The Mission: Impossible films have some staples that persist, no matter who's starring in them. There's usually a threat of the world-ending variety. An IMF agent will don an extremely convincing latex mask to disguise themselves as someone else. Tom Cruise will flip off death by performing a stunt that's both impressive in terms of setup and terrifying in terms of how he's willing to push the envelope further and further. But one element, in my opinion, is heavily underrated, and that's the dynamic between Cruise's Ethan Hunt and his IMF team. If you're a Mission: Impossible fan, you have George Lucas to thank for a simple suggestion that altered the course of the Mission: Impossible franchise.
George Lucas Convinced Brian De Palma To Add a Scene in 'Mission: Impossible,' Which Sets Up Ethan Hunt's Team
When Emilio Estevez appeared on a special episode of Josh Horowitz's Happy.Sad.Confused podcast, talk turned to Mission: Impossible, and what happened when director Brian De Palma showed George Lucas a rough cut of the scene. "Brian screened it for him, and George says, "Where's your spaghetti scene?" To Lucas, having a scene where the IMF team gets to know each other would help endear the audience to the characters...and make it all the more shocking when they're killed off shortly afterwards. De Palma and screenwriter David Koepp had previously confirmed this account on the Light the Fuse podcast and Script Apart podcast respectively, with De Palma also revealing how Lucas convinced him to cut out a subplot that features a love triangle between Hunt, his mentor Jim Phelps (Jon Voight) and Phelps' wife Claire (Emmanuelle Béart):
"In the beginning we had this very strange scene - it's hard for me to remember now - with [Jon] Voight and somehow the jealous thing with the wife and Tom, and then we got into the first mission. And when George saw the movie it's the first thing he said, 'What are these people doing? This is Mission: Impossible, it's a group of guys going to do something! So you've gotta get them all around a table and tell the audience what they're supposed to do,' and that's what we did. We went back and reshot it. So that's an example of us helping each other."
This wasn't the first time that Lucas and De Palma had helped each other out. De Palma helped shape the iconic opening crawl for Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope, rewriting it from a lengthy six paragraphs to a clear and concise three. He and Steven Spielberg also offered their tough but fair assessment of the film, which helped Lucas shape it into the definitive film it is today. Since De Palma helped him with Star Wars, it's only fitting that Lucas offered his notes on Mission: Impossible.
Ethan Hunt Goes Through Hell and Back for His Friends in the Mission: Impossible Films Close
In making sure Brian De Palma had his "spaghetti scene" in Mission: Impossible, Lucas helped establish a core part of Ethan Hunt's character -- namely, the fact that he'll put his life on the line to protect his loved ones. Mission: Impossible - Fallout shows that he isn't willing to risk the lives of others to achieve his goal, as he stops a police officer from dying and trades the cores for three nuclear weapons to save his friend Luther Stickwell (Ving Rhames). Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation has him agreeing to help the villainous Solomon Lane (Sean Harris) to spare the life of his fellow IMF agent Benji Dunn (Simon Pegg).
But the Mission: Impossible installment that most closely follows Lucas' "spaghetti scene" is Mission: Impossible III. It starts with what might be the grimmest cold open in the franchise: Ethan is bound and forced to watch while arms dealer Owen Davian (Phillip Seymour Hoffman) threatens his wife Julia (Michelle Monaghan). The clock then winds back to a house party that Ethan and Julia are hosting, where their guests -- and, by extension, the audience -- get to know how Ethan fell in love with this woman. Though it hasn't been confirmed if Mission: Impossible -- The Final Reckoning will be the final Mission: Impossible film, it more than likely will feature a "spaghetti scene" of its own.
Mission: Impossible is available to stream on Hulu in the U.S.
Your Rating close 10 stars 9 stars 8 stars 7 stars 6 stars 5 stars 4 stars 3 stars 2 stars 1 star Rate Now 0/10 Like Follow Followed Mission: Impossible PG-13 Adventure Action Thriller 9.0/10 Release Date May 22, 1996 Runtime 110 minutes Director Brian De Palma Cast See All Tom Cruise Ethan Hunt Jon Voight Jim Phelps Where to watch Close WHERE TO WATCH Streaming RENT BUY
An American agent, under false suspicion of disloyalty, must discover and expose the real spy without the help of his organization.
Writers David Koepp, Robert Towne Powered by Expand Collapse