That may be a low bar since Mission Impossible is probably the second best action flick that year. I tend to like Peter Berg movies and this is his best by far. The "shaky camera" a lot of people complain about has been a staple in Hollywood now for 2 decades and is no worse than the early Jason Bourne films. The plot is somewhat far-fetched (no more so than MI) and the action sequences don't go over-the-top. In fact the martial arts scenes are great. For some reason, Berg decided not to really use Rousey in the hand-to-hand fights.The characters are rough and sarcastic, kind of like the military in real life. All of the acting was good. Rousey especially impressed me, not that she was challenged to do some light romcom. But as some 90's martial artists (think Norris, Van Damme, Segal) proved, merely kicking and punching your way through a movie doesn't qualify as acting.So, who is this movie for? Do you like Peter Berg and Mark Wahlberg? Are you willing to overlook some far fetched plot elements for some realistic action? And like the other movies I compared it to, this is the first installment on what they hope to make a franchise from.

Ronda Rousey, Mark Wahlberg did fantastic! Great ending too, caught me by surprise.

Mile 22Mile 22 is a plot driven mind-numbing action feature with an agenda of an "in and out" missions that all goes horribly and expectedly wrong. Wahlberg's last few unstable features corners him to shake Berg's magic hat and draw out the card from it but unfortunately this time, it isn't the card that anyone was seeking for, not even the makers. It inherently gets difficult to rub on a genre that is already almost explored in each way, and addition to that when you feed the audience a wafer thin concept and expects them to be blown away by the blazing barrels; it's a bit much. Not only does the feature surfs around the surface, the characters that it forcibly installs is just pathetically one-dimensional. One of the primary reason why it fails on levels, is its antagonist, which is not kept under any shade but is just non-existent, leaving the audience with the stakes that are all hoax and all distraction. The anticipated twists and turns which are mundane in such genres, is so independent from any of the incidents occurred in the feature, that it nullifies itself; the viewers couldn't care less. It doesn't have any circle that comes around or makes sense, nor any arc or gist to stand on the self-created slippery ground. As much as exciting it is to experience sharp sound effects, its heightened version latter, shucks it all way. A decent background score or cinematography is pure myth in here, although the camera work is intriguing and convincing whose credit goes to Berg's experience. The choreographed action sequences are enthralling with all the actors working hard and investing all their chips in, especially Uwais who easily is the highlight of it. Berg's world in here seems like the first draft of the script, where his weaving of the structure in front of the audience takes out every inch of the thrill that was about to hit them. Wahlberg is annoyingly loud and disappointingly unstable in his portrayal where no supporting cast like Cohan, Rousey and Malkovich, is supporting him. Berg; the director, still needs some work to do especially to work with his editing department, since all crisp is purely hazardous. Few action sequences and sharp sound effects are the only high points of this sinking feature. Mile 22 has a long way to go, probably more than it titles for, but in the end it too wouldn't matter since they are following the wrong directions.

Mile 22 is an espionage thriller that is pure crack for the action addicted. So much action that characterization is left in the cars' dust or lost in high-tech programs. While the techno-glitz and high-speed chases dominate, now and then super government operative James Silva (Mark Wahlberg) peeks thorough with a tough line or two and a few stream-of-consciousness-Jason-Statham-like speeches, minimal at that.Yet, this film belongs to a genre that demands action, in this case smuggling an Asian police officer out of the country in order for him to disclose world-saving information. My enjoyment of this actioner, however, comes largely from the fusion of technology to our sense of vulnerability.While it is comforting to see the government using banks of computers to spy on the minute actions of bad guys, it is discomforting to realize those goons or foreign powers have the same capabilities to spy on us. Even though we can use drones to ferret out enemies, they can do the same.But no enemy can have James, a lethal weapon of high IQ, verbal dexterity, and stirring memories that keep him in the game. Mile 22 is for those who won't complain about the abundance of action and lack of story or character arc. We are in, after all, the end of summer arc when norms of traditional story telling are ignored while we indulge in action porn of the first order. You will enjoy regardless.