Mission Impossible: Fallout Review - 6 Ups & 3 Downs
The moustache really WAS worth it after all...
When Justice League came out and everyone got a look at the monstrosity of Henry Cavill's top lip in the very obviously reshot (and badly CGIed) scenes, Mission Impossible: Fallout immediately got an awful lot more interesting. Depending on how you felt about Moustachegate, your perception of the movie would probably have been wildly different, but that face fuzz certainly put the sixth MI movie on the map a little more firmly.
In all honesty, this franchise doesn't really need that much marketing: it has Tom Cruise's star power (and seemingly endless willingness to throw himself out of plabes or into hospital for it) and it's getting to Fast & Furious levels of entertainment. Even without Cavill's lip, it would have been a fairly big draw.
But how does it perform in the end? Well, it's great. It's no Oscar-winner, because it's about as dyed-in-the-wool an action blockbuster as you'll ever see, but as film experiences go, you'll be hard-pressed to find anything as fun and exhilirating as this for the rest of this year. It's not flawless, obviously, but at the final summation, there's an awful lot more right about this movie than there is wrong.
But first the negatives...
Downs
3. The "Twist" Is Spoiled
There was absolutely no need for the trailers to pretty much give away the film's apparent biggest twist. Sure, this is a world where character's true intentions and allegiances are very fluid, but there is absolutely no way of avoiding the suggestions in the marketing.
It's so obvious that you just assume it's not going to be a twist reveal, but then the film treats it like there's no hint up until that point, so it's not all that successful when executed, anyway. Which is a shame. It takes nothing from the characters, thankfully, but still.