Film Review: Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part I

 

Sexuality/Nudity Acceptable

Violence Acceptable
Vulgarity Acceptable

Anti-Catholic Philosophy Acceptable

Being a movie star means that your name becomes a brand.  And Tom Cruise is a movie star.

In the last 10 years, he has starred in 6 excellent movies: Oblivion, Edge of Tomorrow, Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation, Mission: Impossible - Fallout, Top Gun: Maverick, and now Mission: Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part I.

This is the seventh film in this massively successful and entertaining franchise.  The story picks up a few years after Fallout.  The government has developed an Artificial Intelligence called "The Entity" which has now become self aware.  The Entity has infected every single intelligence agency computer system and appears to be bending towards world domination.  However, the Entity is hellbent on obtaining two halves of a key.  Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) is tasked with retrieving the keys.  One of the keys is held by Ilsa (Rebecca Ferguson), Ethan's partner/rival for the previous two movies.  He also enlists the help of regulars Benji (Simon Pegg) and Luther (Vin Rhames).  Getting in the way is a master thief Grace (Hayley Atwell) who has been hired to get the keys.  Grace is caught in the middle of the IMF team and the Entity's human agent Gabriel (Esai Morales) and his assassin Paris (Pom Klementieff).  As with all Mission: Impossible movies, it is a race against time with the odds against them where they all may not make it out alive.

One of the things that is coloring this review is that I spent the week watching all of the previous films (not counting the awful 2nd film).  Starting with Ghost Protocol, the series begins to build a continuity of character, which was different than the previous stand-alone style.  The last three films have all been directed by the same man: Christopher McQuarrie.  Watching all of the movies in a row helps to create a greater sense of connection and tension because of the connection to the characters.  While Ethan may be wearing invincible plot armor, the rest of the team feels very vulnerable and having spent so much time with them, you feel dread at the impossible challenge ahead.

At first I was not as impressed with the AI enemy.  It seemed a bit too much of a science fiction element.  And the first part of the film feels very boiler-plate M:I fare.  It isn't until the first confrontation with Gabriel in a Venice night club that the story really kicks into gear.  Once that happens, I found myself gripped until the end.

As the movie went on the "Entity" grew on me as an antagonist.  It began to feel like a combination of Skynet and Sauron.  As the Entity is able to worm its way into all computer systems, the group can no longer count on any of its technological advantages.  This helped emphasize the theme about how human begins have become too dependent on computers.  We end up becoming the source of our own destruction.  Even with all this danger, governments want to try to turn the Entity into a weapon of the state.  Only Ethan and his team cannot be corrupted by that temptation to power.

Atwell's Grace was an incredibly refreshing element to this movie.  She is hyper-competent as a thief.  But she also not an unbeatable girl-boss.  She is human in a way that is very relatable to the audience.  When someone fires a gun behind her, she freaks out the way a normal person would.  When in a car with Ethan being chased by dozens of others, she understands that his driving skills are superior and insists he drives.  She won't jump over giant chasms without fear.  But she will summon her courage like a hero.

More-so than any previous M:I films, Cruise lets us feel Ethan's desperation.  You can draw a straight line from the loss of his first time in the original film to his terror at losing anyone now.  The script also finally gives us hints as to Ethan's mysterious past in ways that had not been explored before.  Pegg and Rhames are as good as ever and the chemistry between the three feels comfortable and natural.  I've always been a fan of Morales and he plays his part with a cold confidence that makes him intimidating.  Klementieff plays the opposite of her Guardians of the Galaxy character with great physicality and charisma.

The title "Dead Reckoning" refers to when sailors have to navigate without any of their electronic navigational methods.  This movie lays out the question of human nature.  Are we reducible to a predictable algorithm or are we governed by our free will.  The movie explores the nature of what it is to be human as we continually commoditize the different aspects of our humanity through technology.  There is something wild and defiant about standing  against this reductionist view of who we are.

But above all, this movie series is about fun action.  The only sequence I found a bit too long was a car chase sequence.  Other than that, this was excellent M:I spectacle.  Besides death-defying stunts, the movie did a fantastic job of ratcheting up the espionage tension.  There is a scene at an airport where there are no fight scenes, but the suspense was excellent.

My favorite moment was a part where Ethan tells someone that their life is more important than his.  This responds with "You don't even know me."  To which Ethan simply and sincerely responds: "What difference does that make?"  This exchange is such a wonderful and simple explanation of why Ethan is a real hero.  He puts the lives of others, even those he doesn't know, before his own.  This has the flavor of agape love that Christ calls us to: to love everyone with our lives.  This exchange also helps explain why we keep coming back to this series: 

We want to see real heroes in real action.

And that is what you get in Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part I.