Huge improvement over "M:I 2", returning to the roots

Rating: Null/10 (31 July 2015)

(Review in preparation for Rogue Nation) Ethan Hunt is now in semi retirement training new recruits and getting ready to marry his fiancé Julia Meade who is (naturally) completely unaware of his job as a spy. While at a party he receives an off the books mission to rescue an agent Lindsey Farris who was surveying an arms dealer named Owen Davian.
Compared with "M:I 2", this is a much better film that returns to the roots of what the series is all about while making things more personal for our main protagonist. The director this time is J.J. Abrams and in his feature film debut he breaths life into the franchise again and pays respect to the source material; focusing more on the team cloak and dagger dynamic of the franchise, injected with high octane summer action.
Tom Cruise is great as always and he gives a much more vulnerable and human performance as Ethan Hunt. Ving Rhames once again comes back as Luther Stickell and he is given much more to do in this film than in the last one. The dialogue he shares with Tom Cruise gives you the sense that these two have been friends for a long time and I've always liked the banter about how marriage doesn't go with these agent's line of work. Michelle Monaghan is Ethan's wife and she does a good job of playing the innocent civilian unaware of her spouse's true line of work. The late Philip Seymour Hoffman easily gives his best performance as Owen Davian who is one of the best villains of the series. He plays the character as completely ruthless and he has one of the best lines that pushes our hero over the edge. Laurence Fishburne is great as Ethan's boss in the film and Simon Pegg has a small role as Benji Dunn who offers insight on the "Rabbit's Foot" and some drool humor.(Pegg would reprise the role in the next film as a field agent.)
Huge improvement over the previous film and a fun summer action film 9/10