Review of Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation (2015) by Matt H — 04 Dec 2016

Welcome back to the wonderland where impossible things happen nine times out of ten, and human bodies don't break down as they use to in the real world, even if one happens to crash with a superbike!

Yes, it's the fifth "Mission: Impossible", aiming for the same throne as "Fast and Furious" and 007 series, among many others.

This is the genre colloquially known as "competence porn", which means usually drama or action movies full of skilful and powerful people doing tricky stuff which you should not try at home. And watching them do their thang, all confident and shit, is a big part of the viewing pleasure.

"M:I" is all about action and big setpieces, starting strong with the airplane-infiltration and never letting us down later either. Quality job all around. As usual, action relies heavily on orchestrated movement, so, don't expect much realism.

I would say that "Rogue Nation" doesn't try to be as massive action movie as two of the previous ones, or most of the "Fast and Furious", or 007 with Daniel Craig. But the result works well, everything is in its right place and there's always enough entertainment.

The plot and the characters are really thin, to make room for the big setpieces. So there's not much to remember afterwards to call it a real classic. After all, there are so many epic action movies these days, even fairy-tales go this way now.

But I really liked "Rogue Nation". Tom Cruise still knows how to get down like them youngsters!