Submarine Weekend Extravaganzaaza - laserdiscs

Crimson Tide
The Hunt for Red October

Ok, last weekend (July 13th, 14th) I watched two very well done submarine thrillers. The Hunt for Red October and Crimson Tide. I'm sure you could have guessed those titles...

Anyway, earlier this year I got a laserdisc player. Now, I'm sure you're wondering why I would do that. I have a DVD player and a collection of