Latest news with #Mission:Impossible:TheFinalReckoning
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
A Lot Of Mission: Impossible Fans Think The Final Reckoning Ending Is Open-Ended, I Need To Loudly Disagree
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Warning: spoilers for Mission: Impossible: The Final Reckoning are in play. All IMF operatives who haven't been properly debriefed are warned. We've finally arrived at Ethan Hunt's final reckoning, after almost 30 years of seeing Tom Cruise's espionage hero in action. The 2025 movie schedule has been marketed as the end of the Mission: Impossible series - at least for Cruise, anyway. While some may feel that the eighth entry is far from final, this door is firmly closed - and for really good reason. Spoilers abound from this point on, folks; so those who want to remain unsullied can read our review on Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning. For everyone else, please unseal your files, and let's begin. Want to know how to defeat The Entity? Just ask Ethan you can find him. When last we saw The Final Reckoning hero, he was standing in a crowded London setting, taking a final wordless meeting with Benji (Simon Pegg), Grace (Hayley Atwell), and Paris (Pom Klemantiff). Grace hands Ethan the item that's crucial to this ending's finality - a storage device that contains The Entity, and after that point, our hero puts his hood up and walks away. Let's hope he has a Paramount+ subscription to pass all of the time he'll be spending in solitude. Paramount Plus: from $7.99 a month/$79.99 a yearYou don't need The Entity to see all of Ethan Hunt's past exploits - you just need a Paramount+ subscription. For as little as $7.99 a month (with an option to upgrade to ad-free/Showtime inclusive streaming for $12.99 a month) you can run through every Mission: Impossible movie without leaving the couch. And when you've accomplished that mission, there's still plenty of entertainment you can choose to accept at your leisure. View Deal Now, I know what you're thinking: 'Mike, Ethan isn't shown as dying. Do you really think he's never going to come back?' Well, Reader, I'll say this: there may be a slim margin of error, but even with that severely narrow window in existence, you'd better hope a potential Mission: Impossible 9 doesn't bring Mr. Hunt back to the playing field. Which leads to the loudest part of my dissenting argument. Ethan and The Entity are made for each other. Not literally, but rather metaphorically, because the man himself is the only meat-based life form this rogue A.I. is afraid of. Which means that The Final Reckoning's digital demon probably saw Cruise's sick wing walking stunt, and the resulting on-screen deaths that came from them. By showing Ethan its plan, The Entity gives its human foe the way to defeat it. Who better to take a plan to the edge, risking the lives of the entire planet, in order to vanquish a foe once and for all? For this digital genie to be kept in its bottle, it needs a minder, as Ethan is the only person who isn't swayed by its powers of persuasion. Which also means that when and if he ever pops up again, all parties who want to possess The Entity will be pursuing him to the ends of the earth. We saw that dance skirt the edge of nuclear armageddon in The Final Reckoning, so I don't think anyone wants to return to that state of play. If you want The Entity to stay put, Ethan will have to totally swear himself to that IMF Oath - living in the shadows, to save those that he'll never meet. Perhaps Dead Reckoning's ending, and the plot that came before it, was good for something after all. There are still more stunts and secrets to discover in Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning, as it debuts at a theater near you. Especially if, somehow, you want to loudly counter my disagreement with what you see as cold hard fact. This message will self-destruct in five seconds…so you can use the smoke as an excuse for any potential tears you may be shedding.
