Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation

I apparently have an affinity for the natural freaks of this world. This would explain why I live in a neighborhood where it's standard fare to see a man in his thirties riding a unicycle on his way to work while also rocking a top hat. It also explains why I love oddball bands like Radiohead so much, they have a lead singer who has a lazy eye and dances around on stage like he's having a seizure! It's almost as if I love to be around people whose lives seem to be way more messed up than mine is; it just makes me feel better about myself.

This would also explain why I own more Tom Cruise movies than any other actor or actress in Hollywood. I am by no means a fan of Scientology but I loved it when he was jumping up and down like a drunken marionette on Oprah's couch because he finally convinced Katie Holmes to sign a contract to "marry" him. Everyone else abandoned ship on Cruise but not me! I went right out and bought the War of the Worlds DVD (awful movie btw) the day it came out on video!

So of course I was there on opening night of Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation, where else would I be? The Pee Wee's Big Adventure party isn't for another week or so, so I had time.

Rogue Nation was written and directed by the guy who wrote The Usual Suspects and Jack Reacher (Christopher McQuarrie), so you had to know going in that you were in for a good complex thriller that would be full of twists and turns.

Head IMF agent Ethan Hunt (Cruise) is being chased by the CIA after the Impossible Mission Force was shut down by the government due to recklessness. Hunt is refusing to come in and give himself up until he tracks down this new secret organization called the Syndicate; he believes that they are a subversive unit of ex agents who are responsible for most of the world's latest disasters and that they have a plan in place to take over the world once they get what they need.

The first act of the movie is fairly hammy, as there are all of  these weird almost choreographed action scenes that feel like tributes to the old Indiana Jones movies. But once you get to the second act, you finally get what you came to see. Hunt has to complete what appears to be an impossible task which involves a secret underground water facility and a high level hacking job, very reminiscent of the infamous scene from the first one.

Having said that, they are able to hack into some pretty sophisticated systems a little too easily for my taste but that's just nitpicking; when a movie is already clocking in at 130 minutes, you don't really have time to show nerds breaking computer code.

There are two action scenes in particular, one involving a knife fight and the other a killer motorcycle chase scene, that will make this movie stand out above any of its counterparts this summer. I've seen a ton of action movies in my lifetime but none had a chase sequence that was filmed in this manner. It honestly felt like you were playing the most advanced Moto GP video game ever made! This scene alone is worth the price of admission.

There are double agents, bad guys who use hammers, and beautiful British women who wear bikinis in Morocco; what more do you need in a movie. My only concern is that they can't really make any more sequels as father time has to at some point catch up to Cruise. I mean, it already has with Ving Rhames as he looks like fat grandpa Jenkins in this this movie. He honestly had to run 10 feet in one scene and it looked like he was about to die on screen.

But we're not talking about the future, we're talking about this movie, and this movie just happened to be very FRESH!