Mission Impossible More & More

Mission Impossible More

Watching Tom Cruise hurtle through the latest “Mission: Impossible,” taking one blow after another, you can’t help worrying that he won’t be able to keep this action stuff up. It looks so hard! But here he is, the 53-year-old Tom Terrific, holding onto a plane as it takes off, defying sense and gravity, and making you wonder (not for the first time) if he would actually die for our pleasure. By the time he’s flailing underwater without an oxygen tank, struggling against violent surges as breath and time run out, you can almost feel the life leaving his body.

The first “Mission: Impossible” movie, a spinoff from the 1960s television show, was released 19 years ago and was, though it’s almost hard to believe it now, something of an auteurist event, having been directed by Brian De Palma. Mr. Cruise was an established action star by 1996, but he also helped produce the first film, which strengthened his status as an international brand.

 As a star-auteur, he has always been the most important feature and effect of the series, although it’s telling that Mr. De Palma oversaw the set-piece that gave the movies their foundational image: Mr. Cruise’s operative, Ethan Hunt, hovering like a spider (or a puppet) above a luminous white floor while suspended by a very thin rope.

As the clock tick-tocks, and Ethan struggles to keep his cool — a single drop of sweat splashed on the floor would blow the operation — the visual gloss and high-tech gobbledygook, Mr. Cruise’s graceful athleticism and Mr. De Palma’s New Hollywood suspense chops flow together, turning the scene into the emblematic “Mission: Impossible” showstopper. 

It’s the kind of pure cine-spectacle that jolts you before sweeping you up. There’s never been a scene in the series as memorable as that one, even if the exploding fish tank, the film’s other eye-popper, comes close. These sequences set a high bar both for directors who followed in Mr. De Palma’s wake and for Mr. Cruise’s physical performance, which in the later installments has largely involved progressively scarier stunts.

 

The writer and director of the latest movie — its goofy full title is “Mission: Impossible — Rogue Nation” — is Christopher McQuarrie, who’s been tethered to Mr. Cruise for the past decade. They worked together on Mr. McQuarrie’s adaptation of “Jack Reacher,” a grim genre bummer that was a bad fit for Mr. Cruise, who can rarely go tough and dark with conviction.

Mr. McQuarrie also had a hand in writing “Edge of Tomorrow,” Doug Liman’s underloved science-fiction romp that dovetailed with Mr. Cruise’s strengths, including a too infrequently tapped gift for light comedy. Mr. McQuarrie, who made his name with his rebuslike script for “The Usual Suspects,” tends to work the more lugubrious end of the entertainment spectrum, so it’s a nice surprise that “Rogue Nation” isn’t just another clenched-jaw blowout.

Sleek and bloated, specific and generic, “Rogue Nation” is pretty much like most of the “Impossible” movies in that it’s an immense machine that Mr. McQuarrie, after tinkering and oiling, has cranked up again and set humming with twists and turns, global trotting and gadgets, a crack supporting cast and a hard-working star.

Jeremy Renner, Ving Rhames and Simon Pegg (with his valuable comic timing) are all back, joined by the series newcomer Rebecca Ferguson. She plays a super-vixen, the amusingly named Ilsa Faust, who enters with the camera peeking up her skirt and rises like a half-shell Venus, à la the original Bond Girl, Ursula Andress. Even so, Ms. Ferguson has more going for her than man-throttling thighs (and an ace stunt double, Lucy Cork); she holds her own both on the ground and in midair.

Mr. Cruise looks comfortable with Ms. Ferguson, another plus. For most of his action-movie career, he has come across as a less romantically nimble, less self-amused version of Douglas Fairbanks, the swashbuckler who leaped through the silent era. Like Mr. Cruise, Fairbanks performed many of his own white-knuckle stunts, as when he climbs up the chain of a closing drawbridge in “Robin Hood.” (Fairbanks helped start United Artists, which Mr. Cruise owned a piece of for a while.) 

All too often, Mr. Cruise’s insistence on doing frightening stunts in the “Mission: Impossible” series has become its most distinguishing quality. In this movie, though, when he goes airborne like a barnstormer, the scene’s self-conscious sense of the absurd suggests he’s trying to let his inner Harold Lloyd out to play.

That helps speed up “Rogue Nation,” which slows down when the plot tangles or some ceremonial manly peacocking ensues, usually from Mr. Renner and Mr. Cruise. Clearly Mr. McQuarrie and his star feel the need to stamp the series with seriousness, something that Mr. De Palma knew better than to do. 

And throughout “Rogue Nation,” you can sense the filmmakers comfortably, at times awkwardly, playing tug of war with the mood, which grows sinister with the excellent Sean Harris as the regulation evil genius and almost frisky with Alec Baldwin as an intelligence blowhard and Tom Hollander as a political boob. Mr. Pegg’s second-banana flair is especially crucial here because it helps show that Mr. Cruise, whose smile at times seems awfully strained these days, can still take a ribbing as well as a licking.

