What I liked: Let's start with what I thought was the most impressive element of the movie. The IMF team infiltrates a music festival in Paris. There are thousands of people enthusiastically dancing to the music in standing room only performances. The team trails the bad guy to a bathroom to kidnap and interrogate him. You guys, this bathroom was spotless, so spotless they are ok with touching the walls and doing a little wrestling on the floor. There was no line to get in the bathroom and there is even a 5 minute fight scene where the team and the bad guy have the entire bathroom completely to themselves. Any music festival I have ever encountered has bathrooms that are so terrifying that you and the bad guy would both agree to take your battle outside maybe even forgo the fight completely because you are too busy combating every germ known to man. And while I know that the line for the men's toilette is usually shorter, there always is a line. I must find this French music festival, I don't know about the bands but the bathroom experience if bound to make the ticket totally worth it. As far as other things I liked, all of the best elements of MI 1 and the 60's TV show are back. We have a fuse running through the credits. We have a projector, using film on weird little film reels. We have helicopters, elevators, masks, fake rooms, double agents, gates and stabbings. I was very impressed with the construction of the helicopters, the tow cables, and the large glass roof. I think the same engineering firm must have built the glass roofs in Jurassic Park and in this movie. I'm really glad they made a Geiger counter app. I want one now.
What I didn't: My chief complaint is that the MI franchise seems to have transitioned back to taking itself seriously. I know of no series where you can take movie #6 seriously. If you're chasing someone who escapes into the river that runs under the city and there are manholes every 10 feet maybe you could just run to the next one and shoot them from there. Every time I kidnap someone I don't put them in the most conspicuous seat while driving through town. Clearly your friends are higher priority for shotgun than the person you just kidnapped, who traditionally goes in the trunk but at the very least should have to have the middle back seat position. Would it really be that hard to at least throw a tarp over the guy so people don't immediately say "huh, I wonder what they're doing with that guy tied up and blindfolded in the front seat?" So, while every single character in this movie is a spy, we still effectively only have two spies that do anything. Couldn't we delegate just a little bit? Why does the bad guy keep going along with the plan? It is clear early in the movie that he is expecting to get paid, but when his payment is literally going to explode, why is he still gung ho about the financially irresponsible plan? If, hypothetically speaking, you were going to set off a nuke, don't you think you might like more than 15 minutes on the timer for you to get away? I was going to look up how inside the blast radius you would still be going at top speed, but my phone auto-corrected the question from "nuke blast radius" to "nice blast radish" and I refuse to try again. For the record I found no nice radishes either. Why do all of the girls look so similar? I spent most of the small amount of time I had to think about those women wondering if they were the same person. I know there was a blonde, a brunette, and a red head, but it was still confusing. I feel like when transporting refined plutonium cores there may be safer approaches than just tossing them all in a suitcase and throwing that suitcase around. At a minimum I would want some lead shielding and to keep them in separate suitcases. If you are a professional assassin, shouldn't you be a good shot? and shouldn't you use your gun in a fight?
Who should watch this? People invested in the Mission Impossible series. People looking for music festivals with the cleanest bathrooms. People designing roll bars for helicopters.
Would I watch it again? I was really glad I got to see the Godzilla trailer, I have watched that again and sent it to several people.
After reading this review, I am super excited to see the movie AND find that French movie festival (and maybe see yet another Godzilla movie!)
ReplyDeleteI have since consulted with a nuclear engineer. It turns out that 15 minutes flying at the average helicopter speed of 160mph would actually put you out of immediate danger. I apologize to the film for my skepticism, but still think that I would like more than 15 minutes if I were trying to out run a 5 megaton nuke.
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