What's Tom Cruise's secret? I'm in my late twenties and often feel like getting out of bed is a physical feat, but TC, now 61 years old, is only getting more outrageous with his films.
When I attended an early screening of Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning I was greeted with the perfect movie to munch popcorn along to. Now with its streaming release, I'd implore you to get the microwave ready. The seventh film in the franchise hits Paramount+ on January 25th.
Dead Reckoning sees Cruise's Ethan Hunt and his fellow Impossible Mission Force (IMF) members scrambling to face their toughest foe yet - AI. Yes, it's Cruise versus ChatGPT, ok it's actually called The Entity but close enough.
The biggest addition in this instalment however is a new hero. Hayley Atwell plays trickster Grace, a thief and hustler dragged into the midst of a conflict for the fate of the free world. She's not afraid to get into the action either and with her baggy-sleeved outfits and sleight-of-hand flourishes, she reminds me of a magician (in a good way).
Even with the stakes, there's plenty of levity in this film too. Simon Pegg's Benji is always good value but that's not all. During the film's best sequence, Atwell and Cruise find themselves handcuffed together in a yellow Fiat 500 and being chased by the police in Rome. Besides the setting, it's a long way from the traditional glamour of spy films and features some amazingly choreographed stunts too.
The best set piece in the film however is saved for the end, and all I'll say is that it involves a motorbike jump that would make Steve McQueen blush. There are plenty of generic action movies with outrageous stunts, but traditionally they are all green-screen trickery. The Tom Cruise guarantee that he does all his own stunts really does give everything extra impact, and watching behind-the-scenes clips is just as impressive as the finished movie.
The bad news is that the next Mission Impossible movie is delayed until 2025, but on a positive note, that gives you plenty of time to rewatch all of the previous films on Paramount+.
