Mission: Impossible II A Movie Review	MPAA Rated - PG-13 It's 2:03 Long A Review by The Dude on the Right

Here’s the brief rundown on the story. The big, bad pharmaceutical company figures out a great way to make money – make a really bad virus and then make a really great cure. It’s money in the bank. But when the bad guys find out about the plan, well, they realize that if they steal the virus and the antidote, well, they can blackmail the pharmaceutical company and make millions the easy way – in the stock market. So, it’s up to our man Ethan Hawke (Tom Cruise) to get the stuff back and save the world. So, Anthony Hopkins, the mission commander, sends our man to enlist a thief for some girly-style help, they fall in love, and Ethan has to save her and the world. Do you want more of the plot? Would it matter if I told you anyway? Well, it’s Memorial Day weekend as I’m typing this, I’m lazy, so that’s about all you get on the plot because that’s all you really need to know.

But the underlying thing about "Mission: Impossible 2" is the fact that it’s a John Woo film, and no matter how dumb or how cool a story-line, I just don’t think John Woo is a "Mission: Impossible" telling kind of guy. Why? His signature "slow down the action" action scenes and use of birds play throughout the movie. Some movies this can work in, but M:I-2 isn’t one of them. I want cool gadgets. I want in-my-face action. I want hot chicks (alright, Thandie Newton was kind of hot). What I don’t want from a "Mission: Impossible" movie is artsy melding action, and that’s what John Woo does. How does this hurt? Well, the scene that really comes to mind in the movie is this: Ethan Hawke and the bad guy, Sean Ambrose (Dougray Scott), are playing chicken on a set of motorcycles. Alright, that’s cool. Well, they head at each other at breakneck speeds and as they near each other the speeding action is slowed to artsy mode, our hero and the bad guy jump off of their bikes just as the bikes are about to collide, and they grab each other in mid-air as the bikes explode. Yes, it’s a cool action scene, and I think it would have played out if shown in real time – kinda wham, bam, thank you mam motion, but in the slow, artsy motion most of the crowd seemed to laugh, a "give me a break" laugh instead of a "God that was cool" laugh. I just wanted in-my-face action, and I knew I shouldn’t have gotten it from John Woo, I just hoped maybe he changed a little for this film.

Yes, you get unbelievable stunts, a cool plot twist here and there, a good looking chick, and Tom Cruise getting made fun of for smiling all of the time. But a lot of that gets lost in the artsy feel that John Woo gives the film. There was a lot of plot development that dragged, some of the stunts made you groan more that go "Wow!", and I think maybe I need to start writing movies because I can be master of the obvious as much as the next guy, (tell me you didn’t see it coming that the chick would inject herself with the virus and Ethan would have to save her – please). So as much as some things entertained me, there were enough things to balance that backwards that "Mission: Impossible 2" just fell a little flat. Maybe it was the expectations that came along with the name and the first movie, but I was disappointed.

I won’t say the movie is bad, there are some pretty cool things going on, and with that it’s 2 ½ stars out of 5. You’ve seen, or will see this movie anyway so it doesn’t matter what I say. Just get past the artsy stuff and enjoy the unbelievable-ness of if all and you’ll probably like the movie a little more than I did.

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!