Mission: Impractical

Target three: Sean Ambrose
So who’s the big bad villain of the first sequel? Another IMF agent, of course, and this one makes Jim Phelps look like a piker. Phelps was Hunt’s mentor; Sean Ambrose (Dougray Scott) is Hunt’s double. Phelps was after millions; Ambrose is after billions. Phelps was willing to compromise every American agent; Ambrose is willing to compromise every human being on the planet. Seriously, IMF has to rethink its recruitment strategy.

Remember the plot? A super-influenza (codename: Chimera) and its cure are created, and a pharmaceutical company wants to unleash the influenza in order to make money off the cure. A scientist with a conscience tries to come in from the cold, but he’ll only trust Hunt, who is on vacation (trying to kill himself through rock climbing), so IMF sends an agent (Ambrose) disguised as Hunt to accompany him to the states. But Ambrose is like the pharmaceutical company, without conscience, and he steals the vaccine and parachutes out with his team of undesirables, leaving the passenger plane to fly, like a precursor to 9/11, into a mountainside. Are IMF agents on the no-fly list? They should be.

OK, you’re IMF. There’s a dangerous man loose in the world. How do you find him? BTW: This is no longer a test.

IMF does it by tapping Hunt to recruit a jewel thief, who goes by the tongue-protruding name of Nyah, and is played by the tongue-protrudingly beautiful Thandie Newton. She’s Ambrose’s ex, and Ambrose is still smitten. (An IMF agent and a jewel thief? Shouldn’t they have been suspicious of him then?) If Ambrose hears she’s in prison he’ll have her sprung and brought to his hideout, and she’s got a tracking device injected into her elegant ankle.

Of course IMF doesn’t tell Hunt this, and of course Hunt and Nyah fall in love after a day of knocking cars and boots in the Spanish mountainside. Seems odd for two glib, shallow people to fall in love so quickly but just consider it more thievery: It’s the plot of Hitchcock’s “Notorious.”

Questions inevitably arise. Why did IMF need Hunt to recruit Nyah? Couldn’t they have imprisoned (and tracked) her without her knowledge? And once they found Ambrose’s hideout — an isolated coastal mansion in Australia — why not bomb it back to the stone age? And why leave Hunt in charge of the mission since 1) he’s the one agent Ambrose knows better than himself, and 2) he’s emotionally compromised? Who’s in charge of IMF anyway — Michael Chertoff?

But at least IMF found their most-wanted man, which is more than we’ve done with ours. Maybe we should’ve sent Thandie Newton to Tora Bora.

Target four: ???
So somehow we’ve made it all the way to “M:I3,” which is good news because it’s a fun movie, the best of the series. It restores a sense of teamwork to the Impossible Mission Force, it includes literary references (“Wells, not Ellison”), and it gets rid of that awful, floppy Hong Kong hipster haircut Ethan Hunt sported in the last film.

But — without giving too much away — while the main villain, Owen Davian, played by Philip Seymour Hoffman, is a global arms dealer, willing to sell horribly destructive technology to the highest (Mid-East) bidder, he is only able to do what he does with help from someone within a certain government spy agency. The rationale for the latest IMF mole is fairly unique — one might even call it neo-conservative — but it doesn’t make it any less traitorous. Which is why I’m urging Congress to look into IMF. Call a bi-partisan commission. Get Richard Ben-Veniste on the line. Three movies and three traitors is enough.

Back in 1996 we might have been able to afford a self-generating government agency — one that ensures its own funding by creating the villains it’s designed to catch — but these are more perilous times, in which “Mission Accomplished” banners turn into “Mission: Impossible” banners in the blink of an eye, and we need a little accountability. Yes, we all could use a little accountability.

Erik Lundegaard misses Lynda Day George. He can be reached at:

MORE FROM MOVIE OPINIONS

Oscar season nears, but where’s the buzz?

Oscar season nears, but where’s the buzz? Hollywood’s vampire obsession may bleed out Does ‘Precious’ stereotype big black women? Newsweek: The problem with ‘Precious’ When it comes to stardom, Clooney has smarts ‘Saw’ franchise creates buzz, but is it any good? Remembering concert documentaries that rock theGrio: ‘This Is It’ a final act fit for a king Best actress category looks slim for Oscars theGrio: Tyler Perry can’t do bad all by himself   Add Movie opinions headlines to your news reader: