Mission: Impossible—The Final Reckoning

More Implausible Than Impossible

or

Deciding Not To Accept It

Mission: Impossible—The Final Reckoning may well be the last of the "Mission: Impossible" movies, the series based on the espionage TV show that featured a crack-team of specialists engaged in "heist-movie" scenarios for the government.* The films had some of the tropes, the "fuse" logo, the late Lalo Schifrin's pulsating, propulsive theme, the clandestine mission briefing (that then self-destructed leaving no trace). But, in the movies it spawned,  the "team aspect" always played second-fiddle to its star and champion, Tom Cruise, who increasingly dominated the films, while his character, Ethan Hunt, still remained a bit of a cypher as a character. Other than doing the hardest stuff, of course.

 

But this latest, maybe last, entry, given the evidence on display, indicates the series is past its self-destruct status. At nearly 3 hours in length, what could have been a lean and mean entry feels bloated with a first act crammed with flash-backs (ill-advised as they'd never connected story-lines before and even dropped connections with past movies at the drop of an un-negotiated contract) and a star who, at 62, is looking a little too doughy—in a Brad Pitt/Jerry O'Connell kind of way—to be romping around doing his own crazy stunts and skittering the world in his signature tin-soldier full-tilt run. 

All the worse, because this one really leans (and leans hard) in to Ethan Hunt being the end-all, be-all "only one" whose destiny it is to save the human race from Mutually Assured Destruction at the hands of an AI "anti-god" called The Entity...which featured in the last one and, it turns out, was the undefinable McGuffin dubbed the "Rabbit's Foot" from Mission: Impossible 3.** As The Church Lady would say "Isn't that convenient"***

At the time it came out, I thought it was a nice joke that the "secret thing that everybody wants" (and spends so much time obsessing over) in M:I 3 was so much vapor-ware in the story-line. Nobody knew what it was or what it could do, but it was important enough that everybody wanted it, whatever it was. Turns out, in reality (or film-reality, anyway), it was merely the plot-line of Colossus:The Forbin Project.

"Oh, yeah, there are other people in the movie..."

And Ethan Hunt turns out to be as mythic a lynch-pin to world affairs as Luke Skywalker or Paul Atreides.

 

It appears original, but it's merely a re-gift, just put in a new wrapper.

They also serve—briefly—watching Tom do the hard stuff...

So, anyway, the mission should you decide to accept (and I didn't) is that after the events of Mission: Impossible—Dead Reckoning Part 1, Ethan Hunt was in possession of The Cruciform Key, which would allow him to somehow destroy The Entity which is embedded in the Interwebs and is slowly but surely filling it with misinformation, turning the World Wide Web into a cesspool that has man turning against himself (as if it needed any help!) with the eventual end of taking over the nuclear capabilities of all the world's powers. What it would do then is anybody's guess, but even a digital anti-god would know that anything actually using those weapons would create a nuclear pulse and wouldn't do it any good at all, disabling any electronics throughout the world. If it's aim is murder-suicide then you need some other term than "artificial intelligence". Artificial psychosis", maybe? The Entity sounds like it's related to Monty Python's "Black Knight" ("You're a loony!")

They also serve who sit in boardrooms and clutch pearls...

Anyway, getting the thing to destroy The Entity involves two impossible missions: get to the Russian submarine Sebastopol (scuttled in arctic waters in the last movie) to use his Cruciform Key to obtain the Entity's "Podkova module" (containg its source code); then, using a "Poison Pill" developed by IMF whiz Luther Stickell (Ving Rhames), get that module to the world's "Doomsday Vault" located in South Africa—a huge mainframe designed to withstand said nuclear pulse even in a planet-wide armageddon—and plug the "Pill" into the "Podkova" thus isolating the Entity and somehow managing to contain the thing.

But, there are complications—there always are—such as the sub Sebastopol starting to roll down a continental shelf when Hunt is inside it (evidently it doesn't have a conning tower or fins or sail planes or...ya know...rudders that might impede the progress), or Hunt having to discard his hi-tech diving suit to get out of a jam and swim...in just trunks...in arctic waters...with no oxygen...and no decompression gear (except on the surface), or—a major one—the bad guy Gabriel (Esai Morales) manages to steal said "Poison Pill" making his escape on a bi-plane (...a bi-plane!), thus forcing Ethan to hijack another one and do a godawful amount of gyrating on wings and struts to get on the bad-guy's plane to get said "Poison Pill."

