Ten years it took for three Mission: Impossible films to be made and released into the cinemas.  There will be a fourth released soon.  This blu-ray collection is an excellent way to refresh yourself as to what has gone on so far.

Tom Cruise plays the lead role of Ethan Hunt, an IMF agent.  The series takes place all over the world in beautiful and exotic locations.  The directors are three of the best and the action is explosive…literally.

Mission: Impossible directed by Brian De Palma:

With a star-studded cast including Emilio Estevez, Jon Voight, Emmanuelle Beart, Jean Reno, Kristin Scott-Thomas, Ving Rhames, Vanessa Redgrave, Henry Czerny, and Mr. Tom Cruise you would expect an exceptional movie. Mission Impossible is a decent film, but does not live up to the billing of its cast nor its director, Brian De Palma (The Untouchables, Scarface). The special effects (for the time - 1996) were incredible, but the story and pace of the film does not match their impressiveness. The story/plot/script has so many leaps of logic or holes in it that it resembles a leaky ship by the end of the confusing film. De Palma moves the film so quickly over the twists to get to his action sequences that the audience is never really given a chance to digest them. Some scenes are worth the skipping forward to them. For example, the scene where Hunt is breaking into the vault at Langley is great and full of tension. The old adage in Hollywood is that usually the original in a series of films is the best, but with Mission Impossible this does not hold true as Mission Impossible III is better by far.

In Kiev, Prague an IMF team is assembled by Jim Phelps (Jon Voight - Midnight Cowboy, Pearl Harbor) to catch Alexander Golitsyn (Marcel Iures - Interview With the Vampire, The Peacemaker) trying to steal the NOC list, tail him and whoever he is selling it to. The IMF team includes agents Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise), Claire Phelps (Emmanuelle Beart - 8 Femmes, Don Juan), Sarah Davies (Kristin Scott Thomas - The English Patient, Gosford Park), Jack Harmon (Emilio Estevez - The Mighty Ducks, Young Guns), and Hannah Williams (Ingeborga Dapkunaite - Seven Years in Tibet, Shadow of the Vampire). What begins as a straightforward operation quickly turns into a disaster where all the agents, including Jim, are killed except for Ethan. Ethan calls IMF and meets a handler named Eugene Kittridge (Henry Czerny - The Exorcism of Emily Rose, The Pink Panther). Kittridge gives Ethan a passport in order to leave Czechoslovakia, but Ethan soon realizes that he too is being set up. After escaping Ethan returns to Jim's safe house and soon discovers that Claire is still alive. Ethan and Claire decide to steal the NOC list in order to draw out the buyer Max (Vanessa Redgrave - Girl, Interrupted, Howards End) in order for Ethan to figure out who is setting him up. They recruit two other disavowed agents, Franz Kreiger (Jean Reno - The Professional, Ronin) and Luther Stickell (Ving Rhames - Pulp Fiction, Jacob's Ladder), to help them with the job of stealing the NOC list from Langley.

Mission: Impossible II directed by John Woo

After a good start the Mission: Impossible film series starring Tom Cruise stumbles. Action film director John Woo (Paycheck, Windtalkers) has made several good films, but this is not one of them.

IMF agent Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) is sent to Australia to find and destroy a batch of the deadly genetically created disease known as Chimera. Hunt's job is made more difficult by the fact that other people are also after Chimera. Also, a former IMF agent (Dougray Scott - Hitman, Dark Water) is leading a band of bad guys and they already have the antidote to Chimera called Bellerophon. They now want to steal Chimera in order to control the planet by infecting everyone.

Hunt teams up with Nyah (Thandie Newton - Crash, RocknRolla), who is a thief, to get his hands on the deadly disease first. His already difficult assignment is made all the more so when Nyah is infected with Chimera and now Hunt has to also get his hands on the antidote to cure her.

The biggest problem with this film is the script. It is completely absurd. So much so that you will laugh out loud at times. It becomes so that you hope the action scenes will distract you momentarily, but they end up going on too long and you get bored with them as well. A mess!

M:I:III directed by J.J. Abrams:

Amazingly, Mission Impossible III is probably the best of the series of films. Now, this probably has more to do with the brilliance of director J.J. Abrams (television's Lost and Alias) than Tom's performance, but the man does know how to act in action films. Cruise is at his best with smoldering intense looks, little dialogue and lots of physicality in this film. From about 7 minutes in the action begins and it does not stop until the very last scene two hours later. It is an amazing adrenaline rush of a film, but also manages to be fairly intelligent. Action films always require that you suspend disbelief for some of it, but Mission Impossible III is not so implausible that it becomes silly. J.J. Abrams demonstrates that he knows what to do with a large budget and knows how to hold an audience's attention. Some of the special effects and chase scenes are innovative and top quality. The way Abrams allows the story to unfold is interesting and tricky causing you to have to constantly pay attention. Cruise's performance is well complemented by a decent supporting cast which includes Ving Rhames, Keri Russell and hot young male actor of the moment Jonathan Rhys Meyers. The excellent and intense Philip Seymour Hoffman assumes the role of the baddie and he does a great job. It is a film in which even though you know the outcome of it going in, it still manages to entertain and wow you.

Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) is living a seemingly 'normal' life. He is no longer a field agent for IMF and now trains young recruits. Due to this apparent stability in his life, Hunt is now engaged to be married to Julia (Michelle Monaghan - Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang). On the evening of his engagement party Hunt gets a call from the IMF and he meets with an IMF operations manager named John Musgrave (Billy Crudup - Big Fish, Almost Famous), who tells him that a former star student of Hunt's, Lindsey Ferris (Keri Russell - from television's Felicity), has been captured by bad guy Owen Davian (Philip Seymour Hoffman - Capote, The Big Lebowski). Davian is an arms/weapons dealer who has eluded the agency for years. Due to a sense of loyalty towards his star pupil, Hunt agrees to join a rescue mission for Ferris with fellow agents Luther Stickell (Ving Rhames - Mission Impossible II, Con Air), Declan (Jonathan Rhys Meyers - Bend It Like Beckham, Match Point), and Zhen (Maggie Q. - Around the World in 80 Days, Rush Hour 2). Things on the rescue mission spiral out of control, Commander John Brassell (Laurence Fishburne - The Matrix, Akeelah and the Bee) is furious and wants answers and Hunt is drawn back into the life he left behind.

Special Features:

- Mission: Remarkable - 40 Years of Creating the Impossible
- Mission: Explosive Exploits
- Mission: Spies Among Us
- Mission: Catching the Train

- Behind the Mission
- Mission Incredible
- Impossible Shots