Entertainment Weekly: "2015’s The Man From U.N.C.L.E. unquestionably the best film Guy Ritchie has ever made"

- July 31, 2018

Mission: Impossible — Fallout and the redemption of Henry Cavill

DARREN FRANICH

July 30, 2018 at 07:05 PM EDT

In Mission: Impossible — Fallout, Henry Cavill plays CIA agent August Walker. He’s paired with IMF all-star Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) for a skydiving mission. Cruise looks smaller next to Cavill, but so does everyone. Director Christopher McQuarrie cleverly films Cavill’s height like a running joke, his big, brash mustache the shape of a lesser man’s toupee.

The visual treatment of Cavill reveals a deeper rift. Walker represents brute force, and the brutality of force. He always kills the bad guys, and is okay killing good guys. It’s a philosophical distinction from Hunt and his IMF kin, a chill crew of adventure heroes. They prefer old-fashioned espionage, the deep-cover character work. Walker looms, towers, hulks. You can’t imagine him pretending to be anyone but himself.

Not much chance for emotional range, is what I’m getting at. My favorite Cavill performance this decade came between Supermans, in 2015’s The Man From U.N.C.L.E. Unquestionably the best film Guy Ritchie has ever made, U.N.C.L.E.stars Cavill as Cold War spy Napoleon Solo, opposite also-tall Armie Hammer (plus Alicia Vikander before she won her Oscar and Elizabeth Debicki before she basically played an Oscar.)

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