‘Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning’ Snipped Down to 2 Hours 45 Minutes

Back in February, I posted a positive test-screening reaction for ‘Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning’ which was said to be a little over 3-hours.

“INCREDIBLE. Nerve-jangling. A lot of cliff jumping. Steep mountain riding. “Tom Cruise is certifiably nuts,” one person told me.

Then, in another reaction last week, a reader said the film was a “big highlight of the series.” It turns out that cut was slightly shorter, clocking in at 2 hours 45 minutes.

Last month, Bob Bakish, president of Paramount, revealed that he wasn’t down with the 185 minute cut of the film: “It’s still too long, they’ve got to cut it. But the movie is insane. It’s like a complete thrill ride. And Tom, he’s very good.”

Christopher McQuarrie is back directing this one, and it seems as though, as per Bakish’s recommendations, he’s cut around 20 minutes of it.

Here’s another reaction:

“I had the chance to see a test cut of Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning a couple days ago. The movie is about 2:45 minutes long and holy hell, Esai Morales and Pom Klementieff knock it out the park as villains, super menacing while also being extremely cunning. Tom does Tom but the action set pieces in this one were the best in franchise, honestly I'd say this is the best bunch of the whole franchise.”

There have been constant delays in relation to ‘Dead Reckoning,’ especially due to the pandemic’s effect on global supply-chain, production workers and locations.

The film started shooting in Italy on February 2020, but it had to stop and start production seven different times since then. This one had its budget balloon to $290 million. The first part only recently completed production, after more than three years of shooting.

The end result is that “Dead Reckoning — Part 1” will now be released in theaters this summer. The plan is to have both films serve as a sendoff for Cruise’s Ethan Hunt character.

Last week, 20 minutes of the film were shown at CinemaCon in Vegas. It was also announced that ‘Dead Reckoning’ would be released two days earlier on July 12, 2023. ‘Part 2’ gets released on June 28, 2024.