Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation

is exactly what it should be:  big, action-packed, frequently dumb, Mission: Impossible-style fun.  It starts fast, stays fast, and does the nice turn of dispensing with the scene its trailers most over-used--Tom Cruise hanging onto the plane--in its first few minutes.

As always, Cruise dominates the action and the film itself, but Simon Pegg, whose role is larger than ever, helps balance the movie.  Rebecca Ferguson did a solid turn as the woman who might be with them or might be an enemy.  The rest of the usual cast all turned in good performances.

Films in this franchise are at their weakest when they slow the pace and examine the inner lives of its characters.  At those moments, the movies typically sag to nearly the breaking point.  Rogue Nation never enters that danger zone and instead just keeps on moving.  It's the right choice for this film.

I had a fine time watching it.

Of course, you can't think too hard about the plot or the stunts, but you know that's the case when you walk into the theater.  No problem.  Some of the lines, particularly a late-in-the-film Alec Baldwin monolog about Ethan Hunt (Cruise), are laughable, but mostly they speed by so quickly that you don't have time to feel the pain.

If you enjoy this kind of movie--and you know I do--go see Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation.

Hector and the Search for Happiness

The critical summary for this movie at RottenTomatoes is that Simon Pegg remains appealing but the movie is too schmaltzy, a summary that reflects the film's 31% critical rating.  The audience rating, though, is 66%, which jibes rather well with its 6.6 rating at IMBD. 

I'm with the audience. 

I loved this movie.  Pegg's performance was the best I've ever seen from him.  Though the film's very existence immediately summons fears of sentimentality, it did a good job of wandering in and out of that territory just as its protagonist's own feelings did. 

I don't want to spoil the movie for you, so I'll leave you with this:  Though the critics certainly can make a case for their opinion, I believe they're wrong, that there is still room for a film with good heart and strong feelings, that though there may be no simple answers to complex questions, sometimes, just sometimes, for each of us a simple answer may be the only answer to a very complex question. 

The World's End

I'm a stone Simon Pegg fan.  I consider Shaun of the Dead to be the funniest zombie movie yet made, and I've seen more than any sane man's share of zombie comedies.  So, as I often do, I entered the theater predisposed to absolutely love this movie. 

I quite enjoyed it.  I laughed a lot.  I found the touching moments at least somewhat touching.  If you're in the mood to laugh--and who isn't, really?--I recommend you catch it in the theater. 

I just could not quite love it. 

After discussing the movie with Kyle, who saw it separately, I've come to believe that the central problem is that the filmmakers could not quite commit to a single identity for the movie.  They weren't willing to make it a full-on gonzo comedy, nor were they willing to produce a comedic growing-up story.  The result of this lack of commitment was that the funny parts weren't quite as funny as they should have been, and the touching parts weren't quite as touching as one would hope.

A different take on the same basic evidence is that they tried to make a full-on gonzo comedy that was also a touching film about friends growing up, and they didn't quite succeed. 

I'll resist spoilers because the movie is good enough that I don't want to ruin any of it for you, but I will say that the last third is where the film's mixed ambitions are, predictably, most evident.

Check it out, because we should all want Pegg and writer/director Edgar Wright and the always amusing Nick Frost to make more movies, and because you will definitely laugh.  You may even love it.  I wish I had. 

Paul

I went to see this movie earlier tonight, on opening day. I had to. Consider just some of its attractions:

* Simon Pegg. I've been a fan of his since Shaun of the Dead. I also strongly support his position on traditional zombie values.

* Nick Frost. He and Pegg have a friendship that shines through in their buddy films.

* It's a road-trip film. I'm a sucker for them. Add the fact that the journey is to save an alien (the title character) from ruthless government pursuers, and you have a fine starting point for a run down the back roads of the USA's UFO heartland.

* Their adventure starts at the San Diego Comic-Con. I've always wanted to attend this con, and it is one of the geek meccas.

* It's full of fan-boy in-jokes. I'm quite sure I didn't catch them all, and I caught a lot of them. I'm clearly in its target demographic.

Though my attendance was certain, my reaction was not. I feared the movie would be simply too dumb for me to enjoy.

It wasn't, though at times it veered mighty close to the cliff edge of stupidity. To avoid being annoyed at those moments, I had to check my disbelief at the theater door, turn down my mental processing speed, and accept the movie for the silly bit of fun that it was.

Fortunately, I did all of those things, so I had a fine time watching Paul.

I've been saying similar things about a lot of films lately, and that's sad. I'm completely willing to sign up for and enjoy fluffy entertainment, but I'm beginning to crave the intelligent, well-plotted action or comedy movie with characters who are real and stories that make sense.

Until one of those pops up, though, check out Paul. If you're at all an SF fan-boy or fan-girl, you'll enjoy it.