Tom Cruise is on cruise control...

Rating: Null/10 (9 August 2003)

Tom Cruise is a good actor regardless of what anyone says. He has held his own while acting alongside such legends a Dustin Hoffman, Paul Newman and Robert Duvall. He has also taken direction extremely well from veterans such as Oliver Stone, Stanley Kubrick and Martin Scorsese. If Cruise wasn't any good, do you really think these actors and directors of such a high stature would want to work with him? In 'Mission Impossible' Cruise creates an secret agent character that is sort of a miniature James Bond. Cool, unshaken and physical at every tense moment, Cruise's Ethan Hunt is a great character. Brian De Palma's direction is static as usual but the story (which takes multiple viewings in order to figure out the REAL plot) and Cruise's on screen charisma make 'Mission Impossible' one of the more respectable films to be based on a classic t.v. series when so many of them are nothing but junk. This film is a winner.