DVD Movie Review | Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation (Lights, Camera, Action!) Page 1

DVD Movie Review | Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation (Lights, Camera, Action!)

08.10.2016

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Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation (UK Rating: 12A)

With such a strong heritage in the espionage genre, the Mission Impossible movies have been seen as more serious in theme than the rather tongue-in-cheek nature of many James Bond films. However, comedy elements have started to creep in more and more, with last year's summer blockbuster, Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation, the fifth in the series, being perhaps the funniest so far. Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise, Jack Reacher, Edge of Tomorrow)'s team member Benji Dunn (Simon Pegg, The World's End, Star Trek Beyond) even laughs at the notion that the Impossible Missions Force (IMF) team's objectives are 'impossible.' Obviously, the movie is very self-conscious. However, the longer you watch, the more the feeling creeps up on you that Benji was particularly correct this time.

Rogue Nation starts out interestingly: Hunt needs to take warheads off of a plane (and probably destroy them), yet he's too late to enter...or so it seems at first. Never one to give up a lost cause, he actually ends up hanging from one door as it takes off and gains speed. This does stir some adrenaline, but the close-up camera work is slightly too reminiscent of Mission Impossible 3; the scene never gets heart-poundingly tense, and pretty much just fizzles out. Hunt gets the job done and the IMF is disbanded for the events of previous movies. Yes, it's essentially the tired 'disavowed' plot again.

Nonetheless, Ethan and his team get on with it...don't worry, no spoilers here! Then again, there's not much to really spoil, as the plot is very predictable, and there is a constant feeling that everything has been done before. A Director who doesn't believe the IMF? Check. A strangely insipid car chase (this time down some sets of shallow stairs)? Check. A motorcycle chase with the protagonist crashing and miraculously surviving, even without burns? Check. Bad guys who can't hit a target five feet in front of them? Check. Some kind of USB drive containing valuable information? Check. It's just too predictable, and sometimes even nonsensical. Obviously a device is stored inside a water-cooler cyclone machine! Why not?! The story also suffers from some bad pacing, and the soundtrack seems largely absent when it could have probably done some good.

The problem doesn't just lie with these ridiculous and trite plot points, though. The action never really gains momentum: the car chase is nothing more than a vehicle bumping down a few stairs on a street, with the only danger being that it might slide into one or two of the walls (palpitations in three...two...oh, false alarm), which you already know won't happen. The motorcycle chase feels like it was lifted straight from the second instalment, and the camera angles don't make it seem like it is going at breakneck speeds: it's very stylised but it lacks punch. Even when the inevitable crash arrives, it just fizzles out. Even the 'heist' that is being called the Mission Impossible, is not impossible at all: there is never any sense that Hunt is ever in real trouble, and it all seems incredibly 'possible,' nay, easy. There is never any scene as suspenseful as the one with the pressure and temperature change-sensitive vault from the first Mission Impossible, and that's the main problem: the movie has an overly long introduction, and when it finally tells viewers that the mission is about to begin, said mission ends up being very rudimentary and reaches a conclusion far too long before the psychological pressure reaches a head.

What is perhaps even worse, is that the new character of Ilsa Faust (Rebecca Ferguson, Hercules), is never really fleshed out; all that is known is that she is a deadly assassin who works for the bad guy but obviously has issues with her work. It soon becomes clear what exactly the idea behind Ilsa's character is, and it's yet another action movie cliché. This time around, the main characters don't even become romantically involved, nor are they even very friendly; there is just no substance there. Adding to the frustration is that Ethan Hunt is not fleshed out either, and he doesn't do or say anything remotely interesting. There is just something missing; the dialogue is uninteresting and full of exposition, and there is little fervour, no humanity. The main antagonist, Solomon Lane (Sean Harris, Prometheus, Macbeth), is only barely intimidating, and only in one scene. The visual presence and connection to the main character is absent, so this role is very much inferior to Mission Impossible 3's Owen Davian, especially when he mainly intimidates Ilsa rather than a more important character.

6/10

Good

In conclusion, Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation feels like a mishmash of the second and third films, but instead of being a mixture of intrigue and infiltration with a smidgeon of action, it's full-blown action. The action is clear as day, sure, but it lacks a sense of awe and impact. There is really only one infiltration scene, and it lacks suspense and uncertainty. As it is, all the events in this movie tick boxes, but they are too predictable, too sluggish, and they feel almost scripted within the Mission Impossible world itself. It's almost as good as Mission Impossible 3, but not nearly as good as the original release.