Business Insider
22-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Business Insider
Tom Cruise has a smart career strategy that's helped him stay relevant after 40 years in Hollywood
Tom Cruise returns with death-defying stunts in "Mission: Impossible: The Final Reckoning." In 2023, Cruise told Business Insider that he's "always pushing" to make his films bigger and better. Cruise's commitment to his craft, including doing his own stunts, keeps audiences coming back for more. Tom Cruise has been entertaining film fans for over 40 years and, despite weathering his fair share of controversies, is widely considered the last great movie star. How did he do it? The answer is simple: stunts. In the 15 years since the release of 2011's "Ghost Protocol," the fourth " Mission: Impossible" film, Cruise has done increasingly hair-raising stunts in each of his new movies: whether he's climbing the Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest building, or clinging to a plane as it takes off. Earlier in his career, Cruise acted in a greater mix of genres, including the 1994 horror "Interview with the Vampire," the 1996 comedy-drama "Jerry Maguire," and the 1999 erotic thriller "Eyes Wide Shut." In that era, he was considered widely a sex symbol. Now, he trades in extaordinay feats. Mission: Impossible: Dead Reckoning." View this post on Instagram A post shared by Eammon Jacobs (@eammonjacobs) "Every time they say, 'Can you top it? Can you not top it?' We're always pushing. Every film I do, whatever genre it's in, I want to make it as entertaining as possible for that audience. I know I can do things better," he said. And it's a winning tactic. " Top Gun: Maverick," in which Cruise flew in real fighter jets, raked in $1.5 billion in 2022, while "Dead Reckoning," where he leapt off a mountain on a motorbike, made $567 million. In "Mission: Impossible: The Final Reckoning," which is out on Friday, Cruise performs two nerve-shredding stunts: a scuba dive into the wreck of a submarine that rolls down into an ocean trench, and the climactic third act, where his character clings on to a biplane in flight. It's expected to make $80 million in its opening weekend, The Hollywood Reporter reported, citing the National Research Group. Cruise's enduring star power can even grab the attention of the most seasoned industry insiders. Rob Mitchell, the director of theatrical insights at film tech company Gower St. Analytics, recalled working as a sales analyst at Paramount in 2011, when employees did a set visit to see Cruise climb the Burj Khalifa. "Everyone was taking pictures inside the Burj Khalifa, with Tom Cruise outside waving in," he told BI. These sorts of stunts signal to audiences that Cruise is a bona fide star who is hardworking and takes his craft seriously—all ingredients of a movie more likely to be worth their hard-earned cash. Referring to "Mission: Impossible," Mitchell said: "There comes a point where people aren't really going for the story as much as they are for the excitement and the thrills." "In an era dominated by CGI superheroes, Cruise's staying power lies in the 'authenticity' of his performances," Stuart Joy, the course leader of film and TV at Solent University, UK, told BI. "Like Christopher Nolan, he champions analogue filmmaking in a digital age. But while Nolan does so behind the camera through practical effects and large-format film, Cruise embodies it on screen through real stunts and real danger." Cruise's dedication to filmmaking has taken him around the world. During an interview at the BFI in London in May, he said he would "force" studios to send him to different countries to learn how movies were made there. He also said encourages younger stars to "spend time in the editing room, produce a movie, study old movies, recognize what the composition is giving you, know what those lenses are, understand the lighting and how to use it for your benefit." Last year, Cruise's "Top Gun: Maverick" costar Glen Powell told GQ that he was sent to a theater in Los Angeles to watch a six-hour "film-school" movie that Cruise made just for his friends. "[Cruise] is like: 'Do we all agree that this is what a camera is? This is the difference between a film camera and a digital camera…' The funniest part is on flying. It was like he put together this entire flight school. So he would literally go 'OK, this is what a plane is. Here's how things fly. Here's how air pressure works,'" Powell said. Centering his career around stunts is a smart PR move As well as being undeniably impressive, stunts help to keep past controversies out of the conversation, Joy said. "Cruise's transition from character-driven roles to stunt-centered performances seems intentional, not just as a creative decision but as a deliberate attempt to recalibrate public perceptions of his star persona," he said. "After the mid-2000s controversies (most infamously the Oprah's sofa moment and scrutiny of his ties to Scientology) Cruise has successfully redirected the audience's attention," Joy added, referring to the moment in 2005 when he jumped on Winfrey's sofa while talking about his love for his then-girlfriend, and now ex-wife, Katie Holmes. "Rather than inviting emotional connection through vulnerability, he now earns our praise and admiration through the spectacle of physical risk," Joy said. Next, Cruise plans to shoot a movie in space with his "Edge of Tomorrow" and "American Made" collaborator, director Doug Liman. In 2020, Deadline reported that Universal planned to spend $200 million on the film, and collaborate with Elon Musk's SpaceX to shoot it. Cruise and Liman were originally set to take flight in 2021, but the project is yet to materialize. If it does get off the ground, audiences will likely flock to see "the ultimate Tom Cruise movie," as Mitchell puts it. But wherever Cruise's career takes him next, Joy said that one thing is for certain: "He's made himself the guardian of a traditional cinematic spectacle."
New European
20-05-2025
- Entertainment
- New European
Could Tom Cruise's next mission be the White House?