Now, look...the plot-line is insanely complicated and stupid...way too much so...as well as being openly subject to criticism by what Hitchcock called "The Implausibles" (I can't wait to see the "Goofs" tab on its IMDB page). Such things as Hunt being able to take out two competent goons moments after biting down on a cyanide capsule, or being able to survive "the bends" or the crushing water pressure of a deep-dive while only in his swim-trunks, then being able to do all that dangerous wing-walking the very next day boggles everything that I have left of a mind. The onslaught of implausibles tend to overwhelm such trivial matters as grabbing the barrel of a recently-fired automatic weapon without scorching your hands in the process.

Still, I can appreciate the length and breadths—in IMAX, even!—to which the cast and crew have gone to present such shenanigans. The rolling submarine set that they present is a wonderful little concept design for all sorts of mayhem, and the whole bi-plane sequence is an amazing showcase for what can be done with remote cameras and a star with a death-wish (but one with a goofy absurdist sensibility). As an actor, Tom traditionally dials it to 11, it's in these insane stunts where these proclivities really pay off.

However, the movie is a logical and editorial mess, with sporadic flashbacks that don't quite connect dots or light emotional fuses. It does provide considerable down-time between action set-pieces to make an assault on a snack-bar or sabotage a theater restroom.  

 

If that's your aim I will disavow any knowledge of your actions. Good luck.

*Poof!* hsssssss

Ethan cares, man. He really cares. 

* I'm throwing a lot of stick here, but the TV series, as great as it could be, had elements rolled eyes. For instance: why did every potential, autocratic, generalissimo, and revolutionary look like Martin Landau?

** That was, what, 4 movies ago, the one with Phillip Seymour Hoffman, which, when you see him in the flashbacks, causes actual grief.

 

*** Yeah, okay, M:I fans, I know that the James Bond series just wrapped up an uncharacteristically continuity-obsessive five-film arc, where everything tied together to the point where Bond super-baddie Ernst Stavro Blofeld turned out to be the step-foster-brother (or something) of Bond—in a plot-twist borrowed from (of all things) the "Austin Powers" series. Connecting the dots has a way of diluting the power of a story. In the Craig years, Blofeld wasn't so much an international criminal as a red-headed step-child. Just like in the first Michael Keaton Batman, the criminal who became The Joker was the one to kill Bruce Wayne's parents, rather than just some rando gunman. It waters things down, sometimes to an unpotable degree.

Mission: Impossible—Dead Reckoning, Part 1

"Couldn't You Have Told Me This a Little Bit Sooner?"

or

"Is There Anyone Not Chasing Us?"

 

One can't start out a review of Mission: Impossible—Dead Reckoning (Part 1) without giving props. It is one busy movie, filled with some amazing stunt work and a dedication to craft that one shakes their head in amazement that these things were thought up and brought to some spectacular life. The immediate reaction to one of these things evokes horror and then giggles as they are pain-stakingly realized to convince you that 1) they actually happened and 2) that they actually COULD happen. And a rueful head-nod must go to "Mr. Gung-Ho" Tom Cruise for putting himself "out there" just because he could. One has to say all this, because for the most part this review will trash this entry in the franchise, surely its weakest entry since Mission: Impossible 2.

 

But, wow, those stunts sure are amazing. The trouble is that's what the movie is all about, the stunts and those alone have never made a good movie. What they show is that the characters have an abnormal survival instinct and the tenacity of pit-bulls to pull though whatever obstacle can be thrown, dropped, propelled and fired at them. And that's it for character development. Oh, there's some ret-conning about "how Ethan Hunt became Ethan Hunt" as well as other agents into the IMF, but it's as unsubstantial as...well, as the entire make-up of the IMF apparently is in the spy hierarchy if we're to believe this movie.

The mission this time (should we decide to accept it, and I, frankly, didn't) is to recover the latest "McGuffin" in the series, the two-part "Cruciform Key", which is used to power up "an active learning defense system" which is touted by its Soviet creators as "the state of the art of war." Timely, since we're all worried about AI (and this is where I insert my "written by human hands" disclosure). The Vicious Thingy was last seen on board the Soviet submarine K699, the Sebastopol, which sits at the bottom of the Bering Sea a victim of its own system's ability to present false data to the sub crew causing them to launch a torpedo attack against a ghost target and blowing themselves up. This is one nasty little AI that can wreak havoc on countries and their defenses, but the world's governments don't want to destroy it, so much as control it. World leaders tend to have a lot of hubris; who wants to bet that they learn a lesson in humility in Part 2?

IMF agent Ethan Hunt (Cruise), despite his"habitual rogue tendencies," is enlisted to find the key. Who has it? Ilsa Faust (Rebecca Ferguson), late colleague, who is not so late and has one-half of the key. Hunt and the team (Ving Rhames and Simon Pegg) decide to go after the other half of the key, where they run into an atomic bomb trap (okay) and a pick-pocket named Grace (Hayley Atwell), who manages to lift the other half of the key from the prospective seller, complicating matters. Hunt also runs into a "face from the past" (Esai Morales), who seems to have the ability to not appear on surveillance systems. But, not the ability to make one of those full-head disguises that Ethan depends on in these movies.

