The good news
is that Mission: Impossible 3 is by far the best
of the three films to besmirch the memory of a cool television
series. That sounds like praising with faint damnation,
but with J. J. Abrams (who knows how to make cool television
series) at the helm, M:I 3 actually acknowledges
that it's the concept, not the star, that's supposed to
make it work.
Of course, it
does have a star, one who is not exactly in the most sharing
of moods right now. Though Abrams has a formidable opponent
for Cruise, er, Hunt in the form of Owen Davian (Phillip
Seymour Hoffman), the villain seems shackled once it becomes
clear he may outshine the hero. It's not a fatal mistake,
just disappointing, especially because Hoffman makes Cruise
look good in an incredibly tense opening sequence.
Like Nicolas
Cage impersonating John Travolta in Face/Off, Hoffman
also does an incredible job of being Cruise under a Hoffman
mask Ultimately as a character, though, Davian is supposed
to be a representation of corruption within the system,
easily replaced if he disappeared. What that translates
into for the audience is a cipher. He's evil, but why? He
sells horrible things to our enemies, but what motivates
him? All we know is that he's damned good at his job.
As is Cruise's
Ethan Hunt. Cruise himself borrows a bit from his work in
Collateral. Whether
he intends to or not, he makes Hunt a little bit more creepy
than he was in the first two films, and it works.
The script by
Abrams, Alex Kurtzmann and Roberto Orci puts Hunt in a semi-retired
state. Instead of going on impossible missions, he trains
agents, telling his fiancée Julia (Michelle Monaghan) and
her family that he works in traffic control. Yet he does
have a strange and disturbing habit of eavesdropping on
conversations by reading lips from a distance. Sure, that
comes in handy when you're mapping out traffic patterns.
His newest handler,
John Musgrave (Billy Crudup), calls him back in for the
proverbial one last mission - to rescue Hunt's star pupil
Lindsey (Keri Russell) from Davian's clutches.
Of course, things
go horribly wrong in a still pulse-pounding rescue sequence,
and Hunt has a personal stake in getting Davian and stopping
him from selling some sort of weapon called "the rabbit's
foot." Extra points to the script for actually calling attention
to the fact that they will not explain this macguffin.
At a few points
in the film, Abrams makes Cruise surrender to the charms
of his ensemble, giving everything a great groove. Three
major IMF operations occur, and the centerpiece at the Vatican
has a lightness to it that hearkens directly back to the
original series. Isn't that the point?
Better yet,
this third outing actually makes the obligatory mask almost
believable. In the second film, it was laughable, but Abrams
walks us through the process. With today's technology and
an unlimited Black Ops budget, it's almost plausible that
life-masks could be perfect methods of disguise.
The film doesn't
disguise the great group of up-and-comers here, with Jonathan
Rhys-Meyers and Simon Pegg as part of Hunt's team. Neither
character is allowed much depth, though both actors are
so vibrant that you can see them struggle to achieve a third
dimension.
As an even higher-up,
Laurence Fishburne also does his cool thing, intimidating
for most of the film then becoming a warm and fuzzy bad
sitcom boss. That's a script problem, not Fishburne.
Ving Rhames,
reprising his Luther Stickel, gets much more interaction
than the second film allowed, which is a relief. Left on
his own, Cruise is just too intense and inhuman.
Though Abrams
proves himself a really good action director, he's not strong
enough to shut down Cruise's worst instincts as an actor.
Too many reaction shots have that weird Cruisean distance
- how he thinks people with normal emotions would behave,
a mask over a mask. When the script allows for Hunt to be
a ruthless agent (which, considering his job, he pretty
much should be), it's powerful.
I could live
without seeing another Tom Cruise movie, and would sure
like to stop seeing him in the tabloids. But in the event
of zombie holocaust, there's no doubt that you want Tom
Cruise helping you survive.
He. Will. Get.
It. Done.
As for opening
the summer season, M:I 3 also gets it done. At the
very least, it bodes well for J. J. Abrams' next mission,
should he choose to accept it, which is rumored to be a
famous five-year one.
Rating:
