Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation (2015) Dir: Christopher McQuarrie
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Having enjoyed the all but one of the previous films in the franchise, I very quickly went about watching the fifth installment, this time directed by Christopher McQuarrie.
Visually speaking, I would say this is the best film of the franchise - at least that I've seen thus far. Some of the shots used are epic, or at least very satisfying. The action sequences could have been better, but they were still fun to see.
The story was a little weaker than previous efforts, but still had a lot of strong points to it. I'd say it felt a lot like the Daniel Craig Bond films stylistically, which is not a bad thing, but it's a slight shame after the established identity in 'Ghost Protocol'.
Tom Cruise gave a pretty spectacular performance in his leading role. His stunt work is, of course, without question, but I was also very impressed by the dramatic side of his display. He clearly has the persona of 'Ethan Hunt' down now, and I think he really owns the screen as this character.
Simon Pegg continued to be the most entertaining actor on-screen, and I was pleased to see him increasingly involved in the franchise. He once again proved why he is such a popular actor with another enjoyable performance.
Jeremy Renner got some fairly interesting character developments throughout the film, which formed one of the better subplots. His performance, while not as good as his first appearance, was still very much a decent one.
It was a little bit of a challenge for me to decide what I thought of Rebecca Ferguson here. In the end, however, I decided I did enjoy her quite a bit. Her character took me a little while to warm up to, but by the end of the film, I'd say I was on-board.
Sean Harris made for another weak villain, in my view. He just didn't have enough depth to his character to warrant any real intrigue. Harris's performance was adequate, but felt a little bit typical, cheesy spy villain for my taste.
Alec Baldwin, Ving Rhames and Simon McBurney each provided plenty of quality in their supporting roles, particularly McBurney in this instance.
Overall, I think this was another really solid addition to a pretty consistently good franchise. I don't think it was as strong as the third and fourth films, but I still rated it pretty highly. My main hope is that the next villain, or villains, in 'Fallout' and beyond are far more interesting.
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