Found some other folks who hadn’t seen this. Showed them the trailer and suddenly they were at our place for a movie night.
This is like a good mechanical watch: everything clicks into place and works perfectly. Somehow not old yet. Under appreciated score too.
One thing I’ll mention that this does better than the other films in the series by a landslide: the whole film feels like everybody is in mise en place: if you’ve never seen a M:I film, or haven’t seen one since 1999, they do a great job of catching you up. But they do it slowly: for a while, you just play along. “That must be his wife. When did he get married? Did she die? That guy there must have been a villain. Ilsa? Who is Ilsa? Ah, they seem to know her.”
The only reason it all works is because the script is so strong, McQuarrie’s direction is so confident, and the editing is so obviously good that the audience feels like they’re in capable hands. “I don’t understand yet, but I’m sure I will soon” is a lot of trust to require of an audience — and they get it very early on.
I often complain about how we don’t make any intelligent blockbusters anymore. Here’s one that respects and assumes intelligence in its audience. You love to see it.