Mission: Impossible Movie Review

Mission: Impossible (1996)

Rent Mission: Impossible on Amazon Video (paid link) // Rent the TV Series 1966-1973 (paid link)
Written by: Bruce Geller (television series), David Koepp and Steven Zaillian (story), David Koepp and Robert Towne (screenplay)
Directed by: Brian De Palma
Starring: Tom Cruise, Jon Voight, Emmanuelle Béart, Jean Reno, Ving Rhames, Kristin Scott Thomas, Vanessa Redgrave, Emilio Estevez
Rated: PG-13
Watch the trailer

Plot
American agent Ethan Hunt, under false suspicion of disloyalty, must discover and expose the real spy without the help of his organization.

Verdict
This disappointed fans that wanted a direct link to the original show, but this is a pure action movie with plenty of surprises and a couple of great action scenes that balance tension and motion. This reboots the TV series and provides an alternative to or competitor for the James Bond franchise. This certainly provided a template for the movies in the franchise to follow. The story is pretty standard, the standout pieces are the action sequences at the middle and end. These movies are built on tent pole action scenes.
It depends.

Review
Who knew the franchise this movie would spawn? This was the first movie that Cruise produced, wanting a larger say in the direction of his movies as well as a larger profit. With this movie, and most of the franchise, the action scenes are planned first with Cruise doing most of his own stunts. Each new movie release is preceded by stories of the death-defying stunt Cruise undertook which is great marketing.

The majority of the original series had Jim Phelps handling a group of agents. He is the only shared character this movie has, played by Jon Voight who handles a different group of agents. The original cast was contacted about appearing in the movie, but they refused with none of them liking the movie.

Emmanuelle Béart and Tom Cruise play Claire Phelps and Ethan Hunt

Tom Cruise plays an agent with authority issues, which happens a lot in Cruise movies. Ethan Hunt is the lead of an advanced team that must recover a list of undercover agents. It's an impossible mission which is the point of the title. They have a bunch of fancy toys, and a couple of times in this movie Hunt pretends to be another person with prosthetics, a hallmark of the original series.

This clearly distances itself from the TV series with a few shocking moments in the first act. The first mission goes awry and Hunt is framed. He must clear his name through an elaborate heist by forming a new team. The story is standard, with a few nice turns. This has some great action sequences, in particular when Ethan actually steals the list. He's suspended from the ceiling, restricted in numerous way by an alarm. When this movie came out that scene was discussed everywhere, and watching this again over twenty years later it's still a good scene.

Tom Cruise plays Ethan Hunt in the vault

I was curious how Hunt knew so much about this highly guarded room. He even knew the exact specifications of the louver which he used as an access point. You could argue Hunt has inside information since he's a spy, but having a top secret room is nullified if people can get information about how it's safeguarded. I realize it's movie magic, but disbelief can only be suspended so far and doing any kind of reconnaissance would ruin the pacing.

This was the start of Cruise doing a lot of his own stunts. The action scenes were conceived before most of the story. That's not all that surprising as the two big action scenes are the best part of the movie. Ultimately that's the problem. If you watch the vault and train scene on Youtube, you really don't need the rest of this movie. Whether this movie knew what it was is unclear, but this franchise certainly knows now that it's action first and foremost with the scenes of dialog to link it second.