jadenfate

I can't remember seeing a movie with so much redundant information within one hour. Part of it felt like studio meddling: we don't want to sell it as part 2, therefore we have to address audiences who haven't seen part 1 and therefore we have to recapitulate the whole first movie. Part of it was legacy building, which shows that Cruise & Co. Doesn't understand their franchise, because all these flashbacks prevented scenes which actually made the MI franchise great: suspense-packed action. And part of it is that modern cinema doesn't trust the perception of its audience and has to spell out every detail.

You'd expect that all this exposition at least explains what's going on, but no! The motivation of the AI keeps being nebulous, the victory condition of our guys is strange and I don't buy the inevitability of nuclear war when the humans still have physical control over the bombs.

The second half gets better, the underwater scenes look stunning, the stunts are great (but sometimes too unbelievable), Hayley Atwell is gorgeous as ever and has some nice moments, great to see Tramell Tillman too. But all in all that's not enough to save the movie.

Probably the best film I've seen at the 74. Berlinale, definitely the most interesting. It was made by Alexander Horwath, the former director of the Austrian Film Museum among other things, and you can see his expertise of cinema history in every minute of this essay. However, Henry Fonda for President isn't limited to the history of film, it connects the life of Henry Fonda and his movies with the history of the USA in a congenial way, from the 16th century until today.

Horwath said in the interview that his first version was 6+ hours long, but he and his editor and cameraman Michael Palm condensed it really efficiently, the film takes its time for every Fonda movie but never gets boring despite its three hours runtime.