If you removed all the daredevil stunts Tom Cruise does in 鈥淢ission: Impossible 鈥 Dead Reckoning, Part One,鈥 you鈥檇 have a nifty little 90-minute film.
With them, it clocks in at nearly two hours and 45 minutes, a long sit for anyone. When you consider the story isn鈥檛 really done (Part Two is coming), that鈥檚 overkill.
Luckily, there鈥檚 an interesting story that swirls Artificial Intelligence, rogue agents and Russian sailors into one.
For Cruise, it鈥檚 an opportunity to play James Bond and Indiana Jones.
Getting marching orders from a cassette player, no less, his Ethan Hunt is charged with finding a key that could enable the Entity (as the A.I. don is called) to level the world as we know it.
In more locales than a Cunard cruise ship, Hunt reassembles his team (which includes Simon Pegg and Ving Rhames) to help seek and destroy. Naturally, he has a bevy of women to help or hurt. Paris (Pom Klementieff), one of the latter, chases him around the streets and alleys of Rome in a Hummer. Complicating matters? He鈥檚 handcuffed to a potential partner (Hayley Atwell), who has to share driving duties.
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Also in the mix: Rebecca Ferguson and Vanessa Kirby, two love interests who figured into earlier 鈥淢issions.鈥 They get a chance to square off with the baddies and (in one instance) try their hand at Hunt鈥檚 handiwork 鈥 masks. It鈥檚 a nifty throwback to the television series but there are also several character actors who look like they jump from one CBS procedural to another.
The real calling card 鈥 and that鈥檚 where this gets dicey 鈥 is Cruise鈥檚 ability to run, jump and parachute throughout his quest for the keys and the answer. He does marvelous work but when he鈥檚 fighting atop a train, we get the feeling this isn鈥檛 something original, it鈥檚 just a stunt that Hollywood can do well (thank you, 鈥淚ndiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny鈥).
Director Christopher McQuarrie knows how to maximize Cruise鈥檚 appearance. He just shouldn鈥檛 go back to the same wells all the time.
While 鈥淒ead Reckoning鈥 manages to tap into a futuristic problem (shades of Hollywood鈥檚 writers and actors strikes), it doesn鈥檛 pinpoint a single villain. Like too many recent films, it doesn鈥檛 want to alienate potential audiences. So it plops the bad guys in a nebulous world where billionaires thrive and the rest of us are left to deal with the property they destroy.
That keeps the story unfocused and prompts the stunt show.
鈥淒ead Reckoning鈥 entertains 鈥 no doubt about it 鈥 but it didn鈥檛 need to reach so far so often just to keep the clock ticking.
