Mission: Impossible III   

Ethan Hunt: Tom Cruise

Julia: Michelle Monaghan

Luther Strickell: Ving Rhames

Owen Davian: Philip Seymour Hoffman

Declan: Jonathan Rhys Meyers

Zhen: Maggie Q

John Musgrave: Billy Crudup

John Brassel: Laurence Fishburne

Directed by J.J. Abrams

Written by Alex Kurtzman & 

Roberto Orci & J.J. Abrams

I have always viewed Mission: Impossible as one of the better action franchises.  I enjoyed the first one's labyrinthine plot and the second one substituted style for substance but was still moderately successful.  For the third time around, Tom Cruise, who plays Ethan Hunt, has enlisted television vet J.J. Abrams to inject his vision into the series and the results are good.

For fans of Abrams' show Alias, there isn't much here not to like.  And to say that Mission: Impossible III resembles his former show is an understatement.  The opening scene is from the middle of the movie, and the beginning two-thirds of the film gets us back to that point.  It's a plot device used to great effect on Alias on numerous occasions.

The set pieces are also similar, right down to the exotic locales and derelict factories that play pivotal roles in the action.  

All this similarity is not a bad thing, though.  The numerous action sequences were tight and intense and all felt important to the film and never like filler.  One highly effective scene takes place away from the action involving Ethan's attempt to steal an item from a highly secure location.  Rather than watch him dodge bullets again, the shot focuses on the rest of his team as they wait for him to emerge.  The dialogue is meaningful and the tension is raised by not knowing what is going on.

A lot of focus has been on the fact that Ethan has more of a life now.  He's just a trainer and he has recently become engaged to Julia (Michelle Monaghan).  He is also assigned to rescue Lindsay Ferris (Keri Russell) an agent placed into the field on Hunt's recommendation.  These relationships are pivotal to the plot, but you get the feeling that a lot of these scenes were left on the cutting room floor, especially that of Farris' character, which is relegated to a montage.

It would have been nice to have more character development, but a little is okay, I guess.

As for the rest of the film, the twists in the plot are fairly obvious.  But, of course, in almost every recent action movie involving a government agency, twists like these have become the norm to the point where anything different would be unexpected.  

It's a small quibble, though, because Mission: Impossible III remains entertaining.  It provides what you would want from an action movie and Cruise always manages to deliver in a role like this.  Thankfully, Abrams breathes new life into the franchise and keeps it from going stale, which usually befalls most third installments of any movie series.