something wicked this way comes.
It's the weirder half of TomKat!
I have to say, M:I3 was the ultimate and terrifically shameless ego-rush for the latter. Everyone else including Phillip Seymour Hoffman (Capote and the MI3 villain) was rendered grossly superfluous. I know its an action movie and Tom Cruise is supposed to be. Well. The lead. And that he demanded significant 'creative control' over this movie. But the film's feeble attempts at maximizing Cruise screen-time while still grudgingly attempting to apportion like 3 seconds for his co-stars to become significant sidekicks to the all-consuming screen monster that is el Cruiso, were so lame that they might as well have never tried.
In fact it was so shoddily done it was funny. In 1 out of the maybe 2 scenes where Tom Cruise's mug was not visible at all for a whole 20 seconds, Maggie Q and Johnaton Rhys Meyers were alone in some vehicle. And then Maggie Q starts muttering some Cantonese prayer for Ethan Hawk's safety or whatever, and goes on to recount some nostalgic childhood tale behind the meditative chant. And then Rhys Meyer's character, after maintaining a tactful, reverent silence, asks her very earnestly to teach him the prayer. But then, what could have blossomed into an intimate, quiet scene, or Maggie Q uttering her third complete complex sentence in the movie ("We're on the move" or "I'm on it" don't really count) or at the very least, a great cross-cultural opportunity was ruined by Tom Cruise dramatically smashing through 5 windows from the 10th floor of a skyscrapper practically screaming OK FAIR'S FAIR! YOU'VE EARNED ENOUGH SCREEN TIME TO BE CONSIDERED SUPPORTING ACTORS! CAMERAMEN, BACK TO ME BACK TO ME BACK TO ME!!!! WOOOO!!! LOOK AT ME EVERYONE!! I SAID LOOK AT ME DAMNIT!!! I'M FLYING!!! LOOK AT MY HOT PARACHUTE!!! WOOO THIS KICKSASS!!!!!! I'M TOM CRUISE!!!! AND I'M IN LOVE!
So while I can get why Tom Cruise pops out in every scene like some mutant mushroom outgrowth, why bother with the Maggie Q/Rhys Meyers-in-the-car-praying take? It's completely useless and only served to underscore how redundant they really were in the movie. Perhaps they were emulating the Shakespearan tradition of having like, brief "comic interludes" in tragedies? Only maybe this was modified to become a wannabe "deep, sentimental" moment revealing teamwork and fraternity etc until withdrawal symptoms hit Tom Cruise and he came trundling down the middle of Shanghai? No. It fell as flat as Phillip Seymour Hoffman's utterly ignominous death by the end of the show. (OK NOW HE'S DEAD SO WE CAN PLEASE TURN THE LIGHTS BACK ON ME ME ME ME ME!!!!???? SWEET.)
But other than that little peeve. It's a decent, no-brainer action movie. The part shot in Vatican city was cool. After all, we should not judge films so critically even if they do become cellulite shrines for the burgeoning egos of some artistes. Hm.
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