Upping the ante as ever, Tom Cruise dives to the bottom of the ocean and hangs on for dear life to a mountain-skimming prop plane, in the film that premiered at the Cannes Film Festival this week. In between, he pegs it everywhere as if he'd never heard of Uber, or impatiently listens to eleven different characters delivering a round robin of exposition, a baffling flaw in the era of show-not-tell scriptwriting. 'What was I going to do? Retire? Go fishing?' says a character as they face (perhaps) – don't worry, no spoilers here – certain death in Tom Cruise's Mission: Impossible: The Final Reckoning. The question could just as easily be posed of the star and producer – 'a Tom Cruise Production' – of this final instalment of the colon-rich, sphincter-tightening franchise. The film hasn't quite got the machine-tooled efficiency that gave Bond and Bourne a quite literal run for their money, and suffers end-of-franchise nostalgia – the Return of the King syndrome if you will – trying to give each of the characters their due and getting all strangely mushy about each other. I've always found the Mission: Impossible films to be jarringly uninvolving on an emotional level while always enjoying the kinetic daredevilry of its action sequences. The emotional depth is the kind felt at a goodbye party for an employee who's only been with us a month. The one exception to this might be Tom himself. Let's be clear. I'm not going to miss Ethan Hunt. I mean, who is Ethan Hunt if not 'A Tom Cruise Production' in flesh? He certainly isn't a character. I doubt there'll be a hunt for the new Ethan Hunt, the way there is for a new James Bond. But I am going to miss Tom. I worry about Tom. Without Mission: Impossible, what is he going to do now? Go fishing? Surely, he's going to need to bungee jump off the Hoover Dam or go down the Niagara Falls in a barrel of a weekend, if only to wind down from a career that has made him the most action-oriented American movie star since Buster Keaton. He's the west's answer to Jackie Chan, working in the tradition of a genuine heart-throb doing his own stunts, like Jean-Paul Belmondo. And the weird thing is, Cruise's career has been a mirror image of what it should have been, with his biggest action role in the latter half. When most actors are 'too old for this shit,' it seemed like Tom was just getting started (Danny Glover was 41 when he said that line in Lethal Weapon). In his youth, his films tended to skew comedy or dramatic. Coming out of the Brat Pack via films such as Taps (co-starring Sean Penn) and The Outsiders (co-starring the entire 1980s), Cruise first hit it big with the one-two punch of All the Right Moves and Risky Business and morphed himself by sheer will and persistence into a good actor. A handy trick Cruise employed was to ally himself to elder co-stars as he took on the role of the upcoming and arrogant whippersnapper. In The Color of Money he was the cocky pool player, schooled by Paul Newman's Fast Eddie. In Rain Man, he was a car salesman yuppie and Dustin Hoffman's younger brother, who learns about autism and caring. In Cocktail, he was the acolyte to famed Australian Bryan Brown who would teach him to… make cocktails. 'When he pours, he reigns,' promised the best tagline ever. It was a sly move. Before you knew it, he was not just learning from screen legends – the end of The Color of Money gives Newman a clear advantage – he was besting them. 'You can't handle the truth!' rants a spittle-flecked Jack Nicholson in A Few Good Men in 1992, but the end of the courtroom drama had a clearly triumphant Cruise handling it just fine. Along the way, he'd notched up some of the industry's finest directors. They included legends such as Francis Ford Coppola, Sydney Pollack, Martin Scorsese, Barry Levinson, Rob Reiner and Ridley Scott, though it was brother Tony Scott who had the biggest impact on the star's career with 1986's Top Gun, which gave both aviator shades and the naval flight academy a recruitment bump. Cruise's Maverick has no identity beyond a grin and a catchphrase. Maverick, like Ethan Hunt, is essence of Cruise, this time poured into a cockpit with nary a mentor in sight. He's an insider's outsider. He doesn't follow orders but accomplishes the mission, maverick in call sign only. Kelly McGillis had the thankless task of looking like she wanted to teach him something about aerodynamics. Having dominated the latter half of the eighties, Cruise convinced doubters about his acting chops with his performance as paraplegic Vietnam veteran Ron Kovic in Oliver Stone's Born on the Fourth of July, a heartfelt, angry side of Cruise that reminded audiences that away from sunny Reaganite power fantasies Cruise could deploy an unsuspected range. That's not to say that throughout Cruise's career there haven't been some dips and unfortunate role choices. The public's perception has not always been