Reviewed by Lars Lindahl (larsattacks@mail.com)
Mission: Impossible 2 (2000) ** (out of four)
Directed by John Woo Written by Robert Towne
Starring Tom Cruise, Dougray Scott, Thandie Newton, Ving Rhames, Brendan Gleeson, Richard Roxburgh, William R. Mapother, and Anthony Hopkins.
In 1996, Mission: Impossible confused the heck out of me. A movie way too complex for its own good, only the heart-poundingly superb action sequences by director Brian De Palma made it worth watching and remembering. When I heard that John Woo would direct the inevitable sequel, I was somewhat excited - it's pretty much one great director replacing another. But my primary concern with Mission: Impossible 2 was that the script would once again outwit the visuals and when Robert Towne (who co-wrote the first one) signed onto the project as screenwriter, my worries failed to go away. You see, Towne also wrote the script for Chinatown, without a doubt an excellent movie, but one even more confusing than M:I. To me, Chinatown is the epitome of confusion; one of those movies you have to see multiple times to understand the basic plot. The night before M:I 2 opened, I prayed I wouldn't have to watch a movie that felt like solving a Rubik's cube.
To my surprise and chagrin, it turns out that in order to dumb down a plot, suspense, excitement, and twists all have to be sacrificed. The movie spends so much time trying to explain and re-explain the rudimentary premise that for the first hour and a half, mainly all there is on screen is lots and lots of talking. A lot of dialogue can, if executed correctly, make a film work but if you're expecting a loud, action packed summer popcorn flick and you get a lot of bland conversations - it is very difficult to sit through. Unlike the original Mission: Impossible that forcefully grabs your attention with a mission gone fatally awry, there is nothing in the sequel to get the audience pumped and excited for the final act. To start off the film, there is a plane crash and then some beautiful shots of daredevil spy Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) climbing a massive rock without a helmet, ropes, or even a pair of gloves. But both of these scenes are lacking; the brief incident involving a plane crash is far from interesting and the rock climbing scene is held back by a ridiculous and distracting folk song playing somewhere in the background.
Hunt, conveniently cured from all of the tragic events that happened in his past, is assigned a new mission by his mentor (a cameo appearance by Anthony Hopkins). It turns out that another spy, Sean Ambrose (Dougray Scott), who occasionally substituted for Hunt to complete especially dangerous missions, has turned bad stealing a cell destroying virus called Chimera from a Russian Scientist. It is Hunt's job to find out what Ambrose is up to and who his business partners are. Why does this seemingly routine stand out from others (or why is this movie-worthy material)? Well there is a girl involved. Hunt is ordered to use the angelic and mysterious thief Nyah Hall (Thandie Newton), an ex-girlfriend of Ambrose, to get closer to his arch nemesis. The catch is that, in the process, Hunt almost hypnotically falls for her beauty and really never wants to let her go. M:I 2 is much more romantic than its predecessor when it asks the question - which guy is going to get the girl. The attractive Newton outperforms Hollywood Hot Shot Tom Cruise and is definitely the best part of this movie. Her character contains a certain amount of power that you would never find a female character hold in, say, a James Bond movie and change like this is great to see. But when the plot starts heading into the category of predictable romance story, I knew that this Mission Impossible would not have the paranoia and double-crossing that the original one had.
When something finally happens (during the last half an hour of the movie), it seems particularly out of place from the mild story that started the movie. John Woo, whose unique style of choreographed battle scenes reached its zenith in Face Off, just does not have control over the film. He makes this movie way too serious, when it really should have been a guilty pleasure. For example, instead of Hunt just hitting a guard in the neck and dragging them into an alleyway, he does a cheesy Matrix-style back flip/ jump kick in the air first. After Hunt does this ten times in a row, it is no longer absorbing, just annoying. Another aggravation in this movie was the excessive use of a character wearing a mask and looking like another character in order to fool everyone except, unfortunately, the audience.
The good news is that Towne made the movie comprehensible. The bad news is that the movie is just not interesting enough to recommend. A dull first and second act and an unsuccessfully exaggerated boost of energy in the third act, makes Mission: Impossible 2 the kind of movie that tries too hard to be what is should never have even thought of.
Grade: ** (out of four)
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larsattacks@mail.com (c) 2000 Lars Lindahl
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