Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol is an exciting adventure and a great follow-up to M:I:III

If you're one of those people out there who watched The Incredibles and immediately thought, “Whoever directed this really needs to make a live-action version staring Tom Cruise” then you're in luck. Or maybe you watched Ratatouille and suddenly longed to see a funny little man power running and climbing the outside of the tallest tower in the world? Don't look at me like that. I have no idea where you're getting these hypothetical urges.

But if you did, your wishes have come true.

Brad Bird, the director of The Incredibles, Ratatouille, and The Iron Giant, was brought on to helm the new film in the “Mission: Impossible” series, Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol. This continues the tradition of each movie in the M:I series being directed by someone entirely new, and it totally works here.

Tom Cruise stars as the IMF super-agent, Ethan Hunt. He's sent on a mission to Russia where, after a giant snafu, IMF is blamed for a bombing of the Kremlin. Hunt and his entire team is disavowed while IMF is shutdown completely. So now Ethan has to go out and try to clear the name of his agency regarding a deed they didn't do, and show to the world who the real deed-doers are.

He's joined by Benji (Simon Pegg, one of the only characters carried over from the previous movie), Jane (Paula Patton), and Brandt (Jeremy Renner).

As the M:I films go, I've said that I felt the movies got better as they went. I know some out there liked the first one over the second, but it's pretty accepted that the third movie was a step up. Now, with the release of the fourth movie, I think I still prefer number three, but Ghost Protocol is definitely a good entry into the series.

M:I:I and M:I:II were very much “the Ethan Hunt adventures.” M:I:III brought back the idea of an entire IMF team working together at every level, and M:I-GP continues that concept very well. There's plenty here for every member of the team to do. It's still very much Tom Cruise's movie, but it's an ensemble story.

Which is great for those out there who feel that maybe there's just a bit too much Tom Cruise out there anyway. What with the couch jumping, the rants against Paxil, the marrying of women sixteen years his junior, the rather freaky middle tooth, the rumors of the oxymoronic "silent birth" ..... There's certainly no shortage of Cruise in the Nuise ... I mean news.

But don't take it out on this movie. I suspect the third "Mission: Impossible" movie suffered from Cruise fatigue and I'd hate to see it happen again.

Now, I probably don't have to point out that this movie is definitely different from some of director Brad Bird's previous directorial outings, but there are segments here where I can see signs of his eye for distinctive visuals. There's an overhead shot of one man chasing another. (Do I even have to tell you that one of those men was Tom Cruise?) The camera is about a hundred feet up and the sunlight is coming in at an angle. The end result is a shot where you can barely see the men themselves but on the ground, you see one shadow chasing after the other.

It's simple, but I like it.

Personally, I give this one an 8 / 10.

Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol is rated PG-13 for action violence, some explosive mayhem, a bit of language, and sensuality.