Living in LA, I see a lot of billboards. Know what the billboard for "New Year's Eve" is? A bunch of faces so small that you might recognize them as celebrities. Here's a movie in which there's no plot, there's so many actors that you're going to get nothing but vignettes, and about all you know about it is it's from the same shit cadre that put together "Valentine's Day" which you also would rather set fire to than watch. ...and you expect me to come out to that? I will say this. A buddy of mine has been an illustrator/storyboardist on shitloads of movies, from Tron to Benjamin Button to Zodiac to Cowboys vs. Aliens. He told me nine months ago that Mission Impossible 4 was the first thing he was looking forward to working on in a long time because he loved the script. We're gonna go see it tonight with the crew; I'll let y'all know if it's any good.
MI4 is some of the most fun I've had in a movie theater in years. It's pitch-perfect, pretty much exactly what you'd expect if the guy who wrote IRON GIANT and THE INCREDIBLES were given the task of reviving a musty cold-war icon. I would say it falls squarely between BOURNE IDENTITY and MEN IN BLACK. The movie is decidedly self-conscious about the inherent silliness of the "Impossible Mission Force" and then winks at you, smiles, and says "c'mon, it'll be more fun if you play along. Here, I'll make it easy for you" and then proceeds to entertain the fuck out of you for two and a half hours.