I haven’t seen the rest. As for his *imports,* I’ll never be able to choose between The Killer and Hard Boiled. They are both so great and I hold them higher in regard than Face/Off.

As for Raimi, he’s clearly elevated his game throughout the years, if only because he got Katie Holmes nekkid. Seriously though, I am eagerly anticipating Spiderman 3.

I echo Sean’s comments on the whole. The film played out like a big-screen reworking of Alias. That’s probably a breath of fresh air for MI fans who are Alias newbies – but to someone who has watched Alias religiously through its 5 years, I felt I’d seen so much of this done better on a much smaller budget. I guess I expected more.

Phillip Seymour Hoffman did not disappoint. He has precious few scenes but each one is charged. He’s like a rampaging pit bull. I like the move towards a thuggish lout in favor of the Eurotrash terrorist we’ve come to expect in these endeavors. Speaking of villains, his greatest work has to be as the porn purveyor in Punch Drunk Love. Seek that flick out – specifically for his “Did you just tell me to F myself?” rant.

I do take Sean to task for one thing. MI-2 has lost something in the years. It’s arguably one of Woo’s worst films (or was until he did the painfully bad Windtalkers). Where Sam Raimi has matured as a filmmaker – relying less on the flashy gimmickry that amplified his lower budget efforts (Evil Dead series) in favor of solid cinematic story-telling in the Spiderman series (and of course, A Simple Plan) – Woo seems stuck in that groove where he’s repeating the same riff. The flurry of doves bursting through fireballs got old around Hard Target. Woo’s best American film is Face-Off, simply because that film displayed audacity and verve typically unseen in Hollywood summer fare. I credit some of that on Nic Cage. Afterall, his “put down the f’n bunny” in Con Air elevates that flick to Shakespeare. Anyway, MI-2 drags for the first half with a weak-ass Cruise clone in Dougray Scott (the one decent thing about MI-2 is it tied Scott up – thereby relinquishing his hold on the role of Wolverine, which then went to newbie Hugh Jackman.)

As for MI-3, catch it On Demand.