REVIEW - Mission: Impossible - Rouge Nation

August 02, 2015

After the mega-hit that was 2011's Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol, Tom Cruise proved once again that he is one of Hollywood's most bankable action stars and definitely its most daring, with him climbing the walls of the Burj Khalifa in the Brad Bird-helmed installment. With the latest entry in the 19-year-old franchise, subtitled Rouge Nation, Christopher McQuarrie takes up the MI directing mantle after impressing with the sleeper hit Jack Reacher, also starring Tom Cruise.

Paramount Pictures also seemed chuffed about the latest entry, even pushing the film forwards by a whole five months in the late phases of summer (also to avoid the end-of-year domination of Star Wars: The Force Awakens and another spy film in the form of Spectre. So, in an era where spy films are getting darker by the times, is Rogue Nation able to stand out with its mix of real stunts and humour wedged in between?

The film picks up after the events of Ghost Protocol, with the IMF being disavowed (for the umpteenth time)  after their collateral damage in the previous film,  and with that absorbed into the CIA, headed by Alan Hunley (series newcomer Alec Baldwin). Meanwhile, Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) is on the tail of the Syndicate, a terrorist organisation coined as the 'anti-IMF', at the same time crossing paths with a femme fatale in the form of Ilsa Faust (also newcomer Rebecca Ferguson), a Syndicate member who's also assisting Hunt in taking them down. Among the five flicks, its story is the more straightforward stories, with the IMF team's adventure shifting between Ethan and Benji Dunn (Simon Pegg)'s pursuit of the Syndicate to William Brandt's (the returning Jeremy Renner) actions under the CIA.

The linear story is further appreciated with plot being brought forward with every massive action set piece (looking at you, John Woo's Mission Impossible 2). Tom Cruise proves once again that he's a 'specialist without equal' in the stunts department, which started with him hanging around in Brian De Palma's 1996 original, upping the ante with him strapped to the side of an airborne Airbus 400... and that's just the opening sequence (spoiler?). The film then follows it up with an musical stealth mission in Vienna to a daring heist and chase sequence set in the plains of Morocco, all in equal bits as thrilling as the opening sequence. In terms of action pieces, it's very much up there with Mad Max: Fury Road. the funnies, mostly exchanged between Hunt and Dunn, works even better than the previous installments, be it through the witty dialogue between the characters, or the unexpected mishaps in serious stunts.

However, the film, unlike Tom Cruise's running, loses steam by the tail end of the story. This wasn't helped by, like Ghost Protocol before it, that Rouge Nation lacks of any sort of surprises in the story, other than some oddly looking Chinese investments surrounding the film, one of them coming from Alibaba Pictures (!), and a scene where Ving Rhames' Luther is perched atop the KL Tower in Malaysia. Rebecca Ferguson's Ilsa Faust, while serving up some anticipation as to whether she's really helping or messing with Hunt, things get tiresome and predictable as the story drags on.

While Tom Cruise is the obvious star of Rouge Nation, Ferguson proves her worth alongside Cruise (she shares the bulk of the screen time with him), and on occasion upstages her super co-star. Simon Pegg, one of my favourite actors around, seems to be going up the promotion ladder, as he shares more sole screen time with Tom Cruise as hacker Dunn. By the time Mission Impossible 8 rolls by, don't be surprised to see Pegg headlining and performing his own daredevil stunts.

With Ferguson and Pegg promoted to the 'acting alongside Tom Cruise' rank, the two other members of Ethan Hunt's team are unfortunately relegated to the sidelines. Renner's William Brandt, rumoured to take over the lead role in case Cruise decides enough is enough, gets less screen time (and a lot less to do) as compared to Ghost Protocol, where he was introduced. Meanwhile, Ving Rhames, having appeared in all four installments before this (the only cast other than Cruise), only serves as an assistant to Brandt for most of the duration of the movie.

The less can be said of veteran actor Alec Baldwin's Alan Hunley, whose character, similar to Anthony Hopkins and Laurence Fishburne's roles before him, only serve to move the plot forward in scenes where Hunt's not around. On the other side of the spectrum, Sean Harris (unrecognizable from his pot-smoking astronaut from Prometheus), here as the head of the Syndicate, has that potential to be a convincing villain opposite Ethan Hunt, something which was wholly lacking in Ghost Protocol, but the script limited him to be more of a mastermind behind the scenes. This isn't to say that Harris performance was terrible (his gaze is menacing), but hopefully another sequel down the road will give us a more fleshed-out villain similar to the terror of Philip Seymour Hoffman (MI3) or the hands-on approach of Dougray Scott (MI2)

Rouge Nation is the full package of a great Mission Impossible film, and has everything you love and enjoy from the franchise before it. It's a movie that does't take itself too seriously, with banter and action all over the place, proving that the McQuarrie/Cruise partnership hot streak continues after Jack Reacher and Edge of Tomorrow, though the film fails to give all the characters equal weightage (a return to the 'Hunt does all the work' routine in MI 1-3), which Brad Bird successfully pulled off in the previous film. In terms of a dining experience, Rouge Nation expands on Ghost Protocol to a delicious full course meal, but despite the increased volume, nothing could top that small yet amazing one-course meal you had the last time out (*nudge* the Burj Khalifa climb scene *nudge*).

8.0/10

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