“Operation Rogosh” premiered on October 1st, 1966. Directed by Leonard J. Horn and written by Jerome Ross, it finds the IMF working to prevent a terrorist attack in Los Angeles. What makes this mission impossible is that the person they’ve been sent after, this man called “The Monster,” this man whose speciality is “mass murder to create political anarchy,” is too intelligent, too wiry, too calculating, and too devoted to his cause to willingly turn over information. “Unbreakable by any known means,” the Secretary tells Briggs. The experts are certain he has something planned, and the IMF only have a short amount of time to break Imre Rogosh and save thousands of lives.
It should be obvious by now, but this piece contains spoilers for both Mission: Impossible the TV show and the film franchise.
1.) The IMF is Halloween
Mission: Impossible exists in this nether space, flirting between the garish action of the James Bond franchise and the coolly cerebral, introspective thrills of John Le Carré’s novels. It borrows from both without being either. Yes, it’s an action adventure spy series, and the first two episodes were not without their share of chases and shoot-outs, but it prefers its tricks and misdirection, its quiet manipulations. It focuses on intelligent people working their way through tough situations. It’s popcorn, but it’s stove-popped rather than microwaved.
No where is this more evident than in “Operation Rogosh,” the strongest of the series’ opening episodes. The most violent action happens in the first few minutes, when the IMF run Imre Rogosh down with their car. We see a quick shot of Peter Lupus, a glance of Barbara Bain, a flash of Greg Morris’s face. Enough information to let us know that the IMF have gotten ahold of him. Leonard J. Horn and Jerome Ross don’t tell us what the team plans to do. They cut out the debriefing scene, they remove the montages of them preparing for the operation. Instead, the episode moves directly from Dan Briggs receiving his orders to the team moving in full force.
No one fires a gun. There’s no massive explosions or elaborate car chase. Instead, tension is generated by a ticking clock, some well executed sleight-of-hand, and a gradual unraveling of lies and misdirections.
And it’s completely engaging for the full 50 minutes.
2.) A Bunch of Grown Men
It’s difficult to call this a “return to form” for the series. This is only the third episode, and TV shows typically don’t develop or set their visual styles until much later in the season. “Operation Rogosh” does, however, feel more in line with the aesthetic from the pilot. It’s full of emotional camerawork — snap zooms, distorted angles, whip pans, and erratic rack focuses, a style that’s trying to keep up with the action. For its first act, Horn keeps the perspective with Rogosh, and the plot unravels for the viewer at the same time as it does for the character.
The central action stays centered around one set. Horn takes the time to present the layout of the IMF’s makeshift prison, shows the viewer some of the set’s seams and edges and how the team covers them up. He holds us with Rogosh’s perspective long enough to feel the pressure, but he and editor Paul Krasney cut away when that technique starts to wear out. So the viewer gets several sources of suspense: trying to piece together what the IMF is doing, then how they’re getting the information out of their target, and finally, if they’re going to stop the attack in time. Added to this, Rogosh’s compatriots are lurking just outside the peripherals, also trying to figure out what’s going on.
Of course, if Rogosh really wanted to kill hundreds of thousands of people he could have just become President and blatantly ignored a global pandemic.
3.) In Rubber Masks
I’m interested to see when those beats finally appear. You know the ones. The Secretary does tell Briggs, “Your mission, should you choose to accept it,” and even, “If any of your team are captured or killed, the secretary will disavow any knowledge of your actions.” But he still advises him to “destroy this recording by the usual method.” Briggs gets his message from a hidden tape recorder in a nearby car. He still assembles his team by tossing their dossier head shots on to a table, so the episode can properly credit the guest stars. We’re seeing flashes of those elements, if not yet something totally definitive.
Continued belowAlthough the team all plays different characters throughout their operation, none of them wear a mask, which means they don’t get to have a mass pull moment. Even in the pilot, where Landau poses, with prosthetics, as a South American general, he doesn’t get to yank his face off during a surprise moment.
4.) Playing
Maybe it’s time to talk about Steven Hill.
Dan Briggs led the IMF only for the first season. Hill’s performance isn’t flat, it’s more empty.
I know Geller believed the audience shouldn’t know much about the characters’ personal lives. He was more concerned with the plot, with the action, with the mystery unfolding. Still, we at least get glimpses of their personalities within the performance. Martin Landau and Barbara Bain, who were married at the time, have this flirty and cloy attitude with each other, for instance. It’s hard to know anything about Hill, except he’s team leader. He’s quick with encouragement. He thinks fast. But he’s like a video game character, a cipher, an avatar, played so blank it’s almost like we’re told to project ourselves on to him.
This was most obvious to me in the scene where Rogosh finally figures out how they’ve tricked him. All their work undone by the rental company’s label underneath a chair. Rogosh laughs and shrieks and berates the players. Meanwhile, Briggs stands in front of him, watching him, not letting any of us see if he’s disappointed or angry. It’s like he doesn’t even have emotion, until he cold cocks Rogosh.
(This performance works much better in the climactic scene, where the IMF have uncovered three of Rogosh’s bombs and place them in his cell. Briggs asks about the fourth in his calm, collected manner, while a clock countdowns to their detonation.)
I don’t think Hill’s work is bad or out of place. It feels appropriate for the series. But there are limitations to what this type of acting style can achieve, and sometimes, especially when you hit an emotionally charged moment, that poker face doesn’t carry the scene as well as it ought.
5.) Trick or Treat
Christopher McQuarrie updated and referenced “Operation Rogosh” in Mission: Impossible — Fallout. The scene only lasts a couple minutes, and follows a sequence where Tom Cruise accidentally loses a suitcase full of plutonium to a terrorist group called the Apostles, led by John Lark. The IMF capture a nuclear weapons expert named Nils Delbruuk, whose locked phone contains not only information about the bombs the Apostles are trying to build but direct contact information with Lark. The team stage a car accident, Simon Pegg plays Wolf Blitzer, and Delbruuk is tricked into unlocking his phone. McQuarrie plays with the audience more than Horn and Ross do in “Operation Rogosh.” He makes us think that the bad guys actually did succeed in their nuclear attack. Then Tom Cruise asks, “Did we get it?” and Ving Rhames goes, “Yeah. We got it.” The walls drop and the audience sighs in relief and exhilaration that the attack didn’t happen, and that old school theatrics still make for some of the best spy work. And it’s glorious.
Mission accomplished.
