Great to hear!
I love that this last film really is not just a second part of DR but a culmination of all the movies in this franchise.
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Yes, I agree, but that was not what I ment, what I was trying to say was that the TV series was more plot driven and with disguises, masks and breaking into a building etc, that is what also is more in the first one, more the general atmosphere of the film, itâs not a real action movie, not of the rollercoaster ride style.
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A suspense thriller that lives from the buildup of tension, yes. Despite a few set pieces in the first MI itâs really not quite the outright actioneer. And the identity of the CIA leak is at the centre of it all, not a MacGuffin.
Iâd say MI only turned into the franchise we know today with John Woo. And while he didnât return and his trademark style wasnât reproduced later, itâs probably fair to say when Abrams took over six years later, Cruise had a very particular mix in mind thanks to Woo. The physically testing parts now were a strength of Cruiseâs performance and the show had basically found its footing. Suspense was still an element, but nowhere as central or crucial.
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Fully agreed - and this is a parallel to Bond. After FRWL suspense was leaving. Or dropped.
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I like TFR, but after a couple of days digesting I can see why some people wouldnât. The criticisms people had with DR are all here and doubled down on. I do think the pacing needed to be tighter and less messy. But my initial impressions remain. TFR increases the dread like few movies Iâve seen and it really is an experience by the time you reach the conclusion.
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Just got back. I was not a fan, sadly. A very messy bit of work that didnât feel like a Mission movie. Not an absolute car crash but manâŚa let down for sure.
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I can see why you feel that way. As someone who likes TFR despite the issues I think NTTD is the better conclusion in terms of pacing and providing a true sense of finality. In general I think we need to move away from three hour long films with lots of dialogue. I look back at most of the Bond films with a lot of fondness in just how good they actually were in providing entertainment in a nice two hour package.
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This, absolutely.
I donât even understand the logic behind the ballooning length of movies because this immediately reduces the showings a day, so cinema owners must hate those runtimes.
Remember when OHMSSâ box office also was explained with its 140 minutes prohibiting more showings per day?
These days, you have to spend hours at a cinema (including what feels like a lifetime of ads).
And no story does not benefit from shortening scenes and precise storytelling.
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Indeed, thatâs another factor. I think OHMSS is a film that warrants the runtime with the scope of its story. It needs that level of attention and I think it moves along rather nicely considering the ground it covers.
I used to think âthe more the betterâ but thatâs not always the case for me anymore. Pacing is a huge factor and it does impact on the whole. How many times have we heard something is 20-30 minutes too long?
Iâm imaging a streamlined TFR plot where we
Summary
get to the submarine dive sooner
because thatâs when the movie picks up. Thatâs at about the half way mark.
I still understand the reasons why Cruise and the team went this route on paper, though. I know there is a noticeable lack of levity, but given the stakes I think thatâs appropriate. Itâs impossible for another film to surpass this threat level, so I think it really is the last in the series. Overkill at times, sure, but we get the references to past films to ram that idea home.
It is a different type of Mission movie, for sure. People shouldnât be expecting wall to wall action. Despite it all thereâs an atmosphere that captivates me. Iâm not sure itâs something Iâd watch regularly, but Iâll certainly remember the first time I saw it.
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Seeing that DR is only 6 minutes shorter than TFR I wonder if there will be a future cut with both films edited together, without most of the exposition of TFR.
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Slept on it, still donât like it. Iâd love to know what happened behind the scenes. I canât help but think there was a much more normal Mission movie somewhere in the process, because you see flashes of it here and there. Simon Peggâs performance feels the most in line with whatâs come before it. Cruise seems off for the duration, I canât put my finger on why. I want to believe the performance is trying to match the weight of the stakes but then some weird humor will be tossed in (in one case following a pretty dark scene) that seems to reach toward the usual levity of the prior films in a way thatâs absolutely not appropriate with the stakes. Who knows. Maybe the studio interfered because the budget was ballooning and they werenât able to shoot everything they wanted by the end, leading to a rearrangement of the whole enterprise and the addition of the clip show elements. The action is still tremendously well shot, but there are a lot of scenes involving cross cutting that do suggest an effort to get the runtime down. Itâs sad, I love these movies and since Ghost Protocol I could always count on them to give me a similar fix to what Bond gives me. In the case of the grand finale NTTD is absolutely the superior product. That movie is imperfect and sags at times under the weight of its effort to tie up loose ends from Spectre, but it gets to the end in a more meaningful way than this final Mission does. Again, a total bummer.
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Wel, I loved it.
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After reflecting on it for a few hours, here are my thoughts.
The good:
I liked that it was a true team effort at the end. It felt right, particularly compared to the TV show.
The submarine sequence not only reminded me of TND, but 2001 when Dave tries to break into the ship.
The callbacks generally paid off (for me at least, even if I didnât remember them).
There are plenty of places to go for a sequel. This didnât feel like a finale to me.