What happens next? Chases. Lots of chases. Ethan and Grace are chased by land, foot, wheels, by the CIA, by Morales' "Gabriel"—along with Pom Klementieff's killing machine, Paris—by the forces of arms dealer The White Widow (Vanessa Kirby), by his own IMF Chief Kittridge (welcome back to the series, Henry Czerny!) by the local constabulary, and evidently anyone with a cell-phone or police scanner, until everyone meets on the Orient Express, and everything just goes literally right off the rails. Most of this is played with deadly earnestness, but one can't help but chuckle at the "Perils of Pauline" aspect of it, some of it is right out of silent movies.

But, the plot is a clunker. And the dialog at times is so vaguely inconsequential (and delivered so seriously) that you wonder if people are speaking in spy code. So, this entry in the series—the 7th—is overwhelming in stunts and underwhelming in story—and inventiveness—even though everyone bravely battles on.

I had much the same reaction to the very stunty recent Indiana Jones movie, which was only saved by a particularly risky (and fanciful) last act. This doesn't have something like that, but it does have another fight on a train with subsequent derailment, and another smashing car chase in a vehicle not built for those things.

 

The trailer for M:I7 exposed the weakness of the film by just showing stunts and fights, as that seemed to be all it has because, for the first time, they seemed to be borrowing from the James Bond series: the train fight from Octopussy, the Citroen chase from For Your Eyes Only becomes a Fiat 500e chase here, with Cruise and Atwell handcuffed as a similar situation in Tomorrow Never Dies, the whole "world-spy-network-hijack" idea comes from SPECTRE (notice that when the "Mission: Impossible" series borrows from Bond, it doesn't borrow from very good ones?), then that very hyped motorcycle jump has echoes of The Spy Who Loved Me. Usually, it's the Bond films that borrow from other films—maybe M:I is running out of ideas.

There are other odd little issues, like that director McQuarrie (who has done some inspired work in previous film in the series) seems to have shot some dialog scenes using three cameras, that are edited in such a way that, when edited together, seems to have the actors not addressing each other in conversation. It's odd...and a little off-putting. Given the attention to detail in the action sequences, why would something like that occur?

 

Still, despite the reservations I have about the film, I hope it has a great box-office return. The film industry needs a little help right now, and this Summer's expected blockbusters have been under-achieving. A solid box-office return could reverse that trend, and help movie-makers battle the real-world challenges of AI.

Ready or Not (2019)

Wedding Night Blues (The Family That Plays Together...)
or
"Goddamnit, Emily, Aim for the Center of Gravity!"

There's an old-time comedian's joke as old as Joe Miller's Joke Book that goes "Marriage is a great institution...but who wants to live in an institution?"

For Grace (Samara Weaving, niece of Hugo—and probably the last time any one needs to mention it), marriage is an institution she's been looking forward to for a long time. She's fallen in love with Alex Le Domas (Mark O'Brien) and endured some relationship stipulations from his family, the Le Domas' of the Le Domas games manufacturing fame, who are "big on traditions." But, now, the big day has arrived and she has the usual wedding-day jitters, and as problematic as the family can be ("They just want to make sure you're not a gold-digging whore" says her intended), she's sure about Alex, who has become something of a black sheep of the family. Doesn't mean he won't one day inherit the Le Domas fortune, though, despite the fact that father Tony Le Domas (Henry Czerny) doesn't like her, that his wife (Andie McDowell) is oddly creepy, while Aunt Helene (Nicky Guadagni) isn't just oddly creepy, she's downright horrifying. Then, there's brother Daniel (Adam Brody), "the alcoholic brother who keeps hitting on (her)." For her, the only thing that matters is what Alex thinks, and for that, she's "proud to join your relatively fucked-up family."

Famous last words...

The wedding comes off without a hitch, and it's a dream come true for Grace. An orphan, she's never been part of a family, even one such as this. Well, then again, there IS a hitch: to be truly accepted into the family, she must play a game on her wedding night, which Grace thinks is odd, but she's willing. "If it means your family will accept me, I will play the shit out of checkers."

Led into the substantial mansion's secret gaming room, the extended family is sat around a table, while patriarch Tony tells the story of great-grandfather Victor Le Domas, who made a wager with one Justin Le Bail, who promised him a great fortune, but on the stipulation that any person marrying into the family had to play a game to be chosen by a mysterious box—if they won the game, they would be welcomed to the family and they would all enjoy continued prosperity. That's what they tell Grace, anyway.

