My Favorite Scene: Mission Impossible (1996) “Langley”



Every now and again with “My Favorite Scene”, we like to take a stroll through an entire franchise to prep ourselves for an upcoming entry.  Mission: Impossible V is coming out in 2015.  However it is not coming out until Christmas.  Why not wait until Christmas to review the best scenes from the first four entries?  Well, Mission: Impossible V has the unfortunate luck to be scheduled in the wake of the behemoth that will be Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens.  I have a feeling at that time, we’ll be reviewing the previous entrants in that series, geeking out in articles about Ep. 7 or screaming and gnashing our teeth over Ep. 7.  So let’s give Mission: Impossible, a series that has been around now for nearly 20 years, its due this month. agente-tom-cruise---mision-imposible-1-605xXx80

 

The thing I like about the MI movies, is that each one has a completely different feel.  All five have different directors and they’ve taken the series, stylistically, down different roads (even more so than the Bond franchise which also rotates directors).  The first Mission: Impossible was Brian DePalma’s to helm and it has the distinction of being one of the most confusing (bust still enjoyable) films I’ve ever sat through.  I was 17 and an idiot (still an idiot, beat you to it commenters), but it was about the fourth time I watched it when the lights came on and I went Ohhhhhhh…..that’s pretty cool.  It might have also helped to have known what a NOC list was in the first place.  Google it!  I’m not spoon-feeding you here!

The undeniable highlight of the picture was the break=in of CIA HQ by Tom Cruise’s Ethan Hunt and his team.  I couldn’t find an entire clip of the sequence so I’ve pieced together the iconic portion as best I could manage. The image of him centimeters from the floor, spread eagle, while Jean Reno tries to haul him up, has become one of the signature clips in modern action cinema.  It still holds up, but I would be willing to wager that the Chromebook I’m writing this on is more powerful than that monster comp the CIA has in that vault.

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