Product: Mission: Impossible (1996)
Rating: 3.0
Deserving of a Special Edition DVD treatment...
Having just watched this film again, I was struck by how engaging it is. Sure, the plot machinations get hopelessly convoluted but I think that's kinda the point. Who cares about specific plot points when you've got Brian DePalma directing with his usual stylistic flourishes. True, he's a bit more tied down than with his usual fair (see Blow Out) but even DePalma on autopilot is pretty impressive.This film works much better than its sequel because it doesn't try to pad out the film with a useless romantic subplot. Ethan Hunt isn't a character that needs to be fleshed out and that's what makes the no-nonsense tone of MI1 so superior to MI2. Stylistically, Woo beats DePalma hands down but that's about it.The presence of actors like Jon Voight and Henry Czerny give the first MI an almost Tom Clancy-like feel -- especially in the vein of Hunt For Red October with all the espionage and technospeak.Also, the setting of Eastern Europe contributes a lot to the overall atmosphere of the film -- especially the opening sequence where Hunt's team is betrayed and killed off, one by one.There are some really solid set-pieces in the movie: the aforementioned mission gone wrong at the beginning, the now-famous nearly silent break-in at CIA Headquarters, and the infamous train/helicopter chase at the film's climax. Yeah, that last one was mucho implausible but it's still a lot of fun to watch.Most importantly, Mission: Impossible is an entertaining time waster with a lean script full of all sorts of twists and turns, a solid performance by Cruise and a great supporting cast that also includes the always reliable Ving Rhames and Jean Reno.Alas, this DVD is very bare bones with no extras to speak of. Thankfully, Paramount learned their lesson with the MI2 DVD but it would be nice if they revisited this first one and got DePalma to do an audio commentary, throw in some deleted scenes and a retrospective featurette or two. It's about time.