The problem with the first two "Mission: Impossible" movies was that they should have been called "Mission: Highly Probable." Too often the action came down to Tom Cruise's character, Ethan Hunt, troubleshooting a computer system or dangling, Mary Martin-like, from a guy wire.

The wires are still there in "Mission: Impossible III," but director J.J. Abrams, creator of such TV hits as "Alias" and "Lost," makes a reasonably impressive feature debut with the best installment of the series. Ethan, after taking a hiatus training Impossible Mission Force agents, is pulled back into active service when one of his proteges is captured by an international bad-things dealer; along with his crack team of assistants, he trots from Virginia to Berlin to Rome to Shanghai and back getting it all sorted out.

Abrams keeps the action clicking along in 5/8 time, and Cruise is at his scowling/smiling best as he jumps, shoots and leaves. (See Tom run! Run, Tom, run!) Best is Philip Seymour Hoffman as the baddie; the film's best sequence features him playing Cruise playing him at a swank party in Vatican City. Abrams needs to learn how to pull the camera back from TV-friendly close-ups (if you go, choose a nosebleed seat). But "Mission: Impossible III" will look great on an iPod.

-- Ann Hornaday

Contains intense sequences of violence, disturbing images and brief sensuality.