Mission Impossible 3

Personally, I can’t believe that they ever made a MI:2, never mind number three. Even the first one wasn’t all that good, with the ending being very predictable. Still, it’s a ‘franchise’ now, and that means summer sequels hoping to be blockbusters.

In this one, the hero, Ethan Hunt has given up going on missions and is just training agents for IMF. The reason he has done this is that he plans on settling down and marrying his fiancé (Monahan). All she knows is that he works for the Department of Transportation doing work on traffic analysis.

But, one of his star pupils gets captured and he feels obligated to rescue her. The rescue is a success but she dies shortly after they escape. During the course of it, Hunt runs afoul of arms dealer Owen Davien (Hoffman), who I admit, is one of the best movie villains in a long time. Too bad he got hardly any screen time. Had he gotten more screen time, this likely would have been one of the best action movies of the summer. Without him, it’s nothing special. Of course, Davien kidnaps Hunt’s fiancé and forces him to steal a biological weapon for him from a laboratory in Shanghai.

The rest of Hunt’s IMF team looks pretty, but with the exception of Ving Rhames, is hardly on screen at all and hardly ever talk either.

I kind of feel sorry for J.J. Abrams. He took a franchise with arguably the world’s best known actor (however crazy he is these days) and sank it with his first try. I guess he’ll have to stick to Alias and Lost.

4 out of 10

X-Men: Last Stand

The movie starts off a few months after the end of X-Men 2, with Wolverine and Cyclops still grieving over the loss of Jean Gray. If you’ve seen the trailers, then you have an idea of what happens next. A ‘cure’ for the ‘X’ gene is found and offered to mutants. Of course, the paranoid people in the government turn it into a weapon and plan to use it as a defence against rogue mutants, like Magento. Magento, of course takes exception to this and forms an army, with the intent on destroying the cure and taking over the planet. He enlists the help of dozens of mutants and storms the facility holding the cure. Of course, the government, armed with its new ‘cure’ weapons, is waiting for them and a battle ensues.

There is also a love triangle of sorts between Kitty Pryde, Iceman, and Rogue, as well as some time spent on developing other ‘lesser’ characters, both in the X-Men and the Brotherhood. Plenty of fun new characters are introduced, the best being Juggernaut (played very hilariously by Vinne Jones).

This movie is considerably darker than the others, with plenty of mayhem and death, so that may or may not be your cup of tea. Personally, I enjoyed the darker take on the X-Men instead of the usual superhero movie with the good guys winning and no one getting hurt.

I was pretty impressed by this movie. After reading reviews about it, I was expecting another it to be like Mission Impossible 3, another cash grab with big actors and no story. Instead, I was treated to a pretty decent story, plenty of action, and lots of characters getting killed. There are some major characters that either get killed or lose their powers, so expect the unexpected (I’m not telling you who they are, sorry). You also need to stay in the theatre after the credits finish to see a special scene involving one of the major characters, otherwise, you’ll have to wait for the DVD in the fall.

8 out of 10