The film the Mission: Impossible franchise desperately needed.

Rating: 6/10 (13 March 2009)

Mission: Impossible III plunges you head first into both chaos, anxiety, fear and general hatred towards the bad-guys as well as sympathy and remorse towards the good. The very first scene of the film sees Tom Cruise in a helpless and rather desperate situation as a psychotic arms dealer named Davian (Seymour Hoffman) holds a gun to our man Ethan Hunt's wife's head spouting some nonsense about a rabbit's foot. The scenario is futile with only one, tragic outcome seemingly going to occur. Systematically and within the opening few minutes of the film, new franchise director J.J. Abrams injects something that had been lacking throughout Mission: Impossible II's entirety: feeling and the general aura of threat, or something at stake.
Gone are the days, thank God, when a long haired Tom Cruise smirked nonchalantly as he pottered about on screen emitting all the necessary characteristics that made you want to throttle him. Gone are the days when Cruise, having just come off an ego-led high following an Oscar nomination for Magnoila, catered to John Woo, who just blew lots of stuff up, had everyone wear masks and at once point came close to having his characters physically fly following a motorcycle chase. The fluffy, two-bit and wholesome bore that was the second 'MI' film has gone and has been replaced by 'sit there and struggle whilst bound to a chair as I threaten to execute your wife'. It's quite a jump, yes, but a welcome one.
Up front, this Mission: Impossible is probably the best of the three but that isn't too much of a commendation. The film has its action, true, but it doesn't allow the action to overtake the narrative and what's at stake. You can argue, rightfully so, that the action set pieces in this are better to that of the first but that is principally down to the fact J.J. Abrams can direct action of this magnitude better than Brian De Palma can; that's no disservice to De Palma, a wonderful director and far more accomplished, but this is territory that Abrams just slots into. If De Palma directs action as an eerie and suspenseful sequence of motions (station shootout in Carlito's Way as well as the pool hall scene plus the drug deal prior to the 'chainsaw' scene in Scarface), then Abrams directs action as a spectacle: the jet, the helicopter, the guy being thrown off his feet into a window, the machine gun fire, etc. When I recall De Palma's 'MI', I recall the coming down through the ceiling and the opening ten minutes as memorable set pieces whereas the chopper in the tunnel at the end was a bit silly and an easy, explosive way to end a summer released espionage film.
But Abrams does this well and maintains an interesting story that spaces the action set pieces fairly well. The first of these is a rescue mission in Berlin during which Hunt actually comes out of retirement from the force and rescues the needy via gun fights, escape and general mayhem. It is this that spawns a certain postcard that is delivered to Hunt and this in turn spawns the notion that baddie Owen Davian should be apprehended. This action set piece pays special attention to getting into the establishment, apprehending the target and then 'cloning' him in the way they do before trying to escape in the manner they do. What follows is a shoot out on a bridge and one or two other action scenes later on.
These action scenes vary in form, from a rescue mission; to an apprehension to a dealing with an ambush and each feel nicely spaced as a consequence of the film's progressing rather than for showy reasons. The crux of the film is about terrorism; it's about arms dealing. Its villain is selling weapons and terrorism will be the result of their actions should the heroes fail. This is the first post 9/11 Mission: Impossible and the fear of further terrorism as a result of the heroes' (the West's?) incompetence is quite clearly up there on screen. It's an interesting array of ideas, backed up by a very True Lies inspired scenario revolving around Hunt being what he is and Hunt's wife, Julia (Monaghan), not knowing this. Like True Lies, it establishes this female character as this unspectacular and seemingly normal individual before ripping her out of the mould and forcing her to become a bit of a solider herself or a life saver; but that would be spoiling too much.
If there are flaws, it's that towards the end, little individual stunts begin to tarnish the hard work laid down. Someone shoots out tyres from beneath a truck, whilst getting a phone signal and putting pressure on a gun wound mostly all at once and I think Abrams gets a little carried away with his action  maybe they hadn't spent so much of the budget, realised the film was closing and just put everything into a last hurrah for the climax. Still, the action is good and well spaced; we care for the characters and the narrative doesn't demand we be too dismissive of it. If there is a fourth, it needs to build on what Abrams has most certainly laid down right here.