It is hard to believe that 1996 saw the birth of the highly successful film series.
Leading the way is the one and only Tom Cruise. With a steep filmography, this is the only franchise that he is part of. This also saw Cruise become well known for doing his own stunts, which I am glad to see that he is maintaining those morals.
Now aged 53, Cruise is back for a fifth time. The previous installment's director Brad Bird is not part of the team this time. In charge now, is Chris McQuarrie. The New Jersey native has worked with Cruise in the past with Valkyrie, Jack Reacher and Edge Of Tomorrow. Other notable achievements was writing the screenplay for The Usual Suspects.
I was unsure what to expect from McQuarrie. However, he managed to prove to me that he can do a big blockbuster.
Literally from the very start, you are thrown right into the action. From one quite astonishing action set-piece to the next, this is certainly a Mission: Impossible film that manages to blow all other recent action blockbusters out of the water.
As you can tell, I had a lot of fun with Rogue Nation. This franchise seem to lately have a policy of making one action set-piece that will top the lot and get everyone talking.
Ghost Protocol had Cruise climbing the tallest building in the world. Rogue Nation has it in the opening scene, and it is an absolute feast of action, and as always Cruise is doing it himself.
Cruise never fails to perform. His commitment to the cause is second to none. You can see his passion for the franchise that made him, and his dedication for the fans will make you trust him in keeping this film series successful.
It was nice to see Ving Rhames reprise his role once again. His safe pair of hands helped the film stick together. Simon Pegg seemed to excel himself in this one. He definitely feels like an integral part of the team. Jeremy Renner was not bad, but he was not anything spectacular either.
As for Sean Harris who played the villain was quite unrecognisable. It took me a while to realise it was him as the only that I remember seeing him in was Prometheus. His performance was better than expected, but it was not threatening enough to be memorable.
The big surprises were Rebecca Ferguson and Alec Baldwin.
Baldwin was a great support and I can see potential in him being in the franchise for the next few years. But for me, the start of the film was Ferguson. Her bad-ass and heavily physical performance was great to watch. It almost reminded of Emily Blunt in Edge Of Tomorrow (who also partnered with Cruise) and Charlize Theron in Mad Max: Fury Road.
I must mention the soundtrack, which is wonderfully old-school. As much as I liked the Limp Bizkit remix of the main theme in M:I 2, there is nothing better then sticking to the original material. That infamous theme always gets the juices flowing and this helped the adrenaline of the film flow at ramming speed.
Despite all of this, I'm still giving it a passable rating as the story is as just similar as any other M:I film, which is nothing ground-breaking. The only exception was the third one as that had something extra such as a great villain, really well told and developed story, wonderfully paced and is directed by J.J Abreams who I am a big fan of.
There are not any major flaws, it just did not have anything exceptional that impressed me enough. It is just good fun and the type of film that you can turn your brain off to and just enjoy what is on screen.
However, there are minor flaws. The duration of the film was a bit long and I could definitely find content that can be taken off and the film would still be as enjoyable. The villain was nothing special. Thankfully, it was better then the one in Ghost Protocol, but I think the performance of the late great Philip Seymour Hoffman in M:I 3 will be a tough one to beat.
Despite all that, this remains to be a pure Mission Impossible movie. Even with the duration being slightly too long, I was never bored. There is a lot to love about it, and the action scenes are unforgettable. The consistency with its formula will make it interesting to see where they can go from here. McQuarrie and his team should be proud of what they have done, and I would not mind having him in the sixth feature.
This deserves to do well at the box-office and I believe this will be a smash hit. It might be the highest-grossing film of the summer due to this not being totally appealing for families, but they will definitely put themselves up there.
If you are interested in where I would rank it among the others, I will still have M:I 3 as the best in the series. But Rogue Nation will fit just ahead of Ghost Protocol and just behind the first M:I.
On an additional note, this film was also my first viewing experience of IMAX. Due to cost of tickets, I usually go a regular showing. But as IMAX was the only way of seeing it at the time, it was the perfect type of film to fully experience the technology. Now I can see why directors like Christopher Nolan believe that this is the future of cinema, rather than 3D.
I will think twice before seeing certain films as I will probably view it in IMAX.
Rating: 7/10
No comments:
Post a Comment