Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One

Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One is an upcoming American action spy film written, produced, and directed by Christopher McQuarrie. It will be the sequel to Mission: Impossible – Fallout (2018) and the seventh installment in the Mission: Impossible film series. The film stars Tom Cruise, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg, Rebecca Ferguson, Vanessa Kirby, Hayley Atwell, Shea Whigham, Pom Klementieff, Esai Morales, Rob Delaney, Henry Czerny, and Cary Elwes.
Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One is scheduled for release in the United States on July 12, 2023, by Paramount Pictures, following numerous delays due to the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent production shutdowns. Unlike the previous four films, neither J.J. Abrams nor Bad Robot Productions were involved with the film. 
The sequel, Dead Reckoning Part Two, is scheduled to be released on June 28, 2024.
== Plot ==
The Sevastopol, a next-generation Russian stealth submarine, employs an advanced AI that is activated by a two-piece cruciform key. The AI becomes sentient and goes rogue. It deceives the crew into attacking a phantom target, only to be struck by their own torpedo, killing all aboard. IMF agent Ethan Hunt travels to the Empty Quarter of the Arabian Desert and successfully retrieves a key piece from Ilsa Faust, a disavowed MI6 agent, and also fakes her death to ensure she survives a bounty placed by an unknown source. Back in Washington, D.C., Ethan infiltrates a U.S. Intelligence Community briefing for Director of National Intelligence Denlinger discussing the rogue AI. They give it the title "the Entity" because of its sentience and defiance. CIA Director Eugene Kittridge states that the Entity can manipulate cyberspace, allowing it to control global defense intelligence and financial networks. World powers compete to obtain the cruciform key to control the Entity, though the exact means of controlling it are unknown.
Ethan reveals himself and converses with Kittridge, who reveals that he was the one who placed Ilsa's bounty. Ethan confesses his intention to destroy the Entity, knowing he would be considered rogue and is participating in a global race. Ethan and his IMF teammates Benji Dunn and Luther Stickell travel to Abu Dhabi International Airport to intercept the holder of the other key piece, while evading US agents. During the pursuit, the key piece is stolen by a thief named Grace, while Luther and Benji disarm a hoax nuclear device. Ethan suspects foul play after seeing Gabriel, a ruthless Entity liaison with ties to his pre-IMF past. Aborting the mission, the team scatters and Grace escapes to Rome. Grace is apprehended upon arrival, but Ethan rescues her from local authorities, US agents and Paris, an Entity operative. Grace escapes again, while Ethan meets up with Luther and Benji, with Ilsa rejoining them. With Benji and Luther providing support, Ethan and Ilsa follow Grace to Venice, where they infiltrate a party held by the arms dealer Alanna Mitsopolis.
With the party masquerading as a brokerage set up by the Entity, all groups disclose their role in acquiring the complete key. Grace was hired by Alanna to steal the other key piece to produce the completed key, which will be sold to her buyer the next day on the Orient Express. Through the Entity, Gabriel proclaims that he will possess the completed key the next day and that either Ilsa or Grace will die. Ethan unsuccessfully attempts to dissuade Alanna from the sale, allowing Gabriel and Grace to escape. Ethan pursues Grace, but the Entity hacks into their communications and impersonates Benji, leading him into a fight with Paris, whom he spares. Concurrently, Gabriel incapacitates Grace and kills Ilsa, devastating Ethan, who vows to exact revenge. Grace agrees to impersonate Alanna and take the key during the sale. Luther leaves for an off-grid location to prevent interference from the Entity, advising Ethan to spare Gabriel to determine information about the Entity. On the train, Gabriel kills the engine crew and destroys the throttle and brake. With Paris, Gabriel meets Denlinger, who divulges information only he knows in an attempt to form an alliance between himself and the Entity.
The Entity was originally an advanced cyber weapon developed by the US. The completed key unlocks a chamber inside the Sevastopol containing the Entity's source code, allowing it to be destroyed or controlled. Gabriel subsequently kills Denlinger and tries to kill Paris as the Entity determined she would betray them after Ethan spared her life. Impersonating Alanna, Grace brings the key to Kittridge, revealed to be the buyer, and negotiates a $100 million sale alongside protection for herself, but pickpockets the key from Kittridge after cancelling the transfer. Ethan parachutes into the train to save Grace, but Gabriel acquires the key. Ethan and Gabriel fight atop the train, but Gabriel escapes and detonates a bridge ahead. Grace and Ethan detach the locomotive from the rest of the train, saving the passengers. Paris rescues both from falling and manages to tell Ethan about the key's connection to the Sevastopol before losing consciousness. Grace informs Kittridge of her desire to join the IMF. Ethan flees the wreckage by paraglider with the completed key, which he took from Gabriel during the fight, and rendezvous with Benji to continue the mission to find the Sevastopol and destroy the Entity.
== Cast ==
== Production ==
=== Announcement and casting ===
On January 14, 2019, Tom Cruise announced that the seventh and eighth Mission: Impossible films would be shot back-to-back with Christopher McQuarrie writing and directing both films for July 23, 2021, and August 5, 2022, release dates.
