Crude, Clumsy Letdown

Rating: 4/10 (2 June 2000)

I liked the twisty plot of the first Mission Impossible movie. This movie is very different.
This movie has a paper-thin plot intended only to provide an excuse for action scene after action scene.
Instead of plot twists, we get ludicrous latex-mask-impersonation scenes - lots of them. Any self respecting episode of "Scooby-Doo" limits itself to just *one* of those scenes.
MI2 clumsily tries to throw in a little romance to spice things up, but it does so in the form of a simply stupid car chase/flirtation scene that's about as sexy as a poke in the eye.
So all that's left is action. That's too bad, because the action, frankly, isn't so compelling. A lot of it is so overdone as to be laughable. And there's a limit to how much of this stuff you can watch in one sitting without getting a headache, anyway.
And, just to make things worse, the spectacle and noise of the huge explosions, the car chases, and the gun battles is exactly the kind of thing you have to see in the theater to enjoy at all. This flick will have even less to offer on video.
4/10