MISSION IMPOSSIBLE: III (2006)
Tagline: The Mission Begins 05:05:06
(Adventure, Thriller, A Tale of How Spies Keep the Duct Tape Industry in Business) [PG-13]
You can look at me with those judgmental eyes all you want, but I b------t you not, I will bleed on the American flag to make sure those stripes stay red.
Lindsey Farris is sent overseas to follow upon an arms dealer named Owen Davian. Davian is after a sophisticated weapon known as the “rabbit’s foot”, that might possibly be able to end all time according to intel legends. Ethan Hunt trained Lindsey and he puts a team together with the sole purpose of extracting her. Hunt has been out of the field for a while and actually engaged to Julia who thinks he works with the traffic department. As it turns out Owen is one of the most ruthless arms dealers the IMF (Impossible Mission Force) has ever encountered and Ethan has no idea what’s coming. The task if he should accept it is impossible.
This installment ramps up the emotion because unlike in past missions Julie played by the astonishing Michelle Monaghan is in real danger. It’s the first time someone he’s in love with is involved. I think the last film was more of a SPEED situation where he and Nyah were kind of pushed together by adrenaline. As much as I like Michelle Monaghan as an actress, I am kind of bummed that just as we were getting to know Nyah, she’s suddenly out of the picture. Thandiwe Newton who plays Nyah took time off to take care of her kids around this time and was offered the chance to reprise her role. I will say that these films do seem to be addressing things in real-time. As you can imagine that 6 years have passed since these characters last saw each other. The great news is we get Ving Rhames back as Luther and he gets more and more involved with each movie. Another nice touch was adding Maggie Q as Zhen. Maggie doesn’t seem to age. The first time I ever saw her was in RUSH HOUR 2, and at least in my head, she looks about the same. She is also a great action star and has been the lead female protagonist in several films including last year’s THE PROTÉGÉ. She did have to learn how to drive to be in this movie.
Acting wise we also get Simon Pegg (READY PLAYER ONE) for the first time as Benji. He would go on to become a major player in the series moving forward. In this one, he’s almost an afterthought. We also get Laurence Fishburne (THE MATRIX) as Theodore Brassel and he is very convincing in this role. Keri Russell (STAR WARS: THE RISE OF SKYWALKER) does a great job in the screen time she gets as Linsey Farris. I sometimes forget what a great action star she turned out to be. As a tidbit, Michelle Monaghan and Keri Russel were both born on March 23, 1976. Tom Cruise is great as Ethan Hunt as usual, but the best actor in this thing is Philip Seymour Hoffman as Owen Davian. This is just a flat-out spooky role for this guy who I best know from stuff like TWISTER. I know he did a ton of serious roles, but Dusty was my favorite character of his.
The stunts as usual are out of control for this movie which is kind of a staple for the series at this point. Tom Cruise did a ton of his own stunts again and even broke a couple ribs. One thing this movie also has more of than any of the other films thus far is lens flare. That’s because genius director and lens flare extraordinaire J.J. Abrams directed it. This was actually J.J. Abrams's first big film as a director.
Pacing wise this movie is superb. To be honest there really isn’t anything I don’t love about this movie. As much as I like John Woo’s directorial style, J.J. just killed this thing. It’s freaking mind-blowing. The score and soundtrack are also superb. If it’s not clear by now, this is the best of the first 3 Mission Impossible movies and I am giving it a 7 out of 7.
GRAPHICS ARE THE PROPERTY OF PARAMOUNT PICTURES AND ARE USED FOR REVIEW PURPOSES ONLY.
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