In February 2021, Paramount Pictures scuttled that plan, but Rebecca Ferguson confirmed her return for the seventh installment. In September 2019, McQuarrie announced on Instagram that Hayley Atwell had joined the cast. In September 2019, Pom Klementieff joined the cast of both the seventh and eighth films. In December 2019, Simon Pegg confirmed his return for the film, with Shea Whigham cast of both films. Nicholas Hoult was cast in a role in January 2020, along with the addition of Henry Czerny, reprising his role as Eugene Kittridge for the first time since the 1996 film. Vanessa Kirby also announced she was returning for both films. In May 2020, it was reported that Esai Morales would replace Hoult as the villain in both films due to scheduling conflicts.
Angela Bassett confirmed that she would return as Erika Sloane in December 2020, but was later removed from the film due to COVID-19 pandemic-related travel restrictions. In March 2021, McQuarrie revealed on Instagram that Rob Delaney, Charles Parnell, Indira Varma, Mark Gatiss and Cary Elwes had joined the cast. That same day, Greg Davis was also confirmed to have joined the cast.
=== Filming and COVID-19 pandemic shutdown ===
Under the working title Libra, filming was scheduled to begin on February 20, 2020, in Venice, set up to last for three weeks before moving to Rome in mid-March for 40 days, but due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Italy, production in the country was halted. Three weeks later, stunt rehearsals began in Surrey, England, just before a hiatus. On July 6, 2020, after another hiatus, crew arriving in the UK were given permission to begin filming without going through the mandatory 14-day quarantine. The set was located at Warner Bros Studios, Leavesden in Hertfordshire.
The following month, similar permission was granted for filming in Møre og Romsdal, Norway. That same month, a large fire broke out on a motorcycle stunt rig in Oxfordshire. The scene had taken six weeks to prepare and was "among one of the most expensive ever filmed in the U.K." No one was hurt in the incident.
Filming began on September 6, 2020, when McQuarrie started to publish images from the sets on Instagram. In October 2020, across Norway, when the previous installment was filmed in Preikestolen, including the municipalities of Stranda and Rauma, with Cruise sighted filming an action scene with Esai Morales atop a train. On October 26, 2020, production was halted in Italy after 12 people tested positive for COVID-19 on set. Filming resumed a week later.
In December 2020, during filming in London, an audio recording of Cruise shouting at two production crew members for not following the COVID-19 rules on set was released online. Cruise was likened to his character Les Grossman from the 2008 film Tropic Thunder as a result. The response from the general public and that of many celebrities was supportive, suggesting that his tone and seriousness were warranted given the extreme circumstances and burden of ensuring production not be halted again. On December 28, 2020, Variety reported that the film would conclude principal photography at Longcross Film Studios in the United Kingdom, with production shifting from Warner Bros. Studios, Leavesden. In Longcross, which is in Surrey in Southeast England, productions were allowed to continue under strict COVID-19 protocols. In February 2021, filming concluded in the Middle East and the crew would return to London for "finishing touches".
On April 20, 2021, filming commenced in the small village of Levisham, North Yorkshire, North Yorkshire Moors Railway, for a sequence set in the Alps in Switzerland with a train going 60 miles (97 km) an hour through a bridge being blown up, as a reference to the climactic train wreck scene in the 1926 silent film The General. In August 2021, filming commenced in Birmingham at the city's Grand Central shopping centre, with Cruise and Atwell spotted by onlookers. In September 2021, the film's gaffer Martin Smith confirmed on Instagram that principal photography had officially wrapped.
=== Polish bridge controversy ===
During the pre-production in late 2019, the Swiss government refused to authorize any explosions for the train sequence in the Alps; as a result, the Skydance Media production team embarked on location scouts in different countries to find an unwanted railway bridge. Among those asked to help with staging a "full-scale train crash" was Polish-American film producer Andrew Eksner. In November 2019, the Polish State Railways proposed Eksner use a 151-meter (492 ft) long, 1908 German-era riveted truss bridge on Lake Pilchowickie [pʲilxɔvʲit͡skʲɛ] [pl; es], in the Jelenia Góra Valley, in Lower Silesia. In December 2019, Paramount Pictures producers including McQuarrie landed in southern Poland, accompanied in deep secrecy by officers of the Polish engineering troops. McQuarrie documented the visit on Instagram.
Officially opened in 1912 by Wilhelm II, the proposed bridge survived World War II mostly intact and was used by trains until 2016. Despite publicly praising the bridge as "extremely valuable," an expert misrepresented conclusions of a commissioned report, that instead of renovating, it would be best to demolish the bridge and build a new one. In March 2020, after the rejected Eksner spread the information, local authorities and museum officials were appalled by the producers' intention to physically destroy the bridge, instead of using CGI effects. The filmmakers and government officials said the bridge was devastated and intended for demolition.
