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"We put an explosive charge inside your head," an offscreen voice announces as M:I III flickers to life — the ultimate summer movie promise! Unfortunately, the promised detonation turns out to be a dud. J.J. Abrams workmanlike set pieces can't touch the convulsive craftsmanship of his franchise predecessors ó tossing off a reference to the first movie's 2001-style break in is a very bad idea ó and the psychodramatic stuffing Abrams uses to plug the chinks is hardly a fitting substitute. This time out, Tom Cruise's Ethan Hunt is angling for the straight life, his IMF duties reduced to training as he prepares to marry Michelle Monaghan's pretty nurse. (Incidentally, although the movie takes a while to remind you of it, IMF stands for Impossible Mission Force; I kept wondering if I'd forgotten the part in M:I II where Ethan goes to work for the International Monetary Fund.) But after Ethan's trainee Keri Russell (who wields a gun with surprising conviction) is kidnapped and killed (via one of those boom-in-the-head deals) by all-purpose trafficker Philip Seymour Hoffman, all thoughts of retirement are off. Besides, as old colleague Ving Rhames reminds him, you have to be crazy to think a secret agent can have a "real relationship." The attempt to add psychological depth three installments in feels misguided and purposeless ó if we've gotten this far without caring who Ethan Hunt "is," why start now? And besides, who wants to get inside Tom Cruise's head these days, anyway? —Sam Adams

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