars crash, we felt rather than just observing passively. The action here is so brilliantly choreographed that only John Wick: Chapter 4 can match the best in the genre this year.
There’s also something thematically compelling here about a movie star battling AI and questioning the purpose of his work. For generations, blockbusters have been cautionary tales about technology, but consider the meta side of spy movies. The world could fall apart when espionage operations are hijacked by sentient computers starring actors who are central figures in spy movies. controversy About your own deepfake. The plot here also has a distinct edge that affects the actors’ ages in that Ethan is forced to answer questions about what’s important to him when it comes to a very unusual work/life balance. , reflecting what an actor like Cruise has to face as he grows up, ends an action-movie rope that’s been far longer than anyone optimistically expected. I don’t know if Cruise intended that reading of him or not, but I think he thinks so, but it adds another layer to the action.
Of course, the most important thing is that Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part 1 is incredibly fun. The length feels half that, and contains enough memorable action sequences for several series-wides. Can Cruise save the blockbuster experience again? perhaps. And we may do it again next summer.
Released in theaters on July 12th.
