The Impossible Missions Force (IMF) is a fictional independent espionage agency commonly employed by the United States government. It was introduced in the television series Mission: Impossible that ran from 1966 to 1973, and later in the revival series that ran from 1988 to 1990. Beginning in 1996, the IMF has been featured in a number of theatrical films starring Tom Cruise, including Mission: Impossible, Mission: Impossible II, Mission: Impossible III, and Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol as the "Impossible Mission Force."
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In the television series, thanks largely to the involvements of William Read Woodfield and Allan Balter as writers, story editors and producers, the IMF operates primarily by executing confidence tricks on its mission targets, sometimes with the aid of high-tech gadgetry. The agents are able to deceive their targets into cooperating with them without detecting a set-up until the mission is accomplished; by that time, the IMF personnel have already vanished from the scene.
Woodfield was a devotee of The Big Con, a book written by linguist David W. Maurer, and he and Balter consulted it as one of the "testaments" in their "Bible" for the series; the other "testament" of their "Bible" was a four-page outline that they based partially on the principles of writing instructor Lajos Egri, author of The Art Of Dramatic Writing, which book Egri had published in 1946.
As depicted in the original series, IMF agents were mostly part-time operatives, who kept regular day jobs, and many of them were independently wealthy, in large part so that they could not be bribed. Regulars included Rollin Hand (Martin Landau), a performer billed as "The Man Of A Million Faces;" Cinnamon Carter (Barbara Bain), a fashion model and cover girl; Barnard "Barney" Collier (Greg Morris), a technological genius who owned his own electronics company, which, presumably, was a NASA contractor; and William "Willy" Armitage (Peter Lupus), a bodybuilder known as "The World's Strongest Man." Later regulars included Leonard Nimoy as stage magician The Great Paris, Lesley Warren as Dana Lambert and Lynda Day George as Lisa Casey. Other occasional members included specialized experts such as doctors, lawyers, circus acrobats, and even entire repertory companies. The only "full-time" member identified was the team leader. In the first season of the original series, this is Daniel Briggs, played by Steven Hill; starting in the second season and continuing into the revival series, the team leader is James Phelps, acted out by Peter Graves.
All team members displayed skill in social engineering and misdirection, improvisational acting, hand-to-hand combat, sleight of hand, and fluency in multiple languages. Where some operatives who specialized in these skills had reason to believe they would not be available, they often cross-trained the others between missions.
IMF agents are anonymously sent on covert missions to tackle the dangerous worlds of counterterrorism, espionage, political subversion, international crime and domestic organized crime. Their international actions tend to counter communists, dictatorships, and other opponents of democracy. The television series never directly specifies who oversees the IMF, though it is assumed to be the United States government or the United Nations; all team members are American. They operate under non-official cover status, and if they are captured or killed, their employers will disavow any knowledge of their actions. In the secret tape messages issued to the team leaders, reference is made to "the Secretary," but exactly which secretary is never specified. The IMF team leader is also given the option to reject a mission with which he does not feel comfortable or if he believes it truly is impossible to accomplish. This has not yet been shown to happen in either television series or any of the movies; in fact, the film Mission: Impossible II has a scene in which IMF leader Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) meets the owner of the tape voice face-to-face, and the latter explicitly states that Hunt does not have the option of not accepting a mission, even though the films' recorded briefings contain the famous phrase, "Your mission, should you decide to accept...."
Other "missions" are undertaken by the team as personal favors to the team leader or to a fellow member, but these are far less common.
In the 1980s revival series, the IMF is implied to be an independent agency, with multiple IMF teams as well as specialized divisions for research and development.
James Phelps is still leader of an IMF team, and, presumably, the IMF Director. Grant Collier, a prodigy and son of the original series' Barney Collier, is also a member (played by Phil Morris, son of Greg Morris). Other members were Nicholas Black (Thaao Penghlis), a university drama professor; Maxwell Hart (Tony Hamilton), a former Australian mercenary; and Casey Randall (Terry Markwell), a fashion designer. Randall was killed partway through the series (becoming the only regular TV IMF operative to be depicted as "disavowed") and replaced by Shannon Reed (Jane Badler).
James Phelps (now played by Jon Voight) is also depicted as the leader of an IMF team in the 1996 Mission: Impossible film. In the film Phelps is depicted as a villain, a development which angered actor Peter Graves, as well as many fans of the original series. Other members of Phelps' team are Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise), who leads an IMF team in the second and third films (following the killing of Phelps in the first film); Claire Phelps (Emmanuelle Béart), shown to be James Phelps's spouse in another development which angered Graves and series fans; Sarah Davies (Kristin Scott Thomas); and Jack Harmon (Emilio Estevez). Other IMF agents throughout the film franchise include Luther Stickell (Ving Rhames), disavowed at the beginning of Mission: Impossible but reinstated at the film's end; Franz Krieger (Jean Reno), disavowed; pilot Billy Baird (John Polson); rogue agent Sean Ambrose (Dougray Scott), computer specialist Benji Dunne (Simon Pegg), Declan Gormley (Jonathan Rhys-Meyers), Zhen Lei (Maggie Q), and Lindsey Farris (Keri Russell).
In Mission: Impossible, Phelps's superior officer, Eugene Kittridge (Henry Czerny), is shown working in the Central Intelligence Agency's headquarters. In Mission: Impossible II, it is not as clear to whom the IMF reports. In Mission: Impossible III, the IMF is identified as an independent agency of the US government, some of whose agents front as Virginia Department of Transportation employees. Hunt refers to the group as the "Impossible Mission Force."
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