Aaron's Thoughts
This is the film that supercharges the franchise in the right direction for me. The jump in quality from MI3 to this one feels quite jarring at times.
Cruise climbing the Burj Khalifa is the often noted set piece from this film, but it’s the sequence after the climb that is breathtaking for me. The scrambling to copy the codes while on two separate floors is a masterpiece in tension & action filmmaking that you grow to expect from the franchise. I also adore the Kremlin break in scene. The moving screen to conceal the break-in is the kind of creativity that sets the bar high in the franchise (which somehow gets continuously topped going forward).
The whole film gives the franchise a look & feel that sets it up for success going forward. The McQuarrie films probably don’t happen without this solid foundation - this one is almost a palette cleanser
