Thursday, May 04, 2006

Mission Impossible 3

Why is Mission Impossible 3 so good?
And make no mistake - it's not only the best of the series, my new list of favourite Action Movies now reads:

The Matrix
The Terminator
MI3
Die Hard

Why?
- I admire how the first scene gives you the structure of the entire film to come
- The first 10 minutes makes me care about the relationship (which is pretty vital to the film working)
- Keri Russell turns into an action-goddess the second she gets a gun in her hand
- Italy
- every single Tom Cruise/Philip Seymour HOffman conversation
- I like Ethan Hunt as a character (and anyone who's heard my 'I nearly vomited during MI2' story will appreciate how much of an achievement that is)
- the entire supporting cast is fun to watch (and sexy too!)
- it had real plot twists

And most importantly, it played action the way I think it should be played. The heroes fail at every turn + the writers ask at every point "What would make this situation worse?" That's the rhythm I like from my films.

It falls apart a little towards the very end - but not in any real way that messes with my appreciation of it.

Go see!


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3 comments:

Seraph said...

Hmmm. Your review is tatalising - but I was thinking of boycotting movies with Tom Cruise in them. Because he's a freaking nutcase, and I'm not sure that I want any of my money getting to that crazy mofo.

Anonymous said...

I have been amazed today at the number of people who've said pretty much the same thing to me.

Weird. Didn't think about it at all while watching, but then again I don't care about TomKat, Scientology, or his potential closeted status.

The South Park episode with him in the closet was funny tho'.

Meredith said...

Try this: every time I get irritated with Tom Cruise (for example after he and Nicole broke-up, after the couch jumping...the 'glib' list goes on) watch the first 10 minutes of Austin Powers: Goldmember. Hearing that self obsessed lunatic say "Yeaaaah baby" gives me a sense of warm fuzzy forgiveness every time.