Starring: Tom Cruise, Jeremy Renner, Simon Pegg, Rebecca Ferguson, Ving Rhames, Alec Baldwin
Director: Christopher McQuarrie
Genre: Action, spy
Running time: 131 minutes
Now showing at Cinema Magic, Metroplex Mall Naalya and Century Cinemax, Acacia Mall, Kisementi
IMF agent, Ethan Hunt returns a fifth time in this surprisingly good movie. I’ll get back to the surprising bit later. Considering these movies started showing when some of you were all but babies, let’s take a recap. Tom Cruise has been going on all these missions since 1996 as Agent Hunt of the IMF –not that IMF; we’re talking the Impossible Missions Force here. Just like the name of the organisation suggests, these missions are tight, almost impossible. So the thrill is in seeing Hunt and his fellow agents pull them off.
In Rogue Nation, the threat is the Syndicate, a secret organisation Hunt is convinced is out to change the world order through terrorism. On top of that, the IMF has been disbanded thanks to CIA director Alan Hunley (Baldwin), sending Hunt into hiding. However, even in hiding, he sets out to find the Syndicate and expose them. His quest takes him across the globe –what’s a spy movie without frequent flier miles after all. Meanwhile, Hunley is also out to get him. Thankfully, former IMF agent William Brandt (Renner) has his back on that end. Among his other allies is former fellow agent Benji Dunn (Pegg), and the mystery that is Ilsa Faust (Ferguson) –mystery because it is not clear whose side she is on.
The plot may sound straightforward and familiar; there are several movies where spies have been disavowed but stick to their mission to keep the world safe after all. What is not straightforward is McQuarrie’s direction. He builds the suspense long enough for us to look forward to the next exciting sequence but not too long that we lose patience.
Earlier, I said the movie is surprisingly good and this is because Cruise always surprises me as an actor. Maybe it’s because of that jumping-on-Oprah’s couch stunt he pulled, but I struggle to take him seriously as an action actor. Yet he delivers on that front, infusing wit where it should be and kicking butt when he needs to. The other star of the show is Ferguson, who is no damsel in distress. Chick holds her own in the movie, even overshadowing Cruise in some instances.