The bad:
The egos of Cruise and McQuarrie were on full display here. Stunts galore with little purpose to the story. McQuarrie needs NOT to direct the next MI. Itâs time for someone else in the directorâs chair.
Way too long. Most of the scenes could have a minute or two cut from them and it wouldnât be much different.
Overall, most of the praises and criticisms I have have already been said. Just have a better plan next time (and hopefully the world wonât go through a MI type of event again). And have a new director!
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Via the Soundtracking podcast, apparently there was a coda that was meant to take place after what we see in the film, but Cruise nixed it. When he saw the current final scene he said âthatâs the end of the movie.â
The canon ending makes things more open ended and I presume the coda wouldâve tied things up more. But I donât see another Mission film happening for a long time, and it would probably be with another team. Tom has other projects lined up and said âitâs not called Final for nothing.â
Without knowing the coda material Iâm actually cool with the chosen ending and Iâm inclined to agree with Tomâs judgment.
Summary
It feels like a natural ending with everyone disappearing into the night. It goes with the statement about the existence of an IMF agent - âWe live and die in the shadows for those we hold close, and for those we never meet.â I predicted that type of ending in this very thread.
If they had coda material it shouldâve been placed before that IMO. Being amongst a crowd of people was also very fitting after humanity barely escaped nuclear holocaust. The mundane existing of day to day reality is actually precious and thatâs what they preserved.
The Entity not being destroyed makes it the ultimate memento of Ethanâs career. The story always goes on but Ethan and the team are now free to do whatever they please. Stay on the job or retire. But theyâre out there, with people oblivious to their identities and actions.
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Saw Mission: Impossible: The Final Reckoning today and I really enjoyed it. They really laid into the impossibility of the mission (multiple times). The odds really were stacked against the team. Tom Cruise as Ethan Hunt may have been on his own quite a bit, but he was still having to greatly rely on all of his team membersâand other acquaintances as wellâto accomplish the mission.
I thought the film was well done. There was a lot of suspense with the stakes sky high. I agree with others that Rolf Saxonâs William Donloe was a nice callback to the very first Mission: Impossible. Everyone got a moment to shine in the film. There were a couple of twists that surprised me and the stunt(s) on the biplanes were top notch. The first part was a little slower in building up the story than the last, but Iâm not sure how the filmmakers could have trimmed it to speed it up, as it set up all the parameters for the team before they set out to undergo the mission.
All in all, The Final Reckoning, while not a perfect movie, is nevertheless a very enjoyable one. Is it the end for Tom Cruise and company? It would seem so, but the end is open ended enough that I am inclined toward the quote of Sean Conneryâs wife, Micheline Roquebrune, ânever say neverâ. Likely the end? Yes. Definitely the end? I wonât go that far. But I agree it might be awhile before we see the next iteration of Mission: Impossible on the big screen.
And as for comparing M:I 8 to No Time To Die. Itâs no contest. The Final Reckoning wins it easily. It has the bigger stakes, it has the better suspense and tension, it has the better story, and it gives the viewers more of what they want in their franchiseâand I have no doubt that they are/will be happier as a result when they leave the theater. The Final Reckoning remembered the first rule of mass mediaâgive the people what they want. NTTD did not. The Final Reckoning is more in line of what NTTD should have been.
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Name a movie where the egos of its makers are not on full display.
(Imagine any film I wrote without my ego screaming: this is what I wanted, not that! 
)
I agree that a fresh approach should guide the next iteration. But letâs be honest: Cruise is the ruler here, and he is tied to McQuarrieâs hip because he loves his work for decades now, and for a good reason.
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I would like for Cruise to detach himself from McQ for a couple of movies.
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Heâs already made that Inarritu comedy without him.
Really enjoyed so many parts of the movie, and just generally it felt like a proper cinema experience, but there were so many very obvious flaws to it that I feel it wonât age well at all to me.
So much superfluous, repetitive and overly complex exposition, and my feeling throughout was that McQuarrie (and doubtless Cruise) had got too sucked into the weeds of their own ideas and concept, and lost perspective of what makes an enjoyable Mission romp.
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Just any Bond movie. I never say any of those thinking this is first a Broccoli/Sean Connery/Craig/Fukunaga/Hamilton/[choose your maker] movie, but a Bond movie.
Dalton explicitely said itâs not good if you think itâsDalton or itâs any stuntman whoâs doing the action. You have to think itâs the character âBondâ.
Whereas in the Mission:Impossible series itâs always âTom Cruise did that stunt himselfâ. And I always feel like the other characters could call him âTomâ directly in the movie and it woyld not change anything. So it has always been admiuted that the M:I series is just a big Tom Cruise ego-trip.
That said, I think it is unfair to say the same of McQuarrie.
And by the way, I am not saying this is something what makes these âbad moviesâ. You can enjoy them for what they are. But donât tell any movie is or tries to be just like them.
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