IMPOSSIBLE
MOVIE FORCE
The Creator Of TV’s ALIAS and LOST Arms Paramount’s
Biggest Movie Franchise
Read the web-only uncut version.
By Mike Russell
Like the resurrected “Superman” franchise — for
which J.J. Abrams wrote a controversial, unproduced script
a few years ago — “Mission: Impossible III” struggled
through a long and abortive pre-production history.
Veteran directors
David Fincher (“Seven,” “Fight
Club”), Joe Carnahan (“Narc”), and Frank
Darabont (“The Green Mile”) all spent time in
producer-star Tom Cruise’s offices, trying to figure
out how to continue the adventures of IMF superagent Ethan
Hunt.
So how did
Abrams — the TV strongman who created the
teen drama “Felicity,” the sci-fi spy serial “Alias” and
the castaway blockbuster “Lost” — get
to make his big-screen directorial debut on a $150-million
Paramount
tentpole?
Abrams, who
wrote and directed acclaimed pilots for both “Alias” and “Lost,” traces
the opportunity to the distribution of freebies. “I
met Tom with Steven Spielberg during ‘War of the Worlds,’” he
recalls. “I wasn’t available, because I was working
on a version of ‘Superman’ which never happened,
and I started doing ‘Lost’ and pilots. It was
a great meeting, but I had to tell him I couldn’t do
it, and I thought, ‘There goes my opportunity to work
with these guys.’”
Flash-forward
several months. “I was shooting the ‘Lost’ pilot,
and I got a call from Tom. When he left my office, my assistant
gave him the DVDs of the first two seasons of ‘Alias’ as,
um, swag — and he actually watched them, which is miraculous.
And he loved them. He wanted to hang out when I got back.
“I thought ‘Mission III’ was going swimmingly
[without me]. He never brought up any issues, but I guess
things just weren’t working out. And he asked me if
I was interested in directing it. I told him I couldn’t
start for about a year — because I was working on ‘Lost’ and ‘Alias’ — and
I told him I’d want to start over with the story.
“He said, ‘OK.’”
Abrams laughs. “You know, the odds of that happening
were zero. The whole thing was impossible.”
In Focus spoke with Abrams for almost
an hour, about “Mission:
Impossible III,” “Alias,” “Lost” and
related matters. (Be sure to marvel at how carefully he dances
around “M:I III” character and plot
details.) An edited transcript follows.
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The first “M:I III” teaser trailer seemed to
echo the very underrated “On Her Majesty’s Secret
Service” — what with the agent’s significant
other in peril, plus a bulky, well-spoken villain.
Well, not intentionally — although, as a happy by-product,
I’ll gladly be compared to anything that’s underrated
or of any quality. [laughs]
The story — while in no way based on that, and in fact
being incredibly careful to avoid “Bond” comparisons — definitely
has similar themes. I think you’ll see in [“Mission:
Impossible III”] a side of Ethan Hunt that hasn’t
been in the films before.
You said Frank Darabont is
one of your “favorite writers
and did unbelievable work on the [‘Mission: Impossible
III’] script.” So what made you decide to start
over?
I wanted to start from scratch because it wasn’t my
voice. It wasn’t my story. It wasn’t the kind
of approach that I would take. Not to say that it wasn’t
brilliant, or that if Joe Carnahan or Frank Darabont had
directed that installment, it wouldn’t have been unbelievable — I’m
sure it would’ve been.
Was the Darabont script the one that was rumored to involve
Africa and black-market organ rings?
A portion of the Darabont script took place in Africa, in
Ghana. It was incredibly well-written — a classic,
densely plotted thriller. It was terrific. It just wasn’t
the version of “Mission: Impossible” I thought
I could do.
There was too much at stake to come in and
work on a story that I didn’t feel, in my heart, was sort of my territory.
It’s not just the money that’s at stake: I feel
beholden to the franchise that Bruce Geller created — the
spirit of the TV shows, the movies, the character that means
so much to Tom. He’s incredibly proud of his first
producer effort. I was shocked that he was open to starting
over.
The HEAVY HEAVY &
HUNTING For HUNT
Well, let’s talk about your version. What’s
the story with Philip Seymour Hoffman’s character?
On the face of it, if you say, “Phil Hoffman and Tom
Cruise are gonna be matched intellectually and physically,” you
think, “Tom Cruise will probably kick his ass.” [laughs]
But when you see this movie, Phil Hoffman is so imposing
and so scary and brutal. He infuses the role with wit and
honesty. There’s nothing worse than a bad guy who feels
flimsy or arch.
