Mission: Impossible III
Mission: Impossible III
Retired from active duty, and training recruits for the Impossible Mission Force, agent Ethan Hunt faces the toughest foe of his career: Owen Davian, an international broker of arms and information, who's as cunning as he is ruthless. Davian emerges to threaten Hunt and all that he holds dear – including the woman Hunt loves.
James Saenz reviewedMay 8, 2025
i have an on again off again relationship with jj abrams’ approach to filmmaking and storytelling. i don’t always like the way he shoots action, and this is one of his films where i wasn’t enjoying it as much as i would’ve liked. the stunts are insane as usual, but the way it’s filmed and edited is a little too jarring and haphazard for my taste, and his visual style doesn’t have the same appeal as woo’s or de palma’s. this is a rougher approach to filmmaking, which is tonally in line with the story abrams chose to tell, but in my eyes this style really suffers from the lack of de palma’s swanky and reserved formalness and woo’s bombastic kineticism. this is also the least visually appealing of the three so far, with some garish color grading and mostly conventional cinematography. that being said, i liked how this entry unofficially starts the series trend of tom cruise sprinting for ungodly distances and the way that sequence was filmed was really gripping.
this is without a doubt cruise’s best acting in the franchise so far, and ethan hunt’s commitment to his relationship with julia is compelling, but that’s the extent of my praise for the narrative and characterizations. all of the side characters typically feel hollow outside of ethan in these movies, but that feels the most apparent here. philip seymour hoffman is an absolute tour de force, and while he’s genuinely stellar in this role and carries the performance with this eerie gravitas of barely reserved fury, his character isn’t given much to do and feels like wasted potential. the twists are predictable and not very satisfying, whereas similar twists like the masks felt fresh in the original film and campy fun in the sequel.
i still had a good time, but i miss the over the top flair of woo’s directorial hand and lament what could’ve been had the series retained the paranoia and anxiety of de palma’s entry. i’m also coming to terms with the fact that ethan hunt won’t be doing magic tricks anymore and that’s honestly the saddest part. his little card trick scene in the original was so quirky and added so much personality to both his character and the film.