Possibly Good. Not Great.

Rating: 6/10 (14 August 2015)

Your mission if you choose to except it is to spend 131 minutes in a cinema of your choice watching Tom and his mates save the world. There are insane action scenes, outrageous high speed chases, gunfights, explosions and lethal hand to hand combat.
I have never fully engaged myself into the world of the IMF and their top operative, Ethan Hunt. It's probably because I have never accepted that Tom Cruise could genuinely be a spy and it is this bias that has hindered my appreciation for the Mission Impossible film series. The original film was brilliant but then came the diabolical sequel and my hunger for M.I. never returned. It took me a long time to watch the third instalment which brought the series back to form thanks to an outstanding performance from the recently past Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Ghost Protocol continued the momentum perfectly. Are they in the same class as the rebooted 007 films or the superb Jason Bourne Trilogy?
Rogue Nation sees Cruise return as Ethan Hunt but not all is well with the IMF. The head of the CIA (Alec Baldwin) wants the organisation shut down or absorbed by the powerful Central Intelligence Agency, claiming Hunt and his mates have been causing too much collateral damage. Ethan has been on the trail of a rogue outfit calling themselves "The Syndicate", but there is no proof that they even exist. With the CIA after him, Ethan Hunt disappears then recruits his team to track down the "Rogue Nation".
All the usual suspects are back in Simon Pegg, Jeremy Renner and Ving Rhames but it is Alec Baldwin's cameo appearance that leaves a lasting impression, delivering the best lines and adding a bit of grit to the film that can at times fall into the trap of becoming a movie about Tom and his buddies killing people and conversing in a bit of banter. The performance of Cruise seemed a little bit off as though he was tired of the series but ironically it comes across as a little less annoying.
Rebecca Ferguson plays a double agent of sorts who needs to play both sides of the coin to stay alive in the dangerous world of espionage. Her appearance at the opera wearing a stunning yellow gown cannot be ignored and neither can her performance as she brings a great back story to the film that could have quite easily gotten lost for its need to deliver non stop action.
Christopher McQuarrie who directed Cruise in "Jack Reacher" delivers a film that is fast paced and entertaining. Rogue Nation has done what it set out to do and that was to give the audience a thoroughly enjoyable package that doesn't require the viewer to think too much. It is a good film without being great and fits into the M.I. pantheon in the middle. Better than M.I.2. but not as good as M.I.3.