Although the usual media blitz associated with a Tom Cruise vehicle is in full swing, much of the attention is understandably focusing on the real-life injury that made it into the final cut of Mission: Impossible – Fallout, the sixth installment in the 22-year old franchise. Such an on-set injury not only gets people talking, but Cruise’s passion is on full display in his dedication to giving the audience what they want, even at his own expense.
And thank goodness. Tom Cruise is nuts (find out just how nuts here), but he’s nuts on-camera for our benefit; and the Mission Impossible franchise is all the richer for it, record-breaking 80-million dollar insurance claims aside.
Fallout is chock-full of breath-taking stunts like the one in which Cruise busted his ankle (which is also featured in the trailers), along with a shipload of exposition right up front. Luckily, the filmmakers wisely follow-up on such pre-titles set-up repeatedly during the movie, so it’s reinforced—you don’t have to remember all of it on your own. Viewing all five of the earlier installments is also unnecessary (but it wouldn’t hurt since past characters resurface) since the filmmakers make it a point to explain everything and everyone, albeit sometimes in a ham-fisted way.
But you may have to go to the bathroom during the previews since Fallout is a bladder-busting 2 and 1/2 hours. But at least you don’t have to sit through the entire credit roll since there is no end-credits tag. But MI6 is fun, exciting, and over-the-top right where it needs to be except for some seriously funny overacting between newcomer Henry Cavill and series staple Angela Bassett.
But don’t let their scene-chewing distract you since you need to pay attention: Fallout features multiple double-crosses which overlap as the runtime wears on. Fallout would have benefitted from some tightening in its exposition to be sure, but also even in some of the extended action/chase scenes, which would have corrected its main flaw: being unnecessarily overlong.
The plot is admittedly somewhat standard stuff; bad guy threatening civilized society with black-market nukes. But in the capable hands of writer/director Christopher McQuarrie (Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation, Edge of Tomorrow) and Cruise (who also serves as producer), such stereotypical action-flick fodder is elevated—via equal parts personal vendetta and—to something else; the action event of the summer.
- Mission: Impossible – Fallout
- Distributor: Paramount
- Release Date: July 27, 2018
- Genre: Action
- Runtime: 2 hrs. 27 min.
- Rated PG-13 for violence and intense sequences of action, and for brief strong language
- Director: Christopher McQuarrie
- Writers: Christopher McQuarrie, Bruce Geller (based on the television series created by)
- Cast: Tom Cruise, Henry Cavill, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg, Rebecca Ferguson, Sean Harris, Angela Bassett, Michelle Monaghan, Wes Bentley