“Mission: Impossible — Rogue Nation” is rated PG-13 (Parents strongly cautioned). Kids, don’t try this at home.

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Movie Metal Detectors

 

Movie Metal Detectors

Shreveport Representative Barbara Norton says she is already working on legislation to do so. Norton says she views going to the movies as a family outing.
 
"It's a sad day in America when parents and grandparents can't be safe in a movie," says Norton.

Norton plans to introduce the measure during next year's legislative session, if re-elected this fall. She says hand-held metal detector wands start at $50, while walk-through models can cost theater owners one to two thousand dollars.

Norton says no amount of money is worth more than people's safety.
"Is my thousand dollars or fifty dollars more important than a life," says Norton. "I think not."
 
Norton feels that legislators have a responsibility to do whatever they can to make sure Louisiana residents are safe. Some think Metal Detector could scare off potential customers and increase wait times for movie goers to get to their film.

Norton says standing in line for a few minutes is a small price to pay to save lives.

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The Astronaut Wives Club UPDATE !

 















The series, which was created by Stephanie Savage (Gossip Girl, Hart of Dixie) and is based on Lily Koppel's best-selling non-fiction book of the same name, was supposed to debut last summer before being pushed to midseason and then once more to summer as it went through a creative retooling process that allegedly forced the series to spend more time focusing on the actual astronauts of the title, and not just the lives of their wives, which largely feels like a mistake.

Expecting too much from The Astronaut Wives Club, ABC's four-years-too-late companion to Pan Am, will likely lead to disappointment. It's enjoyable as light, escapist summer fare if that's all you're looking for, but it doesn't hold up well under scrutiny and it certainly won't be a deep introspective look at the lives of women in the 1960s


Far be it from me to begrudge more screentime for the likes of Bret Harrison (Reaper) or the handsome Wilson Bethel, who's coming off a four-year run as the best thing about The CW's Hart of Dixie, but the series' attempt to cover a considerable length of time in the lives of both the men and the women is just too much for the series' foundation to support.

The end result is a good-looking, well-styled show that's spread just a little too thin as it tries to serve too many masters. Add in poorly shaded characters dressed in beautiful '60s era costumes and you've got a series that's good but not necessarily great.

The largest check in the pro column is that Astronaut Wives Club employs a cast filled with talented women who are doing their best to sell what they've been given. Yvonne Strahovski (Chuck, 24) plays the striking Rene Carpenter (Rene "rhymes with peachy keen," as she told one of the other wives), a housewife who supports her husband (played by Bethel), but isn't shy about making herself stand out among the other wives either.

This was made quite obvious when she ignored a request for the women to wear a pastel shirtdress for a photo op, choosing instead to dress in a bright floral number that ensured all eyes would be on her. There's also the matter of her platinum hair (most definitely a wig), which often bordered on distracting because it's not a shade naturally found in the real world.

Odette Annable (Banshee) stars as the young Trudy Cooper, a woman who has a perfect life on the surface, but whose marriage is secretly falling apart behind-the-scenes after her husband cheated on her with their neighbor. Despite this, she continues to publicly stand by her man (Harrison) because she believes he deserves to be the first man in space and because that's what women were taught to believe in at the time.

She also had dreams of one day being a pilot herself and is probably the most "modern" of the modern-day wives, as evidenced by her willingness to speak up and the fact she preferrs to wear pants instead of the more common dresses of the era.



Dominique McElligott (Hell on Wheels) is a highlight as Louise Shepard, who acts as the de facto lead in the series premiere, because her husband Alan, played by Desmond Harrington, actually was the first American man in space. Determined and strong-willed, she's cold and unlikeable for a large part of the premiere because she refuses to admit she's a human being with real emotions.

In an attempt to remain strong in the face of the public, she claimed she didn't need anyone's help or moral support when Alan's rocket launched into outer space or when he was caught cheating after the wives arrived to surprise their husbands in Florida (a trip orchestrated by Trudy once she overheard a conversation during a phone call to her own one-time cheating husband).

The rest of the women didn't get as much to do in the series' first hour (that changes a bit as future episodes—three were released to critics for review—expand the focus on the other wives) and so they're even less developed than Rene, Trudy, and Louise at the outset.

Rounding out the cast are the effortlessly radiant JoAnna Garcia Swisher (Once Upon a Time) as the sweet and grounded Betty Grissom, who's husband Gus (Joel Johnston) would be the second American in space; Erin Cummings (Masters of Sex) as Marge Slayton, a bombshell with a secret who's married to Deke (Kenneth Mitchell) and who carries herself with confidence yet secretly fears she doesn't measure up to the other wives; Azure Parsons (True Detective) plays the shy Annie Glenn, the wife of John (Sam Reid), who often blends into the background because she rarely speaks; and Zoe Boyle (Downton Abbey) appears as Jo Schirra, who swears by the Navy Wife, is married to Wally (Aaron McCusker), and is kind of just there at the beginning of the series.



