Movie Review – Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One

Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One (2023)
Written by Christopher McQuarrie & Erik Jendresen
Directed by Christopher McQuarrie

This year (2023), I watched/re-watched the entire Tom Cruise-Mission: Impossible oeuvre (I only get a few chances to use that word). As far as big Hollywood productions go, it’s not among the worst. I do hand it to the filmmakers involved that they always try to go with practical effects whenever possible, and CG is used in ways that never take me out of the films. Almost every scene is an actor in an actual location or set, not a motion capture/green screen. I don’t think Tom Cruise is an actor. Really, he’s the textbook definition of a movie star. The films under Christopher McQuarrie have improved with each entry, and I like including physical comedy as part of action sequences. These are silly movies, after all, so let them be silly.

This overstuffed entry into the MI franchise feels very “of the moment” with an enemy that is A.I. A Russian submarine using the Entity to stealthily attack targets suddenly finds they are being hunted by an enemy submarine. It turns out this is a trick by the AI, which partially destroys the sub and leaves the protected core of the computer buried at the bottom of the ocean. It is already networked with the world’s information systems and can recruit allies in the human world. The only way of stopping its looming threat to humanity is to find the McGuff…I mean two pieces of a key that can deactivate its core.

You’ll never guess this next part, but Ethan Hunt goes rogue when his lover, Ilsa Faust (Rebecca Ferguson), ends up with one-half of the key and must have her death faked. Hunt gets the band back together, Benji (Simon Pegg) and Luther (Ving Rhames), as the team must get to the Entity before it can harm anyone further. It just so happens that the Entity has partnered with Gabriel (Esai Morales), a terrorist the film retcons into killing Ethan’s true love, some lady we’ve never seen taking place before the events of the first MI movie, I guess? Gabriel’s henchwoman is Paris (Pom Klementieff), who was apparently a character on the show played by Leonard Nimoy. Don’t get too attached; she’s dead by the end of this movie, and we never really learn much about her character. Oh yeah, there’s Grace (Hayley Atwell), a thief unknowingly hired by the Entity to steal Ethan’s half of the key. 

I remember seeing some differentiation between movies & films years ago. Dead Reckoning is a perfect example of this. Most motion pictures made in the United States (and I suppose India, but sadly, I only know about their film industry from a distance) are pure escapism. There’s certainly a place for that. I mean, candy & junk food taste great; they are designed that way. When you look at movies made in almost every other corner of the planet, they are often far more artistic, either highly impressionistic or neo-realist, emphasizing exploring compelling themes or characters. Not all of this world cinema works; I admit many films of this type can be dull. However, when these “international” flicks click, they powerfully resonate with me. I can’t say I have ever had that feeling with a single MI movie. 

However, I can see the fun of MI even if I find it very forgettable fluff. The Venice car chase sequence was yet another well-done set piece in the franchise. The more recent Bond flicks haven’t felt as compelling during moments like these as the MI films. I’m not saying there was zero digital trickery at work, but how it was implemented showed how you can make something that doesn’t pull the audience out of the story when you hide the seams. It also elicited a genuine chuckle from me, especially when Hunt & Grace go head to head with Paris, and things lean more into the comedic side. More of that, please.

What McQuarrie & Cruise’s collaboration amounts to here is an expertly done magic show. They are using all the tools at their disposal and creating heightened scenarios tied to substance. Cruise’s insistence on doing some honestly deadly stunts is part of that magic trick. Of course, he’s probably not mentally well. If you or I attempted the things he does, I don’t think a psychiatrist would give us a clean bill of health. I think the actor is a genuine American movie believer; he gets a rush off of wowing the viewers like a magician enjoys doing something his audience can’t quite figure out. Is there a high chance we’ll see a headline one day announcing Cruise’s death on set while doing yet another insane stunt? Yeah, it very likely might happen. 

But this is Part One, so it doesn’t have a satisfying ending; it’s just a setup for another movie. This movie is 164 minutes long and doesn’t wrap things up. I do not like that. This means I watched a very long episode of a costly TV show. Though not too large, there seems to be an audience for this, as the picture struggled to make back its $200 million+ budget at the domestic box office. A lot of the first-act exposition could be cut, and you wouldn’t lose anything; in fact, the script would gain momentum. You don’t show us the submarine disaster, you don’t give us the desert shootout (with a very obvious digital sandstorm, one of the few visual flaws in the picture), go right to the briefing where we get a slew of cameos and the big masked Ethan reveal. Imagine how much more of an exciting opening that would have been. 

I’m pot-committed at this point with the MI franchise; in the same way, I feel obligated to keep watching Fast & Furious movies. MI is the superior of those two franchises but it’s not an actual heated race. It’s like saying I prefer one fast-food burger place over another. At the end of the day, I don’t have a dog in that fight. I did appreciate that the U.S. intelligence community comes across as villainous in Dead Reckoning, a planet ruled by competing bad guys. I also felt the tone was hinting that Part Two should be the end of Ethan’s story. I don’t think it will be, though. They keep trying to set up other characters as inheritors of the mantle. Remember Jeremy Renner in Ghost Protocol? Hayley Atwell feels like the next IMF agent and does an excellent job here. I wouldn’t mind seeing her take the series over from Cruise, but I also understand the myopic Hollywood executive brain, and that won’t happen.