Even though the lines he has in the trailer
are wildly over-the-top, that exchange suits him in that
moment. I don’t think
we’ve seen Ethan Hunt go up against somebody so dangerous.
Can you tell me anything
about the character Hoffman’s
playing?
Uh … not much. [laughs] I can say that he essentially
plays a provider of, um, materials to organizations and countries
that jeopardize the stability of the world. This guy is essentially
the middleman who gets bad people bad things — and
it’s a priority for Western intelligence to find him
and take him out. He’s incredibly elusive and sophisticated.
And what begins as a fairly generic story — “there’s
a bad guy and he needs to be taken down” — becomes
a very specific and very personal story through the movie.
We hear the movie will deal
with Ethan’s
home life. Is he married at this point? And what role does
Michelle
Monaghan play?
She’s a love interest. You’ll see how that relationship
works.
To me, the fun of the story — and the crux of my approach
to this film — is where the professional side of this
super-spy meets the personal and intimate side. The conflict
exists for all of us: How do you maintain a home life and
a personal life with any real commitment, and maintain a
professional life at the level you aspire to?
Well, the only personal aspect
of Ethan Hunt’s life
that we’ve seen up to this point is him rock-climbing
at the start of “Mission: Impossible II.”
And you’ve learned in “Mission I” that
his parents died. But aside from those two moments, there’s
really not any sense of this person as a person. He’s
always a super-person.
The fun of “Mission: Impossible” was always the
teamwork. One of the beautiful things in this movie is that
we’ve got Maggie Q, Ving Rhames, Laurence Fishburne,
Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Billy Crudup, Keri Russell, Simon Pegg … this
credible supporting cast. The teamwork, for me, was always
the greatest part of the “Mission” TV series.
And in “Mission I” and “II” — with
some exceptions in “Mission I” — they’ve
really been Ethan-Hunt-as-spy movies.
That isn’t to say that “Mission III” isn’t
ultimately Ethan’s movie — it is — but
the team has a crucial role in the entire film. For me, what’s
fun in the film is watching how these people work together,
plan an operation and execute it. The supporting cast is
as much a reason to see this film as any of the stunts, or
even Tom himself.
CHARACTER
in ACTION
Each director put his own
stylistic mark on the first two films, particularly when
it came to action
sequences: De
Palma echoed Kubrick and Hitchcock, Woo echoed, um, Woo.
I’m wondering how you’ll be shooting the action
in M:I III.
I think the critical thing for me is that we never cross
a line and get into physical impossibility.
No wire-fu?
Well, I’m not saying there wasn’t some wire removal
in the movie —
Well, sure.
As much as I’m a fan of “The Matrix” and
many of Woo’s movies, my fear in this film ... my fear
in general is that I have no idea if I have a style at all.
But my fear was that any style at all — whomever I
was borrowing from, or whomever I might get inspired by — would
overshadow the story.
So my decision was to approach it from a standpoint
of serving the story, so I never came into something with
an aesthetic
choice leading the way. It was always, “What are the
characters going though?” It was a relief for us, in
a way. By constantly focusing on what needed to be dramatized,
it dictated its own style.
You’ll see that the action is incredibly hard-core,
very fast-paced — but there are equally intimate scenes
that are emotionally incredibly pitched.
And the approach to the action, for me, is
clarity. In action scenes, there’s often so much freneticism, you get
lost in terms of what the hell’s going on. What you’ll
see, during our seven substantial action sequences, is that
you know where you are.
We didn’t design any of the action sequences first — I
didn’t want the action scenes to be dragging the characters
through them. I wanted the characters to be driving all the
action. What the actors are attempting to achieve makes the
action exist.
To me, in the most exciting action movies — “Die
Hard,” “The Fugitive” — each sequence,
big or small, was completely connected to what the characters
wanted, and why. I was aspiring to a movie that was fundamentally
a character piece — even though it happens to have
more action than the first two “Missions” combined.
People always forget that
it was 20 minutes before the first bullet was fired in “Die
Hard.”
It’s actually, I think, more than 20 minutes. Look
at “Back to the Future”: It took over half an
hour to really set up everything before he went back in time.
Now, that isn’t to say that you don’t want to
start a movie off with a real punch. And I think we do. But
it’s critical that you invest the audience in the characters — especially
in a sequel.
When you look at the “Indiana Jones” or “Die
Hard” sequels, as successful as they are, there’s
something about those movies that doesn’t invest as
much in the characters. You can’t assume, “Because
the first one or the second one worked, you know who he is.