By July 2020, history and railway enthusiasts, scientists and filmmakers protested, along with the regional Monuments Heritage Office, members of Polish parliament, and the International Committee for the Conservation of the Industrial Heritage. Activists and NGOs launched a petition against the destruction. And as it was long registered provincially, and being added into Poland's national Registry of Cultural Property, the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage confirmed it was pushing the bridge to play in the movie, with a "small section" to be demolished onset, before revitalizing the related local heritage railway line altogether. Following the backlash, the General Conservator of Monuments assured "there was no question" of destroying the bridge.
In August 2020, as the story turned international, McQuarrie said there was never a plan to blow up the bridge, and that only unsafe and partially damaged portions could have been destroyed, which allegedly needed to be rebuilt, concluding: "To open up the area to tourism, the bridge needed to go." He later added that "there was no disrespect intended".[better source needed] The production company did not pledge to cover construction costs of a potential new bridge, nor the renovation of the historic one. Eventually, cultural property registration procedures for the Lake Pilchowickie bridge were finalized, effectively preventing it from any damage. In May 2021, Eksner sued the Paramount production crew including McQuarrie and Cruise for breach of contract.
Ultimately, filming of the train wreck scene was expected to take place between April and June 2021, in the Peak District National Park in Stoney Middleton, on a constructed set in a disused quarry, with a railway line and part of a bridge over the cliff edge. After two weeks of suspended filming, the scene was filmed on August 20, when a mockup Britannia Class locomotive was propelled off the cliff into the quarry.
=== Post-production ===
Industrial Light & Magic return to provide the visual effects for the film after doing so for the first film, Mission: Impossible III, and Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol, with Blind LTD, Clear Angle Studios and Halon Entertainment being the additional vendors for the film.
=== Music ===
In early May 2020, the composer Lorne Balfe was confirmed to be returning to compose the score for the seventh and eighth Mission: Impossible films, after scoring the sixth. Balfe's music from the teaser trailer was digitally released by Paramount Music on June 23, 2022 as a single.
== Release ==
Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One is scheduled to be theatrically released in the United States on July 12, 2023, by Paramount Pictures. It was previously set to be released on July 23, 2021, November 19, 2021, May 27, 2022 and September 30, 2022, before being delayed to July 14 due to the COVID-19 pandemic and production shutdowns. On April 27, 2023, Paramount announced at CinemaCon that the film will be released two days earlier on July 12. Its November and May release dates were given to Top Gun: Maverick, another film starring Cruise.
=== Marketing ===
A trailer for the film debuted exclusively at CinemaCon on April 28, 2022, including an introduction by Tom Cruise filmed while he was flying in a biplane. The trailer was leaked to social media on May 21, 2022, and was officially released online on May 23, 2022. The CinemaCon introduction was released officially on September 8, 2022. Sam Barsanti of The A.V. Club gave the trailer a positive review and highlighted the many action scenes in it. JoBlo.com also gave the trailer a positive review, saying that the "action on display is truly amazing" and praising Cruise's dedication to entertaining.
A behind-the-scenes look at the film first debuted in front of IMAX screenings of Avatar: The Way of Water. The full preview was released online four days later, on December 19, 2022.
==Sequel==
A direct sequel, Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part Two, is in development and is scheduled to be released on June 28, 2024, after being delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It was announced that both films will be a send-off to Ethan Hunt.
== Gallery==
Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning Part 1 teaser poster.jpeg
Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning Part 1 theatrical release poster.jpeg
===Trailers===
Mission- Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One - Official Teaser Trailer (2023 Movie) - Tom Cruise
Mission- Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One With Introduction By Tom Cruise|Teaser trailer w/ Tom Cruise CinemaCon introduction
Mission- Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One - Official Trailer (2023 Movie) - Tom Cruise
Mission- Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One - Final Trailer (2023 Movie) - Tom Cruise
===Behind the Scenes===
Mission- Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One - The Biggest Stunt in Cinema History (Tom Cruise)
Mission- Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One - Rome Car Chase Behind-The-Scenes - Tom Cruise
Mission- Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One - Speedflying Behind-The-Scenes - Tom Cruise
Mission- Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One - Train Stunt Behind-The-Scenes - Tom Cruise
==References==
Category:2023 films
Category:Films
Category:American films
Category:Action films
Category:American action films
Category:2020s films
Category:2020s American films
Category:2020s action films
Category:2020s American action films
Category:Mission: Impossible films
Category:2020s spy films
Category:American sequel films
Category:Films based on television series
Category:Films about terrorism
Category:Films shot in London
Category:Films shot in Norway
Category:Films shot in England
Category:Skydance Media films
Category:Paramount Pictures films
Category:Films directed by Christopher McQuarrie
Category:Films produced by Tom Cruise
Category:Films starring Tom Cruise
Category:Screenplays by Christopher McQuarrie
Category:Films starring Ving Rhames
Category:Films starring Simon Pegg
Category:Films starring Rebecca Ferguson
Category:Films starring Vanessa Kirby
Category:Films starring Hayley Atwell
Category:Films starring Pom Klementieff
Category:Films starring Cary Elwes
Category:IMAX films
Category:2020s IMAX films
Category:2:35:1 Aspect Ratio Films