Quartile rating: 7.5/10 · 1 rating
Ethan Hunt and his team are racing against time to track down a dangerous terrorist named Hendricks, who has gained access to Russian nuclear launch codes and is planning a strike on the United States. An attempt to stop him ends in an explosion causing severe destruction to the Kremlin and the IMF to be implicated in the bombing, forcing the President to disavow them. No longer being aided by the government, Ethan and his team chase Hendricks around the globe, although they might still be too late to stop a disaster.
Ghost Protocol is a genuinely spectacular action blockbuster elevated by Brad Bird's kinetic direction, most famously the Burj Khalifa sequence which is among the best action cinematography of the 2010s. The plot is functional globe-trotting spy fare — competent but not particularly inventive, leaning on familiar nuclear-threat MacGuffins. The ensemble cast (Cruise, Renner, Pegg, Rapace) performs well without any standout dramatic moments. Novelty is decent given Bird's distinctive animation-influenced staging translating surprisingly well to live action, though the premise itself is recycled spy thriller territory. The climax in a Mumbai parking garage is a letdown compared to the dazzling mid-film setpieces — kinetic but mechanically choreographed and narratively anticlimactic.