Mission: Impossible Dead Reckoning Part One Review
Theatrical Movie Review - Action/Spy
I discovered Mission: Impossible when I was a freshman in high school. The 1966 television show had a brief revival in the late 80’s, and my best friend and I would watch and then pass notes with doodles about the episodes in our biology class. It probably prompted me to go back and watch some of the original show from the 60’s since Peter Graves was a staple in both. So I was excited to see the franchise come to the big screen in 1996. It’s one of the few franchise movies that I have watched, so I was excited to see Christopher McQuarrie’s seventh entry into the series with “Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One.”
There is a new threat and it is an AI consciousness called The Entity. Director Kittridge (Henry Czerny) tells Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) that it can only be stopped with a particular key and that Ethan needs to find the two parts of the key to stop this from falling into the wrong hands. The first part is held by Ilsa Faust (Rebecca Ferguson), but they need to find the second part. Ethan joins Benji (Simon Pegg) and Luther (Ving Rhames) to put together a plan to follow the other half of the key. As they try to track the key through pickpocket Grace (Hayley Atwell), they discover that The Entity will try to protect itself, even from the IMF team.
When I saw that this was a part one, I was wary. This seems to be the summer of unfinished movies with “Fast X” and “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-verse” both being part ones, and cliffhanger movies are notoriously hard to execute well. But “Dead Reckoning” is an incredibly satisfying part one. Plenty still left to see, but a complete story in its own right.
Despite the run time being nearly three hours, I found myself fully engrossed the entire time. The action set-pieces are well paced and despite the numerous characters in this, the story is streamlined in a way that makes it more enjoyable than others in the franchise. There are some really great character beats, just the right amount of humor. I have always loved the gadget side of Mission: Impossible, so it was fun to see the team struggle with that due to The Entity.
The cast is great and it’s clear they have fun working together. The addition of Atwell to the movie is fantastic. At 61, Cruise remains one of film’s best movie stars, giving his all in every scene he’s in. I only wish we had a bit more of Pegg and Rhames because they bring so much fun to the movies.
With both the WGA and SAG-AFTRA on strike right now, I’m not sure when we will see “Dead Reckoning Part Two,” but Part One is a good reminder that handing things over to an AI won’t turn out well, and maybe fairly compensating the people who bring us the stories we love is a good thing.
This review originally appeared in The Dominion Post on July 16. 2023.