of Cruise as the international treasure who rappelled into the Covid crisis to single-handedly save cinema. There was Legend for instance, an early brain fart of a role that had a lank-haired Cruise play Jack in the Green, poncing around saving unicorns from a satanic Tim Curry. Sometimes, it was his private life that skewed the public's perception of him. His relationship with then marriage to Nicole Kidman on the woeful Days of Thunder led to Far and Away the worst film of his career (see what I did there?) His third marriage to Katie Holmes led to a daughter and the smush-neologism of TomKat, but the break-up was acrimonious. Over all of this was cast the strange light of his involvement with the Church of Scientology, a subject I've been careful to avoid lest I start getting followed by mysterious people; something which definitely wouldn't happen. Rumours abound over his attempts to convert Hollywood greats to L Ron Hubbard's religion as well as it having an involvement in the break up of two of his marriages. He had moments of out-of-control exuberance: he jumped up and down on Oprah's sofa and got in Matt Lauer's face about the terrors of psychiatry. The rumours about his sexuality led to a merciless ridiculing in an episode of South Park, something which must have been hard for a man who is always trying to be taken so seriously. Stanley Kubrick would exploit this tendency in Cruise as well as the many ambiguities of the Cruise persona in Eyes Wide Shut, emasculating his lead to a dithering bourgeois doctor being taunted with homophobic slurs on the streets of New York and gnawingly jealous of his wife's (Kidman) sexual fantasies. With his stardom assured and emboldened by his work with Kubrick, Cruise was in a position to move out of his comfort zone. Paul Thomas Anderson turned him into a sleazebag proto-Andrew Tate for Magnolia and Michael Mann made him a chalky-haired hitman with a rare villain role in Collateral. But ever the canny navigator of his own career, Cruise underwrote this risk taking with a popular franchise based on a 1960s TV show. Enter Mission: Impossible. It was, to say the least, an odd choice. The whole point of the original show was the anonymity of the cast. The characters were one dimensional agents who staged elaborate espionage jobs and heists. It had one star: the theme music by Lalo Schifrin. Brian de Palma's inaugural entry kept the faith of the original while promoting young Hunt (Cruise) above the mentor/adversary, played by Jon Voight. But each subsequent entry saw Cruise taking greater prominence and control. John Woo brought his 'gun fu' to the ludicrous fun of the first sequel, JJ Abrams put the train back on the tracks in his efficiently exciting follow up, and Brad Bird ushered in the first massive success of the series with Ghost Protocol. The arrival of screenwriter/director Christopher McQuarrie saw Cruise find a partner ready to loyally serve the star and establish full Cruise control. He would go on to direct all the remaining films in the franchise including the most commercially successful: Fallout. Final Reckoning brings together a whole mishmash of millennial apocalyptic hysteria. The adversary is called the Entity and comprises all our fears about AI, nuclear weapons, misinformation and the rise of populism into a pulsing blue graphic. 'It makes our allies, enemies and our enemies, aggressors,' someone explains. So, Trump 2.0 then? Cruise's mission (if he should choose to accept it) is to put the genie of technology back in the bottle and unite the world. Never has he been more messianic and throughout the film there is a religious fervour. A computer key is shaped as a cruciform, like something from a reliquary, and the Entity itself is referred to as the 'anti-God.' So what of Cruise himself? Having proven once more that the title was a lie, Cruise is the one we are assured who could be trusted with the total power that the Entity promises. Having saved the world numerous times on the big screen, could he be tempted to sort out the world's problem via political office? After President Reagan, Governor Schwarzenegger, Trump I & II, would Cruise fancy running – in his inimitable arms pumping style – for the White House? Given the popularising of so many marginal crackpot ideas, Scientology might not be the dealbreaker it once was. Think about it: President Tom Cruise. Perhaps unlikely, but not impossible. John Bleasdale is a writer, film journalist and novelist based in Italy
Time of India
19-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Time of India
Farhan Akhtar lauds Tom Cruise's 'Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning'; Kunal Kohli calls it a "yawn fest"
