Well I took in Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning Part 1 opening night to see if the massive Rotten Tomatoes score was legit, and I would say it for the most part it was. Now I have only seen a couple Mission Impossible films but not completely with the storylines and maybe it would improve my experience watching the movie if I had as it does play on his past a bit.
The movie certainly provides the action that the series is known for but unlike most action flicks this one has a great story in it and not a lot of action for the sake of action. This much like some films in the past number of years looks at the dark side of AI and can be seen as a warning for going down this path. The movie centres around Ethan Hunt and the IMF team must track down a terrifying new weapon that threatens all of humanity if it falls into the wrong hands. With control of the future and the fate of the world at stake, a deadly race around the globe begins. Confronted by a mysterious, all-powerful foe known as “the Entity.” Ethan is forced to consider that nothing can matter more than the mission, not even the lives of those he cares about most.
The cast does their parts in the movie excelling with me not able to point out a bad job in the cast. Notably the returning duo of Simon Pegg and Ving Rhames as Benji Dunn and Luther Stickell were great standouts. Adding Hayley Atwell as Grace was a great job and was surprised at her abilities in the film as all I know her for is her appearances in the Captain America and MCU movies, never watching the TV show centred around her character. She did a great job portraying a character whose loyalties are somewhat ambiguous. Vanessa Kirby and Rebecca Ferguson reprising their roles was great. Credit does need to go to Esai Morales for his portryal as Gabriel as he ties the movie and story together so nicely. Though I did take some similarities from this movie as Fast X in terms of a villain that is cold and calculating, but Gabriel isn’t the flashy flamboyant androgynous villain Dante Reyes was, but similar missions and methods.
The movie is certainly one to watch and I wouldn’t be surprised if it sets box office records for the franchise. The movie was enjoyable and the near 3 hour runtime went by quick as the movie doesn’t waste time and as mentioned before the action scenes aren’t done just for the sake of action. What I wasn’t prepared for was the comedy that came throughout the film from Cruise and Atwell, as it is expected from Pegg and Rhames. Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part 1 is a movie I think that will be on many peoples favourite movies of 2023.
Final Grade: 8.5/10
Check out the trailer here:
– Everett
