Review #1,374: 'Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol' (2011)

Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol continues the series' trend of introducing a new director with each new instalment, hoping that a pair of fresh eyes will prevent the franchise from growing stagnant. A few eyebrows were raised when it was announced that J.J. Abrams' successor would be none other than Brad Bird, director of such animated classics The Iron Giant, The Incredibles and Ratatouille, with what would be his first live-action picture. However, it becomes clear early on that Bird is more than up for the task, with his background in colourful animated efforts (including one of cinema's all-time best superhero adventures) perhaps inspiring him to make something all the more physical. This fourth entry is the most action-packed yet, and carries a hell of a punch, with one jaw-dropping set-piece in particular blowing any stunts from the previous films completely out of the water.

IMF agent Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) is spending time locked away in a Moscow prison, keeping tabs on Bogdan (Miraj Grbic), a fellow inmate who may posses vital information on a man known as 'Cobalt'. With Cobalt now in possession of a file containing Russian nuclear launch codes, time is running out, so agents Jane Carter (Paula Patton) and the recently-promoted Benji Dunn (Simon Pegg) break him out in order to infiltrate the Kremlin and gather information on their mysterious target. During the mission however, a bomb is detonated, leaving the Kremlin in ruins and Hunt and his team, who are the main suspects, disavowed by their government. Despite IMF's reputation lying in tatters, the agency Secretary (Tom Wilkinson) tasks Hunt with continuing his hunt for Cobalt, who has been revealed to be Kurt Hendricks (Michael Nyqvist), a nuclear strategist who feels that an extinction event is long overdue.

If there is a major flaw in Ghost Protocol, it's Nyqvist's villain. While Philip Seymour Hoffman was brought in last time to truly jangle the nerves, Hendricks isn't given enough screen-time or a clear enough motivation to make much of an impression, despite being played by a damn fine actor. This does, however, open more space for the team itself, who are eventually joined by intelligence analyst William Brandt (Jeremy Renner). Their mission takes them across the globe, and eventually to the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, where of course Hunt must scale the highest building in the world in the most vertigo-inducing sequence ever captured on film. With Hunt wielding only a pair of high-tech suction gloves to save him from certain death, Bird uses every camera angle and editing technique to make it a moment to dread for anybody with a fear of heights. Once again, Tom Cruise does all of his own stunts, demonstrating why he one of the most respected actors around, despite the inherent craziness of his personal life. It's basically none stop action surrounding the flimsiest of McGuffins, but when the fights and stunts are choreographed so spectacularly, it's easy to forgive the picture's flaws and simply go with it.


Directed by: Brad Bird
Starring: Tom Cruise, Paula Patton, Simon Pegg, Jeremy Renner, Michael Nyqvist, Léa Seydoux
Country: USA/United Arab Emirates/Czech Republic/Russia/India/Canada

Rating: ****

Tom Gillespie

Review #1,076: 'Warcraft: The Beginning' (2016)

It was only a matter of time before the massive online role-playing game World of Warcraft was adapted for the big screen. With high fantasy still hugely popular thanks to Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit trilogies and HBO's Game of Thrones, now seemed the ideal time to bring Warcraft's world of orcs, mages, trolls and elves to the cinema-going audience. Yet even with a talented director at the helm, Duncan Jones, Warcraft flopped hard domestically, but proved such a smash-hit in China that there's now talk of a sequel tailored solely for the Chinese market. That little factoid, symbolic of the increasing importance of overseas box-office to U.S. productions, is probably the only interesting thing to emerge from the film.

Somewhere in this tale of giant green orcs, giant grey orcs, magical portals, hairy men, hairier mages, grumpy dwarves and huge CGI battles, there's the faint whiff of a plot that focuses on both sides of a war between the peaceful humans and a brutal hoard of orcs. In order to cater for us noobs - those of us who have never spent days slurping energy drinks and munching on Doritos in front of our computer playing the game - writers Jones and Charles Leavitt spend most of the film explaining this world to us and the many factions that operate within it. The main focus on both sides of the battle is Durotan (Toby Kebbell), an orc chieftain with a pregnant partner, and Anduin Lothar (Travis Fimmel), a stock warrior-type with a charisma vacuum.

Durotan is under the command of warlock Gul'dan (Daniel Wu), who has already sucked the life out of one world using a dangerous magic called 'fel' and has used sorcery to open a portal into the next world, Azeroth. Lothar, observing the devastation caused by one of their attacks, comes across mage Khadgar (Ben Schnetzer), who wants to bring the traces of fel to the attention of Guardian Medivh (Ben Foster) and the king Llane Wrynn (Dominic Cooper). When an orc scouting party are beaten by Lothar and his fellow humans, they capture half-orc slave Garona (Paula Patton) and send Durotan back to the hoard defeated. However, seeing the devastation Gul'dan is causing to the land and his dismissal of honourable orc tradition, Durotan secretly plans to team up with the humans to defeat the evil tyrant and free his people.

I actually quite enjoyed the opening 30 minutes of Warcraft. Unhappy with portraying yet another man vs. evil orcs story, Jones' decision to give them both a voice is a breathe of fresh air. But this thoughtful approach quickly gives away to a textbook of cliches, from the humble warrior with a great destiny to the annoying young sidekick who just may be the one to save them all. And don't expect a complete film, as the 'Beginning' in the title means exactly that. Clearly the film-makers were banking on squeezing a trilogy out of this, and don't bother to give us an actual conclusion that would make us want to see a next instalment. With daft names that anyone unfamiliar with the world of Azeroth won't remember, you'll be too busy trying to figure out what's going on to care about many of the characters, with only Kebbell - delivering another impressive motion-capture performance - and Foster getting through it with their reputation in tact. And so the search for a decent video game adaptation goes on.


Directed by: Duncan Jones
Starring: Travis Fimmel, Paula Patton, Ben Foster, Dominic Cooper, Toby Kebbell, Ben Schnetzer, Daniel Wu, Ruth Negga
Country: China/Canada/Japan/USA

Rating: **

Tom Gillespie