Review Index

Home

Having little fondness for the television show (but having the proper awe and respect for its theme music), I approached this blockbuster big-screen update from a neutral corner and, lo and behold, had a pretty good time. The storyline here finds field operative Tom Cruise betrayed and betrayed again by his superiors. On the run, he assembles his own Impossible Mission Force to clear his name--but the plot here is beside the point. This is a high-concept movie built around the premise that "Tom Cruise in Mission:Impossible" will sell oodles of movie tickets (it will, too) and its mission is to make as much money as it possibly can.

What winds up on screen is almost an afterthought. As such, it grants director Brian De Palma license to play around with the toys some for the first time in a long time. Lacking anything in particular to say, he makes the medium the message and assembles his set pieces like some cinematic collage: the prelude ("borrowed" from The Godfather Part II and translated into Russian), the busted mission, the break-in at CIA headquarters (also borrowed), the train sequence--all impeccably filmed, grace and elegance, and strung together seamlessly and logic be damned. And having Cruise to anchor the movie in bankability lets De Palma populate the rest of the cast with a fascinating gallery of supporting players: Ving Rhames, Kristin Scott-Thomas, Jean Reno, the luminous Emmanuelle Beart, and the delightful Vanessa Redgrave (who seems to have more fun here than the rest of the cast combined). All in all, this particular high-concept is pretty lively in spite of its dubious lineage.