Prelude to a Ghost

See, the only reason I watched Mission: Impossible III (2006) is to get to M:I Ghost Protocol. Maybe I wasn't in the best mood - when I started watching it the first time, my wife went on a tirade about manipulative movies that use violence and emotional anguish for entertainment. And she liked Ninja Assassin.

But she's right. The movie starts with the bad guys holding Tom Cruise and threatening to shoot a woman unless he handed over the McGuffin. Just as they shoot her, we flashback to their engagement party: She is his fiancee! Yep, they introduce her just to put her in jeopardy. So, I was not pre-disposed to love this movie.

That said, this is a pretty neat action movie. The schemes don't always make much sense - like the elaborate method Cruise uses to break into the Vatican, to meet ... his team who pretty much waltzed in through the sewers or something. But we get the old dangle-from-a-cable trick several times, whether it's needed or not, and some high-flying skyscraper action, so I can't complain.

Also, Philip Seymour Hoffman as the bad guy, Ving Rames as a hard-ass and Simon Pegg as comic relief. Maggie Q as eye-candy, in a sweet orange Lamborghini. And - semiSPOILER - Curise's fiancee, Michelle Monaghan, gets to kick some ass after being the girl-in-peril for the whole movie.

That little bit of feminism means a lot to me. Thank you, J.J. Abrams, and thanks for keeping the lens flare to a minimum. Now hand it over to Brad Bird for Ghost Protocol.