Ever since Tom Cruise's ' Impossible: The Final Reckoning' hit Indian theatres on May 17, fans have been buzzing with excitement, with celebs from B-town also giving their honest reviews of the film. Ever since Tom Cruise 's 'Mission: Impossible: The Final Reckoning' hit Indian theatres on May 17, fans have been rolling with excitement, with celebs from B-town also giving their honest reviews of the film. Actor-filmmaker Farhan Akhtar was clearly "mind-blown" by the latest instalment of the action-packed franchise. Akhtar took to his Instagram Stories to praise the film, along with Cruise's performance. "Mind-blown!! What a ride... @tomcruise brings the MI series home in style... and how!" Farhan wrote. However, not everyone felt the same way. 'Hum Tum' director Kunal Kohli felt the film "didn't live up to the franchise's reputation." by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Cost Of Amusement Park Equipment From Mexico Might Surprise You - See Tips Amusement Park Equipment | search ads Click Here Undo Calling it a "yawn fest," he wrote, "They did the impossible. Messed up a #MissionImpossible film. What a yawn fest. Sad end to one of the greatest franchises ever. Will just forget they ever made this one and rewatch the rest of the great MI films. @tomcruise, now make another one. Can't end like this." Meanwhile, Mission: Impossible premiered globally at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival last week. It is directed and co-written by Christopher McQuarrie and features a star-studded cast, including Hayley Atwell, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg , Pom Klementieff, and Angela Bassett . Apart from Cruise, the cast of Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning also includes Simon Pegg as Benji Dunn, Ving Rhames as Luther Stickell, Vanessa Kirby as Alanna Mitsopolis, Hayley Atwell as Grace, Esai Morales as the antagonist Gabriel, Shea Whigham as Jasper Briggs, Greg Tarzan Davis as Degas, and Pom Klementieff as the assassin Paris, according to Variety. Meanwhile, the film is set to hit theatres globally on May 23.
Yahoo
19-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Tom Cruise plans to make movies into his 100s. His secret to staying young at 62 is free, simple, and seen in centenarians.
Tom Cruise, 62, said he wants to keep making movies until he's in his 100s. The "Mission: Impossible" star said he stays young by doing a range of activities. Working the mind and body, and maintaining a zest for life are common traits in centenarians. Tom Cruise said he wants to keep making movies until he's in his 100s. If he stays as active and curious as he is now, he may well succeed. The 62-year-old actor, who is best known for his adrenaline-fueled stunts in the "Mission: Impossible" franchise, said in 2023 that he was inspired by Harrison Ford, who still works at age 82. But he told The Hollywood Reporter on Sunday: "Actually, I'm going to make them into my 100s. I will never stop. I will never stop doing action, I will never stop doing drama, comedy films — I'm excited." "Mission: Impossible: The Final Reckoning," the eighth movie in the franchise that is out this week, sees him doing a lengthy scuba dive and wing-walking on a bi-plane, among other impressive stunts. When asked how he stays young by Men's Health in 2023, he said: "Sea-kayaking, caving... fencing, treadmill, weights... rock-climbing, hiking... I jog... I do so many different activities." Business Insider has spoken to many experts in healthy aging as well as healthy older people, including centenarians. A common theme among them is keeping their minds and bodies active, including with new hobbies. One 2023 study based on interviews with 19 people aged between 100 and 107 published in the journal Journal of Happiness Studies identified eight traits in the centenarians. They included: being active, challenging your mind, taking commitments seriously, and being curious. A person's chances of living a long, healthy life are partly down to their genetics and environment — and Cruise has more resources than the most to take care of his health and try new things. But research suggests that a person's diet, exercise, and lifestyle can have a significant impact on their longevity. Joyce Preston, from the UK, who turned 100 in March, told BI that her morning routine included yoga or gentle exercise, and she also went on short walks. Meanwhile, John Tinniswood, who died age 112 in November 2024, said: "Always do the best you can, whether you're learning something or whether you're teaching someone. Give it all you've got. Otherwise, it's not worth bothering with." Some centenarians also prioritize diets of fresh, whole foods over processed ones. One 2022 study found that eating whole grains, legumes, fish, fruits, vegetables, and nuts could add 10 years to a person's lifespan. Meanwhile, an expert in healthy aging previously told BI that 30 minutes of activity a day, particularly a mix of cardio and resistance training, could help prevent chronic illnesses. Read the original article on Business Insider
