Mission: Impossible III

Review by Adam Weeks

Ethan Hunt sits strapped to a chair, bloody, beaten up and looking for all purposes like a man who has given up all hope. Across from him is his fiancée Julia, held with a gun to her head by Owen Davian – and Owen isn’t happy with Mr. Hunt. 

“I’m going to count to ten, and if you don’t tell me where the ‘Rabbit’s Foot’ is, I’m going to shoot her in the head” – Ethan pleads, tries to reason and bargain with Davian all at the same time, as he slowly counts upwards – “Nine” – a look of sheer horror creeps across Ethan’s face – “Ten”… BANG!

That’s about the first two minutes of the latest edition in the Mission: Impossible franchise, and it sets up the film by J.J. Abrams (Alias, Lost) perfectly. 

As the main credits come to a close, we get to see our first real glimpse into Ethan’s (Tom Cruise) personal life at a party with Julia (Michelle Monaghan). He tells his “normal” friends that he works for the Department of Transport, and it’s obvious that since the events of M:I 2 he’s taken a step back from the field work at IMF, but when he receives a call from John Musgrave (Billy Crudup), he knows that something has gone wrong. 

Musgrave informs him that fellow agent Lindsey (Keri Russell) has been captured by Owen Davian (Philip Seymour Hoffman) during an operation in Germany, and due to Ethan having trained and put her in the field, he should get involved in the rescue operation along with the returning Luther Strickell (Ving Rhames), and newcomers Declan (Jonathan Rhys-Meyers) and Zhen (Maggie Q). 

In true M:I style, the operation is high-risk and chock full of action as the team infiltrate a warehouse complex to try and save the day, but when Davian manages to escape, the team must track him down through missions within the Vatican, and the heart of Shanghai in order to find the mysterious “Rabbit’s Foot” that Owen will do anything to get his hands on, including killing everyone that Ethan knows and cares about.

The Mission: Impossible movies to date have been fairly problematic so far. The first by Brian De Palma was a golden effort that fell apart in the last ½ hour by trying to be far too clever for it’s own good, and John Woo’s second installment looked incredible, had action galore, but was as hollow as any film you’re likely to see. 

A lot of people compare the M:I movies to the James Bond pictures or more recently the Bourne franchise, but at times those people can be a victim of their own nostalgia, imagining some great 007 film that was perfect, but which tends to be a mish-mash of memories from different outings, and they judge every new “spy” film based on those thoughts. 

Thank god for Tom Cruise getting J.J. Abrams to sign up for this one though, because this is the definition of a perfect spy thriller, and will be the measure for all films of its type that come along in the future. 

J.J.’s work on Alias and Lost have given him an incredible eye for detail, staging of action, and using actors surroundings to truly engage the viewing audience, but his work on more heartfelt fare such as Felicity and Regarding Henry has also enabled him to get the emotional aspects of the story down to a tee as well, and he runs with it all the way to the finish line.

The action-sequences that are packed from end to end are incredible to say the least, from the opening incursion in Germany through to the aforementioned Vatican break-in, as well as a freeway shoot out that rivals anything seen in True Lies. The highlight segment however, is the actual theft of the “Rabbit’s Foot” that takes place in downtown Shanghai: to call it jaw-dropping is an absolute understatement. It has to be seen to be believed.

Tom Cruise is a bonafide Hollywood movie star in every sense of the word, and with some of his off-screen antics, it’s sometimes easy to forget that, but watching him as Ethan in this just further cements the fact that he can seemingly do anything with any part. Taking him into his personal life and his relationship with Julia is one of the best aspects of this outing, as witnessed in a very tender scene where Julia questions him on why he’s going away for two days, when it’s obvious he hasn’t been called away in some time. 

Ethan can’t tell her what he does for a living, it would only end up putting her in danger, but he looks her in the eyes and says to her very softly, “You have to do something very important for me…. You have to trust me… okay?” – It may not sound much on the written page, but the connection between the two in this film is so incredibly crucial, that if either one of them was out of step, it would bring the film crashing down. 

That brings us to Michelle Monaghan as Julia, fresh from turns in North Country and Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang she stands tall with Cruise throughout the film, and it would be wrong to say she holds her own with Cruise, because the fact is she matches him every step of the way in her performance, and it’s no wonder she’s getting picked up for prime roles so early in her career.

The IMF team are the key in the action sequences, and the focus is on the “team” aspect. M:I 3 is not about solo man Hunt running into a factory with two guns, and blowing away all of the bad guys in sight, it’s about the entire group working together to get the job done. Leading off the pack is Ving Rhames as Luther, Ethan’s right hand man. Ving has always done a good job as Strickell, but in his pairing up with Jonathan Rhys-Meyers & Maggie Q, they all help to elevate their performances to great effect. The other players such as Billy Crudup, IMF superior John Brassel (Laurence Fishburne) and technician Benji (Simon Pegg) have more limited time on screen, but as with the rest of the cast, what they do with that time is spot on.

As for the “Big Bad”, Philip Seymour Hoffman is flat out brilliant as Davian. He’s not the typical Euro-trash throwaway Bond villain that we’ve gotten used to over the past decade or so, and is in fact quite the opposite, being not a particularly physically powerful man either. What he has in spades is confidence that no matter what he does or who he does it with, he’s gonna come out on top, and in his battles against Hunt, he does just that. 

His speech on what exactly he is going to do to everyone in Ethan’s life is absolutely bone-chilling because deep down, you know from those opening minutes that he’s going to do it all.

Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci and J.J. Abrams have done a magnificent job with the story, and along with J.J.’s deft touch at directing such a mammoth undertaking, everyone involved has made Mission: Impossible 3 not only the best of the films so far, but have also made it THE film to beat. 

Have no doubt in your mind, M:I:3 is a white-knuckle, action packed film of the highest calibur, and cannot be missed. Simply the best film of 2006 thus far.

5 out of 5

Mission: Impossible III
Australian release: 4th May, 2006
Cast: Tom Cruise, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Ving Rhames, Laurence Fishburne, Billy Crudup
Director: J.J. Abrams
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