Saw "Mission: Impossible - Fallout," the new one (part 6). I've never really liked or cared about this series much. I really hated the first one when I saw it originally... I found it a convoluted mess, and didn't like being duped about it being sold as a team movie (you know, like the actual TV show it's based on) then it ending up that it is "Tom Cruise: The Movie." The second one (the John Woo one) I didn't mind as much, but I found really corny, like an overstylized Tom Cruise commercial or music video, and where the first one was intelligent to a fault, the second one wasn't at all. Part 3 was ohhh-kay, but not mind-blowing. "Ghost Protocol" I enjoyed a lot, but somehow not enough to ever go and see the last one, "Rogue Nation."
So yeah. "Fallout" is pretty much the perfect "intelligent" action movie, easily the best M:I movie by far. Absolutely awesome, and I would love to see it again sometime. Super well put together, the action scenes are BIG but never not believable, and often excruciating to watch because of the plight people are in. Super gritty, dirty, and dingy, in the best possible ways. If you've seen the movie, Tom Cruise probably gives this one 300% more than he gave any of the other ones. The score is really good, too. Interesting that it is the first M:I movie which is not wholly independent... it's basically "Rogue Nation, Part 2" from a story perspective. But it feels nothing like that movie, it FEELS like its own thing.
Also, in preparation for this movie, I rewatched all of the previous 5. In the case of 5, watching it for the first time.
M:I: Still found it a little needlessly convoluted but I actually enjoyed it a lot more now. It's fun. It's clever. I basically forgot the whole movie so it was like watching it for the first time.
M:I 2: Definitely still dumb, but I had a lot more fun with it this time. If you kind of approach it like an... exaggerated action comedy thing, it's not bad. It's sort of the "2 Fast 2 Furious" of the bunch.
M:I 3: I also liked this one a lot more this time out. I like how it humanizes Ethan Hunt in a way that none of the other movies did save for the latest one. Seymour Hoffman plays a great villain with not a lot of screentime.
M:I Ghost Protocol: Sort of a new-and-improved M:I, maintaining the feel of M:I 3 while getting back to the basics of the first movie. I think I liked M:I 3 more, but there are some great set pieces here, like the building climbing stuff and the dust storm driving chase stuff.
M:I Rogue Nation: Like "Fallout," super well crafted and put together. I was totally on board until the ending... where it just sort of stops. A series first, they just catch the bad guy (not kill him) and then the credits roll. The titular "Rogue Nation" is still out there... yeah, they stopped a missile but the bad guys are still out there. Unsatisfying. Fallout makes up for this, though.
I miss Paula Patton from part 4 and Maggie Q from part 3, I hope there's still a chance to include them in more. And hopefully Renner comes back in 7. In fact, there's a line in "Fallout" that bothers me... Ethan Hunt says to his team, "The only people I trust are the people in this room." What about Maggie Q's character, Paula Patton's, or Jeremy Renner's? Are they chopped liver?
