REVIEW: Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One [2023]

Rating: PG-13 | Runtime: 163 minutes
Release Date: July 12th, 2023 (USA)
Studio: Paramount Pictures
Director(s): Christopher McQuarrie
Writer(s): Christopher McQuarrie & Erik Jendresen / Bruce Geller (television series)

A mind-reading, shape-shifting, agent of chaos.

It’s tough to follow a late-series high watermark like Mission:Impossible’s duo of Rogue Nation and Fallout, but Christopher McQuarrie won’t be counted out from being the writer/director to do it. He’s the one who brought those two films to life, helping rejuvenate the franchise for star/producer Tom Cruise after it appeared the studio wanted to replace him with Jeremy Renner (a year before the Bourne films tried doing the same). So, why not go back to the well and craft another epic espionage thriller/stunt extravaganza? Why not also make it another two-parter, just a planned one this time?

While there’s nothing wrong with that plan per se, you must come up with a suitably exciting hook. Nuclear weapons have been done. So too have deadly viruses and burning agents. McQuarrie and cowriter Erik Jendresen were therefore tasked with manufacturing a new threat for Ethan Hunt (Cruise) and his crew of IMF castoffs. And what better threat for 2023 (despite the film being shot between 2020 and 2021) is there than artificial intelligence? It got the WGA and SAG-AFTRA to strike and force studios to recognize they haven’t been paid fairly. It’s what has random people ruining classic movies by digitally expanding the frame. And it’s got Elon Musk morphing Twitter into X.

The issue is that AI has been done many, many times before. The Terminator is such a classic that Skynet is still the word most people use when joking about a machine uprising. More than that, though, is the fact that Jonathan Nolan has already created what might be the best science fiction use of the technology with “Person of Interest’s” Machine vs Samaritan (reworked in “Westworld” as Rehoboam). Dead Reckoning’s The Entity was never going to have an easy time winning me over as a result. That doesn’t mean the race to shut it down (or control it) wasn’t sufficiently exhilarating or entertaining. It simply felt like an inferior copy.

That’s what happens when you follow another’s footsteps. I’ll choose “The Machine” whispering in Root’s ear (or “Samaritan” in Control’s) every day before I do The Entity pulling Gabriel’s (Esai Morales) strings. Because the latter never feels as menacing or scary as it should since it isn’t actually doing anything … yet. The closest it got to making my blood pressure rise was the opening submarine-set prologue where a ghost in the machine freaks out a ship’s entire, already tightly wound crew. After that display, however, McQuarrie tips his hand. He shows us that his AI is a manipulator. A disruptor. He teaches us to question everything in such a way that makes the stakes concerning The Entity nonexistent.

And that’s okay since it isn’t the draw. Part One’s mission (should you accept it) is to recover two halves of a cruciform key that may or may not access The Entity’s source code and thus strong-arm control over its now sentient power. Kittridge (Henry Czerny)—long since absent from the series after the original film—knows Hunt is the best man for the job because he’s willing to do anything to save the world and because Ilsa Faust (Rebecca Ferguson) is already embroiled in the chase. Add The White Widow’s involvement (Vanessa Kirby) and things shape up nicely for a wholesale reunion once Benji (Simon Pegg) and Luther (Ving Rhames) get the call.

The AI plays the role of nuisance, toying with Hunt and the others in ways that benefit its own goals. Doing so forces him onto a collision course with elusive thief Grace (Hayley Atwell), the aforementioned Gabriel, and his hired muscle Paris (Pom Klementieff). Bring in Agents Briggs (Shea Whigham) and Degas (Greg Tarzan Davis) and Hunt is pretty much guaranteed to find himself in a few corners with seemingly nowhere to go. Some want him dead. Others arrested. And all of them want the key—for their country, buyer, or selves. That’s why Hunt refuses to quit. He’s the only one willing to do what’s right: destroy it.

If you came for the inevitable action, you won’t be disappointed. We get a crazy car chase with an unlikely lead car, a knock-down fist fight atop a train a la the original film (swapping subway tunnels for outdoor mountain vistas), and a killer close-quarters brawl cementing how much Klementieff steals the show. It’s a lot of grunting and insane physical punishment that ultimately serves to pad the runtime (Part One is 163 minutes alone) and distract from how pedestrian the plot otherwise proves (it’s not enough to threaten to kill Hunt’s newest “Bond Girl”, McQuarrie must fridge another without even giving her a name to set-up a mysterious yet generic origin story for Hunt and Gabriel to have more bad blood than just what’s spilled today).

That’s where this chapter loses me a bit. It’s still very good for what it is, but Rogue Nation and Fallout showed that “good” was actually only good enough. Maybe I’ll reassess after Part Two comes out so I can judge the whole narrative as a cohesive unit, but right now this is probably on the lower end of the franchise spectrum (which isn’t saying much since I’ve given every entry a 7/10 or 8/10 besides the abysmal Mission: Impossible II—apologies to those pretending it’s worthy of reappraisal). It’s great popcorn escapism with expert fight choreography and a much funnier, almost slapstick rapport via sleight of hand subterfuge (a comedic development I can definitely get behind).

Cruise still has it. Whigham is a nice addition playing his usual by-the-books cop. Rhames and Pegg are practically one character, bickering until something happens for the latter to run as help while the former stays behind at his screens. And Ferguson shows why she’s been one of the most intriguingly complex characters of the bunch. I liked Atwell a lot in an assertive damsel in distress role with ample room to grow, but it’s Morales and Klementieff that shine most. They’re perhaps Hunt’s most dangerous villains yet—true psychopaths with confidence to spare. I only wish they weren’t lapdogs for the real antagonist. Rather than terrorize us with their obvious unpredictability, they merely follow commands from both The Entity and McQuarrie.