Choose to accept this ‘Mission’
Tom Cruise takes ‘Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One’ to new heights
Finally, a summer action movie that delivers the goods! “Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One” (henceforth “M:I—DR1”) arrives just in time to save this season from unsatisfying actioners. Unlike “Fast X” and “Spider-Man: Across the Spiderverse,” this movie tells you before you spend your money that its story will not be resolved by the closing credits. Even better, its cliffhanger is narratively satisfying as a standalone ending, something those other films failed to achieve.
“Mission” opens Wednesday. “Part Two” arrives in 2024.
Despite its 163-minute runtime — longer than “Fast X,” “Spidey,” or “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” — this film moves faster than its 2023 summer movie predecessors. I would wager that the script by director Christopher McQuarrie and Erik Jendresen has more scenes of exposition as well. In fact, there’s as much action as there is explanation of the plot, yet somehow that doesn’t slow down the story.
“M:I—DR1” is the seventh installment of the series where Tom Cruise trolls Father Time by doing crazy stunts while working the espionage missions that give the series its title. In this one, his Ethan Hunt drives a motorcycle off a cliff, a death-defying stunt the filmmakers shot on the first day of production in case Cruise pulled a Wile E. Coyote.
Cruise made it, of course, and the production averted the need for “a major rewrite.” The stunt itself is not only spectacular; it’s also a very funny comic punch line.
Ving Rhames and Simon Pegg also return as Luther Stickell and Benji Dunn, respectively. They’re Hunt’s right-hand men, the guys who provide the cool disguises he uses to impersonate other people to get information. Luther and Benji are also Hunt’s eyes in the sky, unlocking doors for him through their computers and keeping him aware of his surroundings at all times.
As always, Rhames and Pegg are a lot of fun. The two actors play off each other well in this series, and it’s amusing to see the physically imposing Rhames as a computer geek. The rapport between them and Hunt is similar to the chemistry among the crew of the “Fast & Furious” series, but Hunt appears even more concerned about “fammm’ly” as Vin Diesel’s Dom Toretto. With his moist eyes and his face a mask of perpetual worry, Cruise makes his devotion even more cloying than Diesel does.
But I digress. Ethan Hunt’s latest mission, should he choose to accept it, is to discover what’s going on with an AI program gone rogue. “M:I—DR1” opens in the Bering Sea where a submarine called the Sevastopol is a victim of that artificial intelligence. It takes over the sub’s computer systems and makes the crew think they’re under attack. Considering the Sevastopol has been designed to avoid detection, its members are rightfully rattled.
Turns out, it’s a false alarm, but tragedy ensues as the crew accidentally blow themselves up. As their bodies float to the surface, we get a glimpse of this film’s MacGuffin, a two-part key on a necklace that is literally the key to solving Hunt’s mission.
Back on land, Hunt sees a ghost from his past while navigating an airport with Luther and Benji’s help. We meet Gabriel (Esai Morales), who shows up for a split second, glimpsed through Hunt’s surveillance spectacles, then disappears. Benji will later describe this phenomenon as a “ghost in the machine,” an indication that the team’s hardware has been infected by the AI, which the film constantly refers to as “The Entity.”
The Entity has the power to confuse and shut down entire systems. Whatever country controls it will become the world’s most powerful government.
Apparently, Gabriel is the representative for The Entity; that is, in addition to being the reason Hunt joined the Impossible Missions Force. Morales is more than a formidable foe. He gives a smooth but intimidating performance, cutting a striking figure as a silver fox who’s as easy on the eyes as he is rough on our protagonists.
Gabriel appears to be everywhere and nowhere at once, making him unpredictable. In doing The Entity’s bidding outside the technological realm, his mission is to kill everyone Hunt cares about, forcing Hunt into a showdown that’s a major Catch-22.
Characters from previous installments have supporting roles here. Vanessa Kirby returns (as the deadly arms dealer White Widow), as does Rebecca Ferguson (as MI6 agent Ilsa Faust). Newcomer Hayley Atwell gets in on the fun as Grace, a master pickpocket who is in way over her head.
Everyone’s gunning for that twopart key, which we’re told is the only thing that can stop and destroy The Entity. The techie in me had some serious questions about the dialogue involving The Entity’s source code; he was overruled by the part of me that loves when movie dialogue devolves into scientific mumbo jumbo.
As if mocking the latest “Indiana Jones” film, “M:I—DR1” climaxes with an extended sequence aboard a runaway train. Cruise, without any need for the de-aging techniques that marred Indy, battles Gabriel on top of the train while multiple dramas occur within it. Kirby is especially good here, as is Atwell. While the two men battle for the title of quién es más macho?, the two women are engaged in an equally exciting battle of wits.
“Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One” ends one mission but leaves us at the beginning of its next one. To my surprise, I found myself choosing to accept it.