Movie Review: Mission Impossible—Final Reckoning

3.5 stars out of 5

Well, it’s the final Mission: Impossible, I reckon — until they decide to reboot the series in two years with an extended cameo from Tom Cruise as Jim Phelps. Or it’s a prequel reboot streaming show focusing on Phelps’ early days, to air on Amazon Prime. Principal photography will likely begin before I finish this review.

The film series has been reliable entertainment these past 29 years, with a rotation of top directors for the first 15 years: Brian De Palma, John Woo, J.J. Abrams, Brad Bird. Since then, my old high school chum Chris McQuarrie has directed and written or co-written the last four films. Initially, this comfortable collaboration (Cruise and action guru McQuarrie have worked together since 2008) was a shot in the arm for the series. But by now, I’m wondering if it’s gotten a bit too comfortable? I.E. Was there no one around to say, “Um, do you think this movie is getting too long?” (2 hr 49 min, topping Dead Reckoning’s 2 hr 40 min) or “Maybe there’s too much plot in this thing?”

The script definitely tries to add some gravitas to give some overarching meaning to these last 3 decades of Mission movies. These guys really love and value each other! And yet the actors still haven’t developed any real chemistry. And a phrase that’s uttered about 15 times, something about protecting those you hold close and those you’ll never meet, doesn’t have the beautiful simplicity of a “With great power comes great responsibility.”

The action is generally solid throughout, and includes one of the funniest action bits I’ve ever seen: The camera stays on a wincing woman’s face as she watches the unseen Cruise beat the crap out of a guy. But a few sequences seem like action for action’s sake — including a fistfight on a submarine and a ridiculous, extended biplane duel — which aren’t integral to the plot and could’ve been trimmed or even cut to reduce that bloated running time.

Also, the ending is pretty underwhelming. But come on, neatly wrapping everything up after eight movies would be a task very difficult to achieve!