journal features

movie review - Mission: Impossible

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-eight years and a million words

Kokubunji, 2023.08.23

Once upon a time I watched "Mission Impossible II" and did not like it. That was a very, very long time ago and I thought I was done with these films. I certainly had never seen the first one.

But then I wound up seeing the 6th in the series after it got a lot of surprise good reviews, and I was happily surprised to realize that it was excellent. So when faced with a movie night and the original was on Netflix, I suggested to my daughter that we see this.

I can honestly say that I don't know what happened to this thing but it feels like production ran into serious problems and they pasted something together out of the resulting mess and somehow it stuck. I can't believe that a confused and poorly-told story like this spawned an entire series of movies. Yes, there was the original TV series but that's ancient history by this point.

Avoid.

rand()m quote

If I had my life to live over, I'd try to make more mistakes next time. I would relax, I would limber up, I would be crazier than I've been on this trip. I know very few things I'd take seriously any more. I'd certainly be less hygenic... I would take more chances, I would take more trips, I would scale more mountains, I would swim more rivers, and I would watch more sunsets. I would eat more ice cream and fewer beans. I would have more actual troubles and fewer imaginary ones. Oh, I've had my moments, and if I had to do it all over again, I'd have many more of them, in fact I'd try not to have anything else, just moments, one after another, instead of living so many years ahead of my day. If I had it to do all over again, I'd travel lighter, much lighter than I have. I would start barefoot earlier in the spring, and I'd stay that way later in the fall. And I would ride more merry-go-rounds, and catch more gold rings, and greet more people and pick more flowers and dance more often. If I had it to do all over again - but you see, I don't.

—Jorge Luis Borges