THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS OF THE DISCUSSED FILM. READERS DISCRETION IS ADVISED.
When everyone has their favorite fictional franchise to watch, there’s always a favorite entry within to pick. When I think about the film series of Mission: Impossible, my favorite right now will be Fallout.
PLOT
The 2018 film follows IMF agent Ethan Hunt go through another unforgettable mission. Two years after apprehending Syndicate leader Solomon Lane, remaining members of the sinister organization have rebranded as the ‘Apostles’ and have adopted a ‘terror for hire’ policy. They’ve recently been hired by an extremist code named ‘John Lark’ to acquire three plutonium cores with the intent to use them as bombs. Although Hunt gets a lead to retrieve it in Berlin, he would lose the cores to protect his teammate Luther Stickell. However, they and Benji Dunn still capture nuclear weapons expert Nils Debruuk (Kristoffer Joner) and confirm Lark’s intent to make weapons out of the cores. Due to failing to retrieve the said cores, CIA Director Erika Sloane assigns Hunt and his team with Special Activities Division Agent August Walker to better the chances to secure them. Hunt and Walker go to Paris with the tip that one whose suspected to be Lark is attending a nightclub to purchase the cores from arms dealer/broker Alanna Mitsopolis aka The White Widow. They try to incapacitate their suspect to take his place in disguise, but he would suddenly get killed by disavowed MI6 agent Ilsa Faust. This would lead to Hunt meeting the Widow without a mask. He earns her trust when he and Walker protect her from assassins. In exchange for two plutonium cores, while she gives one for down payment, she tasks the undercover agents to extract Lane from a convoy moving through Paris. On the day of the extraction, they preemptively attack the convoy to prevent Alanna’s brother Zola (Frederick Schmidt) from killing any officers. They push his van into the water for Benji & Luther to pick him up. And in the process, Hunt is able to avoid Lane from being killed by Ilsa. They’re even able to cover their tracks by removing MI6’s tracker from Lane and replace it with their own. When Hunt checks in with the Widow, he keeps his cover by explaining he improvised because he didn’t trust Zola’s plan. She chooses to believe him, but insists Ilsa to be dealt with. When he meets up with her, the agent explains MI6 has ordered her to kill Lane to officially be exonerated. After reuniting with his team again, all meet up with IMF Secretary Alan Hunley. He explains that the Widow is in cahoots with the CIA as she bargains for immunity with every deal. He then insists for the mission to be aborted due to Erika having suspicions Hunt could be Lark. She only has those suspicions thanks to Walker secretly sharing his theory to her in Paris why it would be possible. Refusing to give up, he and the team trick Walker to confess he is Lark by having Benji swap places with Lane. Once he realized he was tricked, Hunley reveals to have called Erika in advance and hear his inadvertent confession. Not trusting anyone at that point, she intends to have turn everyone in by sending more SAD agents. Little did she know Walker had Apostle agents on the inside, who help him and Lane escape. On the way out, he is able to kill Hunley who tries to stop him from leaving. With Luther putting a tracker on Walker as well, Ethan tries to chase him down. However, he chooses to halt when the enemy threatens to kill his ex wife Julia (Michelle Monaghan). When the remaining team regroups with Ilsa, Luther explains to her Ethan & Julia chose to separate as they both understood how much the IMF needed him to keep saving the world more than anyone else. At the same time, Benji is able to track Lane and Lark to a medical camp over the Siachen Glacier. Apart from apprehending the enemies, the goal is to disarm the bombs by removing the key from remote detonator after its countdown. If they try to disarm them before countdown, the bombs will be triggered instead and will wipe out 1/3 of the population. At the camp, the team is able to find one of the armed cores, but Ethan discovers that Julia has remarried with another man named Erik (Wes Bentley) who reveals an anonymous donor underwrote their operation. This implied that Lark intends to make Ethan suffer by having Julia be one of the first victims to the detonation. By the time Hunt chases down Lark via helicopter, Benji & Ilsa are able to pin down Lane and find the last core. Hunt is able to stop his enemy by ramming his helicopter onto the other. When they crash, Lark gets disfigured from being exposed to the helicopter’s fuel line of hot oil. He still tries to fight Hunt, until the protagonist causes him to fall to his death by dropping a hook from a helicopter onto his face. After he does this, he is able to remove the detonator’s key at the last second, while the team faithfully deactivate the bombs. As Ethan recovers from the incident, Julia assures him she’s lived her best life because of his commitment to the agency. The film would end with Erika praising Ethan’s success and agreeing to have Ilsa exonerated by handing Lane over to MI6 through the Widow.
