Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation

First Hit:  This film was action packed although it did not unnecessarily make much sense – but who cares – it's really fun to watch.

Each MI film is a stretch of the imagination and Rogue Nation continues the tradition. Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) never plays by the rules because he knows better than any other character in the film. And as obnoxious as that is, it works really well.

Cruise makes statements so strong and with such confidence that certainty of his plan or statements are never questioned, despite the strong smart people on his team. In this film in the opening scenes (which is also in the trailer), he grabs on to the side of a plane taking off so that he can get inside and foil the bad guys who are transporting poisonous gas. His crew William (Jeremy Renner), Benji (Simon Pegg), and Luther (Ving Rhames) are here again and with the introduction of Ilsa (Rebecca Ferguson) as an English agent representative working the same sort of case.

The villain they are after is Atlee (Simon McBurney) who portrays an evil doer looking for a huge payoff. The action scenes are not so elongated that the audience tires, yet the film is filled with them. The chase scenes are long and short enough to capture interest. The quips by the MI team are well thought out. Is this film filled with award winning performances? No. Is the storyline one for the ages? No. Yet the film works and is very fun to watch.

Cruise is easy to watch. He’s competent at making the audience think and believe he’s the character. Cruise does intense and action well. Simon Pegg is funny and good as the head support guy in the MI group. Renner is OK in a more subdued role and delivers what is required from the part. Ferguson is strong as an English counterpart to Cruise. Rhames is OK is a small and important part. McBurney was good as the villain. Christopher McQuarrie wrote a strong action script and did a really good job of directing this action film.

Overall:  This is a fun action film.

Magic in the Moonlight

First Hit:  Lighthearted philosophical romp through Woody Allen’s belief structure around magic, God and science.

Stanley (Colin Firth) is a magician named Wei Ling Soo. He’s famous and he’s good. He also has a job of invalidating and unmasking people who claim to be spiritualist, people that can speak to the dead and denote a person’s past.

His best friend, and fellow magician, Howard Burkan (Simon McBurney) comes to him with a proposition to unmask a young beautiful woman who claims to be clairvoyant. Sophie (Emma Stone) comes from a working class family and because of her abilities has gotten some wealthy people supporting her and her abilities by leading séances.

As the story unfolds, Stanley starts to believe until he sees the fallacy of what is happening to him. The scenery of this film is great. I loved the cars used to represent the 1920’s and the costumes were really wonderful. Stylistically this film is really good, but Allenistic dialogue just seemed to be pressed at times although the last ½ hour was a lot more interesting and engaging.

Firth is excellent as the sarcastic arrogant English magician. However his rudeness actually bothered me from time to time – probably the intended result. McBurney was good as the conniving jealous friend. Stone was sweet as Sophie but she wasn’t quite believable as a psychic. I did think that this pairing didn’t work well because of the age differences between the two. Allen both wrote and directed this film and as expected we get Woody’s version of the world and here it was a little overhanded.

Overall:  Enjoyable and easy to watch, however not sure if the intellectual challenges Allen wanted were really there.