Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation

Following “Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol” was quite a feat. While I don’t think this 5th entry in the series is quite as good as the previous, you compare “Rogue Nation” to other spy action films, and they'll shrivel up in terror and embarrassment.

As Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) is gathering damning proof of a secret organization known as “The Syndicate”, the IMF is disbanded by CIA Director Alan Hunley (Alec Baldwin) He believes Hunt and his team – Benji Dunn (Simon Pegg), Luther Stickell (Ving Rhames) and William Brandt (Jeremy Renner) - to be too unorthodox and destructive. Now fugitives, and without the resources they’re accustomed to, they hope disavowed MI6 agent turned Syndicate operative Ilsa Faust (Rebecca Ferguson) can lead them to the man at the head of the “Rogue Nation” (Sean Harris)

I like the continuity here. Last time, the IMF succeeded by the skin of their teeth. Now the team must answer for the craters they left in their wake at the worst time imaginable. In Sean Harris' character, Ethan’s found a worthy adversary. While our hero relies on luck and instinct – to a fault more than once – this mastermind plans meticulously. He’s got measures and countermeasures, backups for backups. When you think you've scored a victory, you've actually played into his hand. I’m not going to call him as good as Owen Davian from "M: I III", but his growly whisper intimidates and after the film's over, you'll want to watch it again just to grasp his plans' details.

When it comes to the series trademark stunts, they'll make your knees buckle and head swoon. There’s a motorcycle chase so intense – and so long – you get swept up in it. Only later do you realize… wait… that was Tom Cruise on the motorcycle the whole time. It wasn’t some stunt guy or a CGI model! The limits of speed and safety were actually pushed to their limits while zipping through traffic and gunshots. Then there’s a long, extended hand-to-hand combat scene in which – once again – the camera pulls back to confirm that the characters really are fighting in a way that, should one of them fall, it’s curtains in real life. It’s so well coordinated, directed, and shot that it looks easy but in hindsight, you begin shaking.

A few details here and there – characters who are slightly indestructible or one object that appears just at the right place, at the right time – prevent me from calling this a 5-star film. Make no mistake, however, this series (bar the second one, so bad it feels like an even bigger anomaly now) is on a plane above its peers' thanks to its lovable characters (we get some good new additions), hit-the-ground-running pace, ambitious setpieces and high stakes. The more I think of the big scenes featured here, the more impressed I am. (On Blu-ray, August 22, 2018)