Man, you gotta hand it to Tom Cruise. Whether you consider him the modern day John Wayne or Rock Hudson, one thing cannot be denied: he is indefatigable, a fact of which is painfully apparent in his new film, Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation. 

The antithesis of the terminally lazy Adam Sandler, Tom’s determined to make you a fan. It’s too bad he can’t sing or he’d already have done a cover of “You’re Gonna Love Me” from Dreamgirls, and he’d mean every lyric.

As you witness him dangling from a plane you can’t help but wonder, “Why are you DOING this?!” But clearly he’s like an undeterred force of nature. Making movies is something he has to do or he’ll die like a still shark.

This is a fantastic Mission Impossible movie. If you’ve enjoyed any of them you’ll probably love this one. In fact, it’s too bad no one has the discipline to stop here.

It’s got it all AND Alec Baldwin as a fussy CIA chief. EVERYTHING including a stunning Hitchcockian fight scene above an opera, Tom being beaten without his shirt (again), and his typical trotting around the globe with an exotic female he has no real sexual chemistry 

with whatsoever.

When was the last time a movie actually took us to Casablanca?

But everything about this incarnation is mint. It gleams like a rocket 

and moves almost as swiftly. The cast all know what they’re doing and bring their best, although I still don’t know why Jeremy Renner is a star.

Honestly, this installment is as good as they get and the narrative isn’t quite as convoluted (notice I said “quite”) as the franchise typically manages to be.

There is one tiny thing, however: there is a tonality to the violence (in this series) that might be about to join the ranks of other matters of taste, which have recently hit a tipping point with the American public. It’s the tinge of misogyny that accompanies the antiseptic brutality. Almost always bloodless, yet still a wee bit cavalier and smug about the offing of women. Just a bit.

A word of warning: If you get nervous or claustrophobic during underwater sequences where people hold their breath for minutes at a time, you might want to calm or sedate yourself accordingly.

A really good summer movie. Definitely go. It helped me with forgiveness regarding Cruise & Baldwin’s last cinematic collaboration, Rock of Ages.

(Loudinni specializes in reviews to be read in under a minute sans spoilers.)