Mission-Impossible-a-Thon, Part 1 - Mission: Impossible (1996)

Director: Brian De Palma

Cast: Tom Cruise, Jon Voight, Emmanuelle Beart, Jean Reno, Ving Rhames

Country: Unites States

Rating: PG-13

Run Time: 110 minutes

Mission: Impossible and its respected sequels are based off of the 1960's television series. To be honest with you, I have never watched the television program before. Therefore, I won't be discussing if Mission: Impossible is a good adaptation of the show or not. This is simply a review of how good the film is and how it fits into both Cruise and De Palma's filmographies.

Mission: Impossible was a huge hit in 1996. The film earned over $400 million at the box office and ranked third in all around box office grosses of that year. It was both the start of a four picture franchise (with a fifth installment coming out Christmas 2015) and a huge commercial hit for director Brian De Palma. Even though Mission: Impossible is a blockbuster action flick, the film still feels like a De Palma film. All of De Palma's trademarks are present as well: a tense build up to a slow motion sequence, POV camera shots, and the exploration of voyeurism through surveillance. For a director never known for creating commercial hits, Mission: Impossible is a tense action thriller that De Palma should be damn proud of. He stuck to his stylistic guns, juggled superstar Tom Cruise, and created a film that fit alongside his varied filmography (Sisters, The Phantom of the Paradise, Carrie, Blow Out, Scarface, The Untouchables, etc). 

The gang's all here. To die that is.

Mission: Impossible opens with a mission briefing where IMF (Impossible Missions Force) agent Jim Phelps (Jon Voight) is instructed to stop a man from stealing the IMF NOC list. The NOC list contains the actual names and the code names of all IMF agents; thereby making it an item that all terrorists or enemies of the IMF would want to get their hands on. Phelps leads a team of agents consisting of his wife Claire (Emmanuelle Beart), Hannah (Ingeborga Dapkunaite), Jack (Emilio Estevez), and pointman Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) to stop the NOC list from falling into the wrong hands. Unfortunately, the mission goes completely wrong and every team member but Ethan dies.

When Ethan rendezvous with IMF director Kittridge (Henry Czerny), the true reasons behind the mission are revealed. The NOC list was never in the hands of the enemy. Due to recent suspicion of a mole in their midsts, IMF planned an entire operation simply to weed out the mole. And since Ethan Hunt is the only survivor, he is public enemy number one in their eyes. After escaping from Kittridge in a glorious slow motion action sequence, Ethan spends the rest of the film uncovering who the true mole is and clearing his name.

To be completely honest with the reader, Mission: Impossible has almost no action scenes in the entire film. There are two exciting action scenes in the form of Ethan escaping from a restaurant and Ethan climbing a top a bullet train in order to reach a helicopter. But beyond that, everything else in Mission: Impossible is slow, tense, and dramatic. I honestly would not have reviewed this film for the blog if it wasn't the predecessor to an increasingly action packed franchise. And while you can still call the film an action movie, there are no fist fights, shootouts, car chases, or anything for that matter. No, De Palma was far more interested in the cool and sleek techniques of spies and espionage. While action enthusiasts will have to wait for Mission: Impossible II to cool their action thirst, Mission: Impossible offers up a great globe trotting story complete with a great lead performance by Tom Cruise and some very tense filmmaking.

Cruise leaps to his escape in my favorite scene in the film.

Mission: Impossible and its respective sequels are heavily reminicient of other PG-13 spy thrillers like the many James Bond films and the Bourne franchise. They mix lots of spy tactics and gadgetry in with a tense story filled with chases, villainy, globe trotting, and espionage. The films have memorable stories, great characters, and tame but memorable action. These are the kind of films that I watched at a young age mainly because they were accessible to a younger mind not ready for hard R rated action films. And while I will always prefer my action films to be rated R, all of the Mission: Impossibles, Bonds, and Bournes are excellent examples of great PG / PG-13 action filmmaking. 

