The latest chapter of the "Mission: Impossible" franchise, with the punctuation-straining title "Mission: Impossible — Ghost Protocol," delivers everything you would want from a blockbuster movie and more: exciting action sequences, exotic locations, clever gadgetry and a whip-smart story that moves the action along logically and efficiently.

Tom Cruise is back as Ethan Hunt, top agent for the Impossible Missions Force (IMF), which takes the espionage cases nobody else will. When we meet up with Hunt, he's in a Russian prison, being sprung by two other IMF agents: his trusty tech expert Benji Dunn (Simon Pegg, returning from the last film) and beautiful and skilled Jane Carter (Paula Patton).

The prison break goes without a hitch, but what happens next doesn't: The team is given a new mission to infiltrate the Kremlin — and takes the blame when a rogue terrorist mastermind, code named Cobalt (played by Swedish actor Michael Nyqvist), blows up the Kremlin to cover his theft of a nuclear launching device.

Suddenly, Hunt & Co. are "disavowed" by the Secretary (Tom Wilkinson, in a cagey cameo) and find themselves alone and on the run. The team, along with a sharp IMF analyst, Brandt (Jeremy Renner), must regroup and track Cobalt from Dubai to Mumbai to keep him from starting a nuclear war.

Director Brad Bird is a newcomer to live-action films, but his stellar work at Pixar (he directed "The Incredibles" and "Ratatouille") turns out to be perfect training for a "Mission: Impossible" movie. From "The Incredibles" he brings an uncanny instinct for action-movie pacing, and from "Ratatouille" he channels a sense of place for offbeat locations — which, in this case, means a vertigo-inducing sequence on the upper floors of the world's tallest building, The Burj Khalifa in Dubai. (The movie is opening early on IMAX screens, and it's worth seeing in IMAX for the views, if you aren't afraid of heights.)

Bird deploys Cruise perfectly, using his muscular physical skills and intense charm to best advantage, while also building up the next generation of action hero in the steely Renner. Then Bird surrounds them with a fascinating international cast to give the story depth. Besides Nyqvist (best known as journalist Mikael Blomkvist in the Swedish "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" trilogy), there are French beauty Léa Seydoux ("Midnight in Paris") as an assassin and Bollywood star Anil Kapoor (the game-show host in "Slumdog Millionaire") as a Mumbai playboy.

The script, by TV vets Josh Appelbaum and André Nemec, also completes the path (begun in director J.J. Abrams' third installment) of bringing the "Mission: Impossible" movie franchise back to the ideals of the TV series.

"Mission: Impossible" was always about the team, the way Jim Phelps (Peter Graves) and his IMF agents brought their varied skills together toward the common goal. That was lost in the first two films, as Cruise's Ethan Hunt largely worked as a lone wolf. This one cements the IMF as a team that's impossible to beat.

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Mission: Impossible — Ghost Protocol

Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to enjoy the sharpest entry in the franchise.

Where • IMAX theaters and some select theaters.

When • Opens in select theaters Friday, Dec. 16, and everywhere on Wednesday, Dec. 21.

Rating • PG-13 for sequences of intense action and violence.

Running time • 133 minutes.