MISSION IMPOSSIBLE: GHOST PROTOCOL (Brad Bird, 2011)
GHOST PROTOCOL is the fourth installment in the MISSION IMPOSSIBLE franchise, the franchise that solidified Tom Cruise's image as an action star. Brad Bird directs (you might remember him as the guy who directed the Pixar animated movie THE INCREDIBLES) while J.J. Abrams takes a back seat as a producer this time. Almost nothing has been carried over from the previous film, except Simon Pegg's character Benji Dunn, who gets equal screen time here as that of Tom Cruise. That is one of the great things about GHOST PROTOCOL: the four leads get equal importance in the story. No one of the four gets used as a tool, like what happened to Pegg at M:I-3, or that Australian guy in M:I-2. Which makes you wonder, what ever happened to Luther (Ving Rhames)? The fourth M:I works because it retains the elements we've loved from the first film (directed by Brian De Palma)- the deception, the edge-of-your-seat missions (remember Ethan Hunt dangling from the ceiling to avoid tripping off t...