Mission Implausible

Rating: 8/10 (5 August 2015)

(Rating: ☆☆☆ out of 4)
This film is recommended.
In brief: This mission is improbable, but it's impossible not to be entertained due to the thrilling action and stunts.
GRADE: B
The mission may be impossible, and highly improbable, but it is unmistakably great fun. So start the action. Stage those death-defying stunts. Cue that recognizable theme music. Show those flashy opening credits. Mission Impossible has once again arrived. In its fifth incarnation, Mission Impossible - Rogue Nation, the IMF are now forced to disband and their primary spy, Ethan Hunt is a hunted man, a rogue agent out to save the world and accept that one last mission (should he decide to accept): to expose a group of political terrorists called The Syndicate.
￼Following its successful formula of high octane action and intricate plotting (which makes little logical sense once one thinks about the logistics of the plan), Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation, the fifth installment of this film series, takes the movie-going audience to exotic locales (Belarus, Vienna, Morocco, London) with nifty technology and enough excitingly- staged chase scenes for three more movies, let alone one. Yes, none of it makes much sense, especially Agent Hunt's endless financial resources and expensive gadgetry he has accumulated, but the far-fetched story remains very enjoyable nevertheless.
￼Ethan is played by the never-aging Tom Cruise and he plays this action hero figure to perfection. Sure, no one could survive these stunts in real life (hanging outside a moving plane in midair, being underwater for an insufferable amount of time, surviving one motorcycle or car crash without any broken bones, etc.) But this adventure isn't remotely real, It's more James Bond fantasy than actual espionage caper, although it desperately wants us to believe it is the latter. Cruise inhabits this physically exhausting role with great bravado. Keeping up with his pace (and almost stealing the film away from this movie star) is Rebecca Ferguson, a talented actress new to me. Ms Ferguson plays Ilsa Faust, a devilish double agent who can whoop HUnt blow-for-blow. She brings as much believability as humanly possible in an unbelievable role. Simon Pegg supplies the humor adroitly. and makes a great sidekick to the gravely serious Hunt. James Renner, Ving Rhames, and Alec Baldwin are there to provide minor support. The only real flaw is the film's chief villain, Solomon Lane, played by Sean Harris. The actor plays him as a second-rung evildoer, common without any real menace or malicious glee.
Christopher McQuarrie wrote a serviceable screenplay with enough twists to engage us. Yet it is his direction that impresses with much ballyhoo and expertly choreographed non-stop action. The film's highpoint, an assassination set piece at the Vienna Opera that juggles multiple deadly threats and exhilarating fight sequences backstage during a performance of Turandot, owes its inspiration to Hitchcock's The Man Who Knew Too Much, a sly homage from a talented modern day director that would have pleased the master director of suspense with his nimble touch.
Yes, the glorious stunts are as complex as they are absurd, wanting to top each preceding daredevil feat just to give us our money's worth of thrills. And while the mission itself becomes more outrageous and implausible, Mission Impossible - Rogue Nation accomplishes its real mission: to entertain and thrill us.
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