What they don't tell Grace is that if she chooses one particular game—"Hide and Seek"—she will be forced to play the game to the death—hers. If she is caught, she will be killed in a ritualistic sacrifice to Le Bail. If she wins, the entire family will suffer a painful and merciless death. Needless to say, the family is very interested in what the outcome of the drawing will be.

Guess what game Grace will be forced to play?

While Grace goes off to find a suitable hiding place where the family can't find her—she is, of course, at a disadvantage as she's the only one who doesn't know the layout of the house or the many secret doorways and passages in the vast mansion—the family arm themselves with ancient weapons to dispatch her, or at least subdue her, so that she can be sacrificed. New husband Alex is forced to stay in a room under guard, so that he can not lend assistance to his newly-wed wife.

Talk about a lousy wedding night. Grace thinks the whole thing is a dumb family tradition, but then, she's not clued in to the fact that the marriage could be viciously annulled at any moment whether by cross-bow, battle-axe, dueling pistol, musket, or bow and arrow. It is only when she comes across one of the servants (who all look like extras from a Robert Palmer video), dead in a case of mistaken identity that she begins to realize that the stakes are very high and that she might not survive it. She is given limited help by Alex, who is under tight family scrutiny, but she's in a white flowing wedding dress with heels in unfamiliar surroundings. The odds are never in her favor.

But, she is adaptable. Plus, she's plucky, and she has a fierce survival instinct. It also helps that the Le Domas family have handicaps—they're not the brightest of bulbs, they are victims of their own sense of doom, and they're rather privileged so the old weapons aren't exactly user-friendly. "The rich really are different." says a depressed Daniel. But, not different in a good way. It also doesn't help that daughter Emilie (Melanie Scrofano) is a coked-out bone-head who tries just a bit too hard and seems to have her best aim when it's directed to one of the servants. Good help is hard to find these days.

If you haven't guessed by now, the film, Ready or Not, is a comedy, but a horrific one. It's laughs are gruesome and grimacing, and only a couple steps less giddy than what you'd find in "The Addams Family." It's gimmicky, but not in the monstrous tradition, more in a comedy version of "The Most Dangerous Game" if the privileged hunters were just as full of themselves, but weren't so competent. Yes, the rich are different, and, these days, they're treated differently, not so much with respect, but with contempt. The Le Domas' (it just occurred to me that the name sounds like "dumb-asses") earned their money the old-fashioned way—they inherited it—and now, their main business is protecting themselves and their dumb-assets from dilution. So, add another hyphenate, this is a satire, as well.

It's something else, as well, but, any other hyphenate would contain spoilers, so we'll leave that one off. Suffice it to say that Weaving's Grace, after some initial whimpering, has an action hero's grit and ability to recover from some pretty scarring injuries, and she has no hesitation about tearing up her pristine wedding dress to make handy tourniquets or garroting material; she's too practical for a trousseau. She is a Bride-zilla with a registry at Cabela's, and as her dress gets more sullied and bloodied, she seems to get more determined to show she's not playing games. 

The directors, Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, seem to take a wicked delight in keeping the thing paced quickly and keeping the tone somewhat bombastic. In fact, this feels like one of those giddy low-budget movies whose social message is buried six feet under a cackling sensibility, like Night of the Living Dead or The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, where the film-makers can't believe they're getting away with it. One is also reminded of the style of Tim Burton without the wobbly art-student design sense or eagerness to please with source pedigree.

Speaking of Burton, it's only a matter of time before he casts Weaving in one of his movies. She has the requisite out-sized porcelain doll's eyes—not unlike Barbara Steele's—that Burton favors as well as the determined stride that his female leads always seem to adapt. But, the Australian actor also has great comic timing, a loose, natural way with dialogue, which, combined with an unguarded buck-toothed smile (that reminds one of John Huston at his most malevolent) that is funny and endearing—you'd root for her even if her opponents weren't so comically incompetent and loathsome. 

Of course, that deck is stacked, she being the underdog, but Weaving's trooperish attitude in an unself-consciously de-glamming performance where she goes from pristine bridehood to looking like a BPA study is a giddy marvel, whatever side of the female empowerment argument you're on. She's great, and one hopes for better parts for her, rather than being perpetually type-cast as Margot Robbie's younger sister.

As gruesome as Ready or Not is, at least it has the good sense to not be too serious about it, taking the tack of that comedy staple, the "in-law" joke. You didn't know you'd be marrying them, too, despite all the warnings signs one sees in the preparation of nuptials. The film might be cathartic for brides made neurotic by "his" (or "her") family, given the universality of the problem. And the film is a fine example of that genre-blending rarity, the comedy-horror film, without skimping on either aspect.