Movie Breakdown: Mission: Impossible – Fallout
Pre-Screening Stance:
These movies have gotten better and better ever since JJ Abrams righted the franchise’s ship with his Mission: Impossible 3. Personally, I think Fallout looks as though it may end up being the best one yet.
Post-Screening Ramble:
It’s hard to mention anything about the plot of Mission: Impossible – Fallout without spoiling something or another, so I’m going to keep things vague. Essentially, the imprisonment of Solomon Lane (Sean Harris) at the end of Rogue Nation (yes, you’ll want to re-watch it before seeing Fallout) did more to scatter than destroy The Syndicate. Now, its members are known as The Apostles, and they want to acquire plutonium in order to build nuclear weapons. This leaves Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) and his team – Benji Dunn (Simon Pegg), Luther Stickell (Ving Rhames) and the CIA’s own August Walker (Henry Cavill) – with the task of preventing such an attack. In the way (or perhaps not) is Hunt’s old semi-friend Ilsa Faust (Rebecca Ferguson). Of course, there’s a lot more to it than that, but that’s as unrevealing as I can be since Fallout is full of more twists and turns than any other Mission: Impossible entry before it. The film also contains the best action sequences in the history of the franchise. Remember when Cruise rode on the outside of a plane in Rogue Nation? Or when he scaled the tallest building in the world in Ghost Protocol? Yeah, that’s all child’s play compared to the stuff he pulls off in Fallout. Holy Xenu is that man dedicated to being an entertainer. By the way, a whole lot of credit for the quality of this film has to go to writer/director Christopher McQuarrie. He not only crafted something that’s a wildly entertaining spectacle, but it’s funny and emotional as well.
In all honesty, Mission: Impossible – Fallout is so good that I’m not even sure they should make any more of them. I just don’t see how they could ever top it.
One Last Thought:
With Mission: Impossible – Fallout being a direct sequel to Rogue Nation, I believe it rounds things out like this: parts 4, 5 & 6 are a trilogy, parts 1 & 3 are prequels, and part #2 is … well, it’s actual #2 and we should all pretend it doesn’t exist.
One More Last Thought:
Henry Cavill is a beast in this movie. It would be great to see him in grittier roles moving forward.