One thing I noticed for my most recent viewing of the film was that there are many lengthy scenes that usually take place in the same setting for quite sometime. The main locations that come to my mind are the banquet in the opening mission, Ethan's hotel hideout, the IMF headquarters where the lengthy heist scene occurs, and high speed train where all of the film's drama unfolds. And while there are other locations in the film, a lot of time is spent at these four locations. 

There are two incredibly tense heist sequences in the film: one where Ethan and his team must stop a man from stealing information from a banquet and one where Ethan and his team must steal the NOC list from IMF headquarters. Both of these scenes are incredibly tense and nearly devoid of dialog, especially the IMF headquarters heist where Cruise iconically hangs from a pair of wires. I love long built up heist sequences like this. They have a great pay off to them and feel very rewarding to watch. But like I said before, these scenes are incredibly long and fill up most of the film's run time. So many other blockbusters move from location to location and set piece to set piece all of the time. Therefore, I applaud De Palma for taking his time with his set pieces and sequences in order to make them memorable and highly affective.

"Marcellus Wallace" and "Leon" join the team.

Mission: Impossible has a great cast. Tom Cruise is fantastic as Ethan Hunt. He's a great character who will do anything to complete a mission and cares deeply for his friends and teammates. I love young Tom Cruise movies, especially ones where he has short hair (a trend that will alternate throughout the franchise). The supporting cast is all aces too. Ving Rhames (Pulp Fiction) and Jean Reno (Leon) are memorable as members of Ethan's team. I even love the few minutes that Emilio Estevez gets in the opening act of the film. Jon Voight and Henry Czerny are also great in their roles as superior IMF agents. Almost every Mission: Impossible film has a new cast each film. Besides Ving Rhames, Tom Cruise, and now Simon Pegg, Jeremy Renner, and Michelle Monaghan, no one else ever returns dead or alive. Therefore, you have to hold on to the cast of each film real tight and love the time you get with them because you most likely will never see them again.

Alot of Mission: Impossible is built around a twisting plot where antagonizing forces and villains alternate constantly. I don't want to spoil any of the twists because they make the film's first time viewing extremely exciting. And while I did predict the twist during my first viewing, I still found the film to be excellent nonetheless. This film also introduces a lot of staples for the franchise: Ethan Hunt's determination, Tom Cruise running around a lot, the masks that help IMF agents disguise themselves as other people, Ving Rhames at Ethan's teck/hacker friend, an ever changing director of IMF, the fuse lighting title sequence complete with awesome theme music, and the unforgettable "this message will self destruct in five seconds" bit. You could set up a checklist of these and mark all of them off with each film.

I also love Danny Elfman's rendition of Lalo Schifrin's classic score for the television series. Everyone in the world knows this theme song whether or not they have seen anything Mission related. Elfman did a great job updating the score for a 90's blockbuster and it makes for both an exciting and occasionally emotional score.

Now that's a workout.

Mission: Impossible is a great action film, like Taken or Die Hard, to recommend to non-action fans. Besides the action scenes, there is a great story packed with likable characters, tense sequences, and an engaging plot that anyone can get behind. As for die hard action fans, Mission: Impossible is also highly recommended. If you want shootouts and car chases, skip to the sequels. Actually, don't skip to the sequels because you will be cheating yourself out of a really tense film. If you want a smartly written and executed spy thriller, this is the film to watch. De Palma also does a fine job crafting an action thriller that can sit next to his two other action features: Scarface, based off of the 1932 original, and The Untouchables, based off of the television series. Hm, I guess all of De Palma's action films are updates of older material.

Rating: 9/10 - Sleek, smart, and tense. A great start to a good franchise.

Franchise:
Mission: Impossible (1996, dir. Brian De Palma)
Mission: Impossible II (2000, dir. John Woo)
Mission: Impossible III (2006, dir. J.J. Abrams)
Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011, dir. Brad Bird)
Mission: Impossible V (2015, dir. Christopher McQuarrie)