Let’s just get to it.” I think every minute you
don’t spend investing the character makes it that much
harder to care about what he or she is going through in any
action sequence.
What did years of doing spy television teach you about doing
a spy movie?
Doing “Alias” and “Lost” — beyond
the fact that I never would have gotten this opportunity
if it weren’t for those shows — was undoubtedly
the greatest training ever. Knowing how to work on the timetable
that television requires, getting to understand the genre
as shorthand.
Tom had an uncanny ability to discuss the
conventions of the genre with such ease that it felt very
much like a meeting
with any of the “Alias” writers. It was important
in terms of action sequences — I’ve spent hundreds
of hours in the editing room with action sequences I have
or haven’t directed, getting a sense of what 
works
and what doesn’t.
So when I was on the “Mission” set, I had this
bag of tricks I knew I could pull out if I needed to. And
I had a comfort level that allowed me to show up on the set
and try and be as creative as possible — the way I
used to when I was a kid, and I would go on vacation with
my parents and walk through a hotel lobby and go, “How
could I film a chase scene here?” Had I not done “Alias” or “Lost,” I’m
sure I would have been far more insecure about what choices
to make.
‘MISSION’
RESTORATION
The “Mission: Impossible” TV
series was born in 1966, the same year you were, and was
out of production
before you entered the first grade. Did the TV series have
any 
influence on how you approached the movie?
For me, the most critical thing in approaching the movie
was not borrowing from the TV show — with one major
exception, which I’ll tell you about. It was more that
I wanted to bring the spirit of the show’s teamwork
to the movie. The fun of watching a group plot and execute
some kind of mission was something I didn’t feel was
as critical to the other “Mission” films as I
would have preferred. This was an opportunity to not be the
Monday-morning quarterback, but rather to make the movie
that, for better or worse, I want to see. And the teamwork
is part of that.
The exception was: There’s a cue that Lalo Schifrin
wrote [for the TV series] called “The Plot” that’s
one of the great pieces of film or TV music ever. It’s
as famous as the theme song for anyone who’s ever seen
the show. Are you familiar with it?
I’m sure if I heard it, I’d know it. [J.J. Abrams
starts humming “The Plot”] Oh, yeah yeah yeah!
I mean, literally — they’ve never used it in
the movies.
That’s a crime.
And that’s the theme that was most often used when
you were watching the team do their thing — it spoke
of that IMF spirit. As much as the main theme song gets your
mojo working, “The Plot” was the heart of the
series. And the fact that it was never used in the movies
was ludicrous to me. I get to bring that back. Michael Giacchino
is composing for the movie, adapting Schifrin’s work.
‘ALIAS,’ ‘LOST’
& JAMES BOND
Will Milo Rambaldi play a
significant role in the “Alias” finale
this May, or has that ship sailed?
There will be a Rambaldi component to it. We would have actually
gone there far more — and in greater detail, as we
originally conceived it — if the network had been more
amenable to that. But they were always very anti-Rambaldi,
so we kind of had to pull back.
Did you ever consider a circumstance that would have necessitated
casting Rambaldi?
We actually have. In a flashback once, you actually saw a
piece of his hand, but you never actually saw who he was.
[brief pause] We actually have — yes.
Once “Mission: Impossible III” hits cinemas,
do you see yourself taking a more active role in guiding “Lost’s” third
season?
I’d love to become more involved in “Lost” next
year — which, in many ways, would be almost anything,
given how time-consuming the movie’s been. I’m
incredibly grateful to Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse for
running the show this year and doing such a great job. But
I’d love to direct an episode. I miss those guys like
crazy.
You’ve spoken often of your love — some might
call it a nerdly love — of the James Bond franchise.
If Sony approached you to make a Bond movie, could you refuse,
or did “Mission: Impossible III” scratch that
itch?
If they did — and I can’t imagine they would — while
it would be hard to refuse an opportunity like that, James
Bond is such an iconic series, I almost can’t imagine
being part of that. I need to be the audience for that — you
know what I’m saying? It’s almost sacrilege to
imagine working on those.
And from everything you’ve said, it sounds like you
feel very strongly about authorship — and authorship
is tough to pull off with something that established.
I think that’s true. That was the beauty of “Mission.” Unlike
so many producers and actors who have a very rigid view,
Tom literally said, “What’s your ‘Mission:
Impossible’ movie?” I hope when you see the film,
you feel that energy. And if you don’t like it, I’m
100-percent to blame. 
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