25 Years Ago, We Glimpsed the Tom Cruise of the Future in Mission: Impossible II

Early in Mission: Impossible II, we’re allowed to catch a glimpse of the Tom Cruise of the future. After an opening sequence re-introducing the audience to the first film’s world of mask-based espionage and deception, where an undercover Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) is revealed as not the real Ethan Hunt at all, we spend some time luxuriating in the genuine article. We know this Ethan is real because there’s no reason on earth for anyone to wear a lifelike Cruise mask while free-climbing a rocky cliff – at one point hanging from a single arm as he readjusts his bearing, narrowly avoiding a plummet to his death. When he reaches a summit and receives a message from his bosses at the IMF, it’s made crystal clear that he hasn’t been chasing bad guys, or retrieving some obscurely hidden MacGuffin. This is Ethan Hunt on vacation.
Abject thrill-seeking is not an aspect of his character revealed in the first Mission: Impossible from four years earlier; nor, really, is it particularly present in the third movie, from six years later. Even the later model of Ethan Hunt, who Cruise has steered into every more death-defying stunts, doesn’t seem likely to do this, or much of anything, for fun. But the current Cruise, who risks his real body rather than tagging in a stunt man, is glimpsed in this scene, which apparently did not feature a double. It’s a jump forward in a movie that is otherwise very much of its year 2000 release date.
That’s true of its music choices (the famous “Mission: Impossible” theme reinterpreted by Metallica and Limp Bizkit, though the Fred Durst vocals in the film are as minimal as possible), its directorial vintage (John Woo deep in his brief American phase, following the success of Face/Off), and the casual misogyny (“To go to bed with a man and lie to him?” Hunt’s superior, played by Anthony Hopkins, says when Hunt questions a female recruit’s suitability for a Notorious-style mission. “She’s a woman. She has all the training she needs.” It’s a line that wouldn’t be out of place in a movie from its inspiration’s 1944 release year, in wit or cruelty). But it’s most true of its position in Cruise’s storied career.
Back in May 2000, Mission: Impossible II was Cruise’s third movie in 12 months, and positioned as a box office comeback of sorts. He was still one of the most popular and recognizable stars in the world. But following the one-two punch of the first Mission and Jerry Maguire in 1996, one of the more commercially impressive single-year double features ever fashioned, he spent a lot of time working on Stanley Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut. That and Magnolia both came out in 1999 – another highly impressive double feature, but not necessarily from a financial point of view. Both movies were challenging, adult-oriented dramas, and although such things weren’t as close to extinction as they are now, Cruise’s presence could only do so much (especially in Magnolia, which featured his first genuine ensemble role since becoming a star). Mission: Impossible II was an easy commercial layup, a hotly anticipated teaming with action maestro John Woo and an easy pick for the biggest movie of the summer.