Movie Review: Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One
Much of the advertising for Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One has been centered around the film’s centerpiece action scene, which finds Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise, doing the stunt himself, as we’ve come to expect) driving a motorcycle off of a cliff and opening a parachute on the way down. The advertisers at Paramount were right to focus on that scene because it lives up to the anticipation. It is a breathtaking sequence and shows that Tom Cruise is a maniac that will do anything for our amusement.
Director Christopher McQuarrie smartly puts this scene in the final hour of a nearly three-hour-long film. The bike stunt is followed by another spectacular set piece set on a train that was truly heart-stopping. It is full of incredible action, from hand-to-hand combat to bait-and-switches, to Ethan hanging on for dear life as a train car dangles over the edge of a cliff. Just another Mission: Impossible film from Cruise and McQuarrie.
But what makes Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One another stellar entry in the Mission: Impossible franchise and one of the best movies of 2023 was everything that took place before the climactic set piece and stunt. This is not a no-holds-barred action film that doesn’t give us any time to breathe. This is a crafty espionage thriller that feels more reminiscent of the first Mission: Impossible than a sequel to the last entry in the franchise, Fallout.
Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One finds Ethan Hunt facing his toughest villain yet: artificial intelligence. There is an artificial intelligence tool, known as the Entity, that could change the fate of the world if put in the wrong hands. Nobody knows exactly what it is or what it does, all anyone knows is that it would make whoever had it the most powerful person or nation on Earth. One of the people vying for the Entity is a ghost from Ethan’s past, Gabriel (Esai Morales), who is partially responsible for Ethan becoming an IMF agent. Ethan and his team of IMF agents must stop the Entity from getting into the wrong hands before it puts the fate of the world in jeopardy.
Dead Reckoning Part One is the most espionage-heavy Mission: Impossible film since Brian De Palma’s 1996 film. The film builds an intricate mystery around the Entity. The film keeps the details relatively generic, but the exposition and conversations between the characters let us know how important and how dangerous it is. There are several scenes of our characters duping one another and getting crafty in how they get the information that they need, like pickpocketing, sleight of hand movements, different identities, and masks, which have always been a staple of this franchise. It is fun, creative, suspenseful, and unpredictable, and a blast to watch.
Following the thirty-minute cold open of the film, which got a round of applause in my screening, Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One is really just four set pieces and a few brief scenes of exposition. There is a scene in the Abu Dabi airport, where Ethan is attempting to intercept half of the key to the Entity with the help of his reliable cohorts Benji (Simon Pegg) and Luther (Ving Rhames). This scene introduces us to Grace (a scene-stealing Hayley Atwell), a crafty thief who happens to steal from the person Hunt is after, which brings her into the mission and forces Ethan to improvise. This scene is followed by everyone in Rome with Ethan and Grace on the run from several police officers. This scene felt like a ramped-up Buster Keaton bit, full of slapstick humor, exciting chases, and explosive chemistry between Cruise at Atwell. The third set piece takes place in a large night club and is a Mexican standoff of knowing looks a slight head tilts between Ethan, Gabriel, Grace, Ilsa Faust (Rebecca Furgeson, as good as ever), and Alanna Mitsopolis (Vanessa Kirby), a foe of Ethan’s from Fallout. This scene is loaded with tension and top-notch acting, particularly from Cruise and Kirby. And then comes the bike jump and train scene. It’s a masterclass in storytelling and technical filmmaking.
The Mission: Impossible franchise is the best cinematic franchise right now and Dead Reckoning Part One continues its greatness. Every film just keeps upping itself in terms of storytelling, filmmaking, and stunt work. While Dead Reckoning is Part One, like another one of 2023’s best films, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, it is a sensational film and I cannot wait for Part Two.
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