“Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning” begins by saying thank you to the man who made it all possible – Tom Cruise.
“Without you, the world would be a very different place,” says President Erika Sloane (Angela Bassett) solemnly via tape recorder – the kind that kicks off almost every “Mission: Impossible” movie – as Ethan Hunt (Cruise) looks on, a keen sense of duty written all over his face. Clips (literally, so many clips) play from previous “Mission: Impossible” movies, reminding us of all that Tom Cruise – ahem, sorry, Ethan Hunt – has done over the years: how many bombs he has defused, how many lives he has saved, how many stunts he has almost died performing.
Tom Cruise is one of our most important movie stars, and also one of our most improbable – and not just because he is still somehow alive after spending a career doing things like driving motorcycles off of cliffs. Despite a significant rough patch in the 2000s/early 2010s, despite the Scientology of it all, despite all the couch jumping in the world – he has managed to stay relevant and position himself as the savior of movies. And, if I’m being honest, it truly feels like he is sometimes!
Read Sammie’s full review on Rough Draft