Some of the women have an easier time wrapping their mouths around and pulling off the often stale dialogue than others—as the most modern housewife, Annable's Trudy was saddled with some truly awful speeches in the pilot about how women shouldn't put up with shit just because they're women (the fact she was faking a happy marriage to her husband for the sake of his career slightly undercut her entire argument for women being equal to men), while non-Americans Strahovski, McElligott, and Boyle were all doing their best to capture the air of American housewives in the '60s.

Strahovski's take on what I assume was supposed to be a southern accent was a little off at times, which was unfortunate because her on-screen husband is incredibly skilled at faking one.  Plus, she proved she was more than capable of handling a generic American accent during her time on Chuck.

But that's largely inconsequential nitpicking and the series faces a much larger, more immediate problem than faking an accent. The cast is made up of impressive, likable, and talented women, but their on-screen personas are largely defined by single personality traits revealed during a party celebrating their husbands where they all first meet.

Annie was embarrassed that she stuttered (hence her character's lack of speaking lines), Louise was harsh and opinionated and thought she was better than everyone else, and Marge led a (probably) promiscuous life when she lived overseas as a single woman. These singular traits didn't do much to fill in the rough outlines these women were at the outset of the series and it made identifying with them rather difficult.



Furthermore, the series is supposed to be about the bonds these seven women share based on their station in life as the wives of the first astronauts, but the relationships between them had little time to grow and breathe thanks to the quick pace the series is determined to maintain.

The series premiere covered more than two years in the lives of these women, but the relationships—outside of Trudy and Marge who we know knew each other prior to the start of the series thanks to a helpful bit of exposition—don't feel lived in or authentic in any way by the end of the hour, which featured a scene in which they all danced and partied together in celebration.

Sure, there's an earlier scene in which the self-assured Rene came to the aid of an overwhelmed Annie when she was cornered by a nosey jackass reporter, and you can understand why Trudy organized a trip to Florida to surprise the men after discovering Alan was cheating on his wife, too, but it's all superficial.

Because the series is an open-and-shut case, it's understandable why the writers aren't doing a lot of deep digging as they attempt to cram years of story into a single hour, but it unfortunately also prevents important bonds from developing and deepening, and when that's the premise of the series, it's a little worrisome.

Still, despite these issues The Astronaut Wives Club had enough going for it as a stylish and enjoyable reprieve from the lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer that if you're willing to accept the fact it may never explore sexism or the true bonds of female friendship or even the idea of women in the workplace, then set your DVR for a summer filled with beautiful costumes, fun '60s-era tunes, and computer-generated shots of actors standing next to President Kennedy.

 But if you're turned off by the idea of women who believe their only job is to stand by their man (even if this is set in the '60s) or make ham loaf or organize block parties to sell their incredible happy life stories to a reporter from Life Magazine (played by Rectify's Luke Kirby), then maybe you should change the channel.

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Earthquake movie : 'San Andreas'

Earthquake movie : 'San Andreas'

"Don't consider this your seismology course," said U.S. Geological Survey seismologist Lucy Jones, who previewed the movie this week in California.

San Andreas, the new disaster movie opening Friday, features gigantic earthquakes ripping California apart. But don't count on a lesson in accurate science.

Filled with typical Hollywood over-the-top exaggeration, it was "a lousy documentary but a good movie," Jones said. "It was better than I thought it would be."

What did it get wrong? Plenty, she said.

The movie features magnitude-9.6 and -9.1 earthquakes in California, which can't happen along the San Andreas fault, Jones said. A magnitude-8.3 quake is the upper limit that can occur along that fault, she added. Worldwide, the strongest quake ever measured was the magnitude-9.5 quake that hit Chile in 1960.

In addition, the movie features a giant quake-caused tsunami, which isn't possible on the San Andreas fault line because it is on land. An oceanic quake is needed to cause a tsunami.

The movie tsunami, which crashed over the Golden Gate Bridge, also was way too big. "You can't get a tsunami bigger than the ocean is deep," Jones said.

Other quibbles: Earthquakes can't be predicted and buildings don't explode in quakes (they collapse).

Still, Jones said there were a couple of things moviemakers got right: One earthquake can trigger another nearby, and the aftershocks in the movie were realistic.

The movie also detailed the correct actions people should take when a quake happens: "Drop, cover and hold on."

Movies are ultimately about emotions, and Jones said the filmmakers really captured that, especially the feelings of separated family members. "Not knowing if your family is OK is hard," she said. Jones said she hopes the film will spur families to develop a communication plan in case of a disaster.

San Andreas, which stars Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, opens Friday nationwide.

Cr.USA Today

Every Tom Hanks Movie in 7 Minutes

This week, Tom Hanks and James Corden... wait, "who's James Corden?"  you ask.

He's the new British comic/actor that's taken over for Craig Ferguson as host of The Late,

Late Show... so back to Tom Hanks. Tom and James reenacted all of Tom's biggest movies, from Splash to Big to Forrest Gump and Castaway, all in 7 minutes.

It's a good way to catch up on Tom's extensive filmography without spending the next 72 hours glued to your TV.


Cr. CH  Collegehumor