Mission: Impossible III

May 3, 2006

Rated: PG-13 Runtime: 126 min Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Mission: Impossible III is the third installment of the feature film version of the old television show “Mission: Impossible”. If this is news to you, you should really get out more. For those of you who have not been under a rock, yes Tom Cruise is back again. And the director this time is J.J. Abrams who is perhaps best known for directing TV shows such as Lost and Alias.

Mission: Impossible III This time out we find Ethan Hunt (Cruise) settling down a bit. He’s no longer a field agent, instead he is teaching new agents. And he has himself a girlfriend who he is ready to marry and try to lead a normal life with. But one of his favorite students ends up in enemy hands and is need of a rescue. Before you know it, Ethan has been pulled back in and is once again dodging bullets and explosions, saving the world and that kind of thing.

But who really cares about plot, we’re in it for the action. And this movie delivers. It’s virtually non-stop edge of the seat action for nearly the entire 126 minutes. Lots of gun fights, explosions, nifty gadgets and crazy stunts. If they continue making sequels, Mission: Impossible may very well be a James Bond type spy franchise for the short attention spans of the new millenium.

Tom Cruise is a bit of an easy target due to American tabloid fascination with his often unusual personal life and beliefs. I’m gonna cut the man some slack though, all he does is turn out entertaining movies. He’s proven himself to be a good actor, and he turns in an entertaining and athletic performance here doing some of his own stunts. Let’s also not forget he’s co-producer of this franchise. I could care less what his religious beliefs are or what kind of sex he prefers. If he wants to blow goats and pray to Crom, I don’t care as long as his movies dont also blow.

Ving Rhames also returns. And the bad guy this time is Philip Seymour Hoffman, who does a surprisingly good job of being a truly nasty villain. We still cant help but see him stealing a smooch from Dirk Diggler in Boogie Nights though. Not that there’s anything wrong with that!

So what’s not to like? Lots of tasty female flesh in this movie and they only tease us, but hey, it’s PG-13. J.J. Abrams does a good job with all of the action. He keeps things moving and crams in a ton of huge action sequences, but they are much more believable than some of the truly over the top stuff that John Woo did in Mission: Impossible 2. I didn’t care for the way they showed us a scene from late in the story before the opening credits though. This took the mystery out of what was going to happen for the first three quarters of the movie.

Bottom line though is this is a 5 star movie. It needs to be seen on the big screen, and this is the type of movie I’ll watch regularly for years whenever it is on. I enjoyed every minute and although it was a shade over 2 hours, there was no urge to check my watch. If you’re an action fan, this is a must see.

Posted by Billy Bob | Filed Under 5 Stars, Action, Billy Crudup, Michelle Monaghan, PG-13, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Theatrical, Tom Cruise, Ving Rhames