THOUGHTS
I recall sneaking into a screening of this film after watching Ant Man and the Wasp, with the intent to end my summer in a high note and boy did I ever. While the said superhero was predictably fun, this spy film was fucking awesome. It was a blessing for Christopher McQuarrie to return to the director’s chair because he would raise the bar once again in what this franchise is all about. My eyes couldn’t be any more glued when looking at each chase and each fight taking place from Berlin, to Paris to Kashmir. And all were incredibly brought to life thanks to editor Eddie Hamilton and the cinematography duo of Rob Hardy & Hugues Espinasse. Even the visual effects were very useful, having us believe there was a storm occurring during the Halo jump when there never was. On top of that, Lorne Balfe straight up composes the franchise’s best score to date, becoming more intense than it was exciting. That alone had me appreciate him coming back for Dead Reckoning. After all these years, I’ve been able to deem this entry to be the best because of its incredible approach in telling the audience to not let those who aren’t you tell you you’re done for the count. Only you can make your own limits that only you can reach and don’t stop reaching your goals until you know you’ve made it. If you let others speak for you, you’re never gonna get where you want to be. This was deeply explored through the arc of Ethan Hunt, in which our investment is intact thanks to another batch of dedication by actor Tom Cruise. The actor tops himself again with stunts we’d never see possible by him or any other actor of any generation. He broke an ankle while jumping from building to building, climbs onto an airborne helicopter he ends up flying himself, and did hundreds of takes Halo jumping 25,000 feet in the air. The dedication is surreal and it still surprises me that he continues to keep this pace going for Dead Reckoning. Being aware of all this is a clear reminder on what Hunt is all about. The character does not know what giving up is until he is out of options. The only time he ever felt like he had to give up was when Erika had him cornered and once he felt that he wasn’t, he took advantage to keep on going. He halted once he knew Julia would be in danger because he knew he had to rethink the solution. Every time someone told him to stop, it only drove to keep working until the exhaustion caught up to him. And even when he’s feeling such, he still had enough will in him to succeed. Each action reminds us how big of a soul he has because even though he acts like he’s got nothing to lose, he cares about so many people. He chose to break up with Julia because he didn’t want to blame his happiness for the reason of setbacks. That has been the only sacrifice in his life he’s ever made at this point and he’s refused to do anymore. He refuses to sacrifice his friends because he knows it’ll be worth it in the long run. It ended up being the case here because with his friends, they saved the world again. With that being said, you can argue that Benji & Luther have brought more value to his life than he’d ever anticipate. Put aside they’re likely good luck charms to his success, Simon Pegg & Ving Rhames are still standout figures because they’re loyal friends who’ll always trust Hunt no matter how high the stakes the get. They appreciate his commitment to put himself out there for them, that they’re returning the favor by defending him until the job is done. If you made friends willing to catch up on your mentality, you’ve blended with the right crowd. Rebecca Ferguson definitely shook things up in her return as Ilsa because she still has her own drive that leads to her success. It was hard for her originally because she got in the way of her friend Ethan, but would find a way around it because she understood there’s always more than one way to succeed. She spared Lane in the end because she knows she wouldn’t truly be satisfied with revenge. She is still like Ethan because she doesn’t enjoy being on the run, but that doesn’t mean she won’t go out of her way doing what’s right. We’ve been aware since she first met Hunt and continued this motive when things worsened. And with that being said, she proved to be another great friend. Alec Baldwin still shines in his given time as Hunley because he now sees Ethan’s point of view and matches his compassion in protecting the world. He’s not as hesitant as before and is willing to work his way around the scenario, which made him another great ally. He knew having Walker involved would be a risk because it wouldn’t go Ethan’s way, which is honestly the best and only way to succeed. It was a bummer when he gets killed because every loss Ethan goes through will be very personal. And sadly, that would be the last piece of the puzzle the protagonist needed to get enough focus in accomplishing the mission. Another character that made an impact in a minimum amount of screen time definitely had to be Erika. She may have not been on the field, but Angela Bassett assures the audience she's a force to be reckoned with when it comes to getting shit done. She was all about immediate action rather than patient strategizing, which makes her an outsider compared to the IMF. She trusted Walker as long as she did because he gave the results she was seeking. Little would she expect that her top guy was pulling strings. She chose to do a big favor by ensuring Ilsa's exoneration because she came to remember exactly how valuable he's been to the government and will keep on proving it with every mission he accomplishes. Vanessa Kirby also shook things up with a character I never thought I'd be so intrigued with. It's easy to identify The White Widow as a villain because of the lifestyle she choses, but if there is one thing we learned way back in the first film from Max, who happens to be her mother, allies can come from unexpected places. She is way more lenient than past people Ethan has ever been around, which shows how playful she tends to be in her environment. She even chooses to kiss him not just out of gratitude for saving her, but because she's got enough power to do what she wants. And at this point, Hunt should be lucky she doesn't know he's the reason her mom is behind bars. Last but not least, I was definitely shook on how frightened both villains would become because it felt like they packed more than a punch. Sean Harris once again got under my skin as Solomon Lane. Whether or not he was under restraint, he was sadistic for thinking his actions with the Syndicate/Apostles would ever make a 'greater good kind' of difference. He truly believed genocide would bring world peace, which is god damn terrifying every time you think of it, especially since he was very close at getting what he wanted. Apart from him, the true threat was another man on the inside. You can joke on Henry Cavill as much as you want when saying his mustache ruined the theatric edition of Justice League, but you know there's more to it than that. The actor succeeded in making him a formidable threat because he comes off as more of a brutal version of Ethan. He's smart enough to be ahead of those against him, which only shows how he uses his skills for the wrong use. The best piece of proof goes to how he believes in Lane's cause that the world would benefit from mass murder. The only reason I believe he chose to take such a path has to be from feeling burnt out of the life as an agent, similar to the likes of Jim Phelps from the first film. When he tells Erika his false perspective of Hunt, pointing out he's gone through enough disrespect, it honestly is echoing how he's felt which becomes a smarter scene upon realization. Unfortunately for him and Lane, the vision would only be delayed and their reign of terror ended. The praise I’ve given for this film is as honest as I can be, but not even that can truly excuse some issues I caught onto during my Re-watch. Going from the top, I think it’s a cool use of visual effects when Ethan gets another visual debrief of the next mission, but since they’re spending so much money to give an extremely detailed video for him alone, would it be a bad idea for him to be debriefed by another agent? They are willing to get agents in the area to give him his debriefs for crying out loud. And let’s be honest, how was neither Luther nor Benji able to hack into Nils’ phone? Considering they’re able to go so advanced with their tech to the point where Benji can disguise himself as Wolf Blitzer, this shouldn’t ever be hard at this point. Also, why would it be a bad idea for Sloane to go on the mission with Hunt? Sure this would complicate the foreshadowing of Walker being Lark, but if she’s so determined to get the plutonium back, I don’t really see a legit reason for her to not participate in the field. It definitely was a smart switch between Benji and Lane, but how did Lark fall for this? He was staring at the camera a long time, so I don’t think he’d miss it by blinking. The bathroom fight is amazing, but it’s kinda weird how a small amount come and go. I respect the effort to create realism, but since the building hosting the rave is large, I’m surprised it’s not full. Also, ain’t it ironic for the police to miss shooting at Ethan when they had the high ground? It’s pretty embarrassing on their end to aim like stormtroopers. It does make sense for Ilsa to shoot at Lane as soon as possible by aiming at the windshield, but if she shot the tires first instead, she totally would’ve made it harder for Ethan to get away with his cargo alive. Other than that, this film remains a wicked experience. In conclusion, Mission: Impossible - Fallout is the franchise’s best entry within the 2010s for dialing everything up to be a breathtaking experience. If you are a fan of these films and can’t get enough, see this now.
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