Review of Mission: Impossible (1996) by Viniciusbrito — 17 Jul 2018

This first Mission Impossible movie is from the year of 1996 and directed by Brian de Palma.

This is one of those espionage and betrayal stories in a secret department of missions. The main character Ethan Hunt have a team of secret agents that need to intercept and prove the theft of a arhive with the name of the secret agents and his pseudonym, otherwise they would be all killed if it comes to wrong hands, during this mission something goes wrong and the story starts getting more intense and curious.

The thriller of espionage works a lot in the word itself "thriller", while some revelations are happening and you start realizing what is going on together with the character Ethan, some tough things being said while Ethan starts getting tense, the camera starts giving a close in the face of the character, accompanied with a Dutch camera wich worked perfectly well in the whole movie, not just that but also the sound that is used goes getting more creepily increased and that all working together with the character realizing the situation was a great combination of multiple elements in one sequence that I found admirable, how they could express what was happening in Ethan's head an also put the viewer right into it. The building of tension as the story unfolds it is a high point in this movie.

The movie does have some heist aspects, where the leader gotta designate what each one will do, and that worked out very well in the movie, like each person that will work in the heist gotta do one specific thing, and they were able to show how important was each of the things in one of the missions, in the other, not that much, somethings felt unnecessary, but overwall it was very functional. One of heist sequences was great, they, before anything, introduce the whole place, what they would have to do, how the security system worked and what could go wrong, introducing this before was perfect because when the action was happening you knew exact what could spoil the mission and how easy that was to happen. So the tension was primary because of that background, that worked out very well.

The acting in this movie very functional. Tom Cruise is the big guy here, his character is confident and struggle a lot, Tom did a great job in moments of revealing his expressions were price less in some moments, he can be charismatic and deceitful, he did a great job. Emmanuelle Béart as Claire Phelps didn't convince much, she didn't had much expressions. Ving Rhames as Luther Stickell was another great casting and acting, he convinces in absolute everything that he do and also is a very fun guy, he delievered what he gotta. Jon Voight as Jim Phelps worked out, it is no big deal, but it was functional.

The story is interesting, it got you engaged and cheering for Ethan, but there are somethings that really bothered me in that, there is some things that the character takes as absolute true that it comes out of nowhere, it is like someone told him in telepathy, it isn't like he is assuming it, he is guessing. The movie also have some conveniences that feels wrong, like the character would absolute sure about something that doesn't make that much of sense.

The sequence at the end was good, the budget wesn't much large and they did a big sequence by it, that doesn't worked 100% but it was cool to see. There is one sequence at the end that didn't make sense, that one atacked other character instead of the other. And there is another thing that felt really wrong, that a situation that a character that came out of nowhere, comes out like magic. But even with that the narrative is interesting, it does have some nice plot twists, and it isn't bothered to explained everything to the viewer, wich is great, it does use a checkhov gun very well and it works.

The soundtrack of the music is great and remarkable, composed by Danny Elfman. It is a little noir and have a old investigation climate, a spying atmosphere wich is perfect.

The cinematography worked on the cameras, the moving camera that they used was beautiful, the Dutch angle that they used a lot was really beautiful in pretty much every moment, helped to contextualize what was going on, and it was very happy in showing more than one perspective, it showed everyone perspectives, wich was crucial.

This movie is a lot of fun, one sequence that surely is unforgetable, a plot that is interesting but isn't the best, characters that are who they are because of the actors, zero deepening in them, a story that seggestion comes out of nowhere and come close to the surreal, but definely a fun espionage adventure with memorable moments.