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It was surprisingly bad. This is my third favorite film franchise (after Bond and JP), and I just can't wrap my head around how the film turned out this way. It's bloated with characters (how many different unsavory government officials do we need? How many badass women of opaque allegiances?) and even unnecessarily doubles its Macguffin into two parts.
And that Macguffin is terrible. I'm sure I'm exaggerating, but it felt like there were a dozen moments where a character effortlessly pickpocketed the thing off-camera. This is not dynamic storytelling. It was like watching Ocean's 12 over and over.
The action--maybe this is just me--didn't do anything for me. Fallout is not a favorite of mine, mostly because the tone is a little darker than I'd want and they don't do a proper infiltration, but the action is undeniably inventive and memorable. Every sequence in Dead Reckoning felt like something I've seen before. And frankly, I don't think DR did anything better. I thought the trailer scene in The Lost World was more suspenseful than the train carriages in this film. I honestly think the FYEO Citroen chase is more effective than the comic chase in DR.
MI hasn't had a ton of strong villains, but Gabriel must be at the bottom of the list. The made up backstory was kind of pointless, and the strange hints of psychopathy (playing with a dead body strung out on the train) seemed a bit desperate.
I really did not see this coming. I feel I have fair expectations of these franchises I like. (I love all four of the last Bond movies and all six Jurassic movies) I'm not terribly hard to please with this franchise genre stuff. Very odd movie.
He talks a lot about the very interesting character of Marie in this one (so far- I'm less than an hour in!), how the opening sequence of the film had to be completely restructured, how it nearly had a de-aged sequence (with Julia Roberts!), and has also mentioned how he had to direct quite a few scenes remotely due to be contact traced by the COVID tracker whilst making it.
What a steal. If London was near my small town in West Virginia, I'd absolutely be there.
Another interesting thing: McQ says that the de-aging sequence he had planned (with Julia Roberts?!) was quoted to cost as much as the train sequence- and there's a lot in that sequence! That maybe shines a light on why Indy 5 had such a big budget.
So that was his thought process for that part, not that it sounds like it went very far. He said he even costed up the 'cheap youtube version' of de-aging, just with deepfakes etc.
Being in my early-mid teens in the last couple years of the 80s, I can't argue with his choices.
Opperheimer and Barbie be released that weak..
Full run in the US likely to end around $175M, lower than what De Palma’s first film made in the nineties. Lowest M:I also adjusting for inflation.
Worldwide is likely gonna end below the $600M mark, unless it explodes Japan.
Before release I was petty confident that topping Fallout would’ve been an almost impossible task but ending with roughly $100M less then Rogue Nation being a thing? Yikes I didn’t see that coming.
Paramount really messed up.
Let’s see if it will be able to top Quantum’s $589M from 15 years ago.
Ouch. I had some issues with Dead Reckoning, but I figured it would have better legs. Why has it faltered now?
I think there are a couple of reasons, the main one being Barbie and Oppenheimer completely over-performing in a perfect pop culture maelstrom (Barbenheimer) just a week after MI came out.
It took the spotlight entirely away from MI, along with the premium screens. Barbenheimer is looking to have another massive second weekend and MI will loose screens to those.
Its a shame as I think the film is great, but it had the unfortunate luck of running head first into quite the unforeseen cultural phenomenon.
Also, as an aside, calling it “Part One” probably didnt help.
- The beginning reminds me of TSWLM.
- The "antagonist" in this film is so eerie and memorable, despite being something intangible and without personality (so far). Really feels like something almost unstoppable. I wouldn't mind if the Bond films explored this "villain" as well.
- My man Cary Elwes, great to see him.
- Same with Henry Czerny, it's been a while. I love how he's still not a full-fledged villain.
- Loved the image of a thousand typewriters, and all the analog technology mentioned in the film.
- Also loved the security camera manipulation at the airport to conceal Hunt's location.
- Briggs is a really cool character. I wasn't familiar with actor Shea Whigham.
- In the Venice scene, I noticed Vanessa Kirby did a certain facial twitch once or twice, and I think Vanessa Redgrave did a similar gesture in the first film. If so, it was obviously meant to connect the characters. I enjoyed that a lot. I thought Kirby was even better here than in Fallout.
- Loved how Grace impersonated The White Widow.
- Loved the idea of the AI predicting betrayal from Paris.
- The ending with the falling train carriages is great. What I particularly liked about it at first was the fact it is so drawn out. The carriages don't fall in quick succession, but gradually-- a disaster in slow motion. Then, I very much enjoyed the logistics and suspense of Hunt and Grace navigating each carriage's dangers and obstacles.
I missed/didn't understand some aspects of the plot of this film. Some synopses I've read online are either not detailed enough, or appear to contain some mistakes. I'll probably give the film another watch and clarify those bits. Perhaps someone here can answer a couple of questions though?
- I could have misunderstood, but I think the original plan was for Grace to sell the key on the train, and then for Hunt to follow the buyer to find out what the key was for. If so, after choosing not to accept the money, why did Grace take the key back?
- Luther deduced that the AI ordered Gabriel to kill one of the women so that Hunt, in a possible chain of events, could not resist killing Gabriel, thus killing the only one who knew what the key was for. But his comment must have been inaccurate, since the DNI also knew the purpose of the key. And at that moment, the team's plan was based on the expectation that the buyer would also know (but in the end, it turns the buyer --Kittridge-- did not know). And Paris knew as well, right? So maybe I misunderstood or misheard Luther's words?
That’s what happened with the bike jump for me. It’s like Paramount saw the reaction to MAVERICK and thought “people love crazy Tom Cruise doing stunts, let’s market the hell out of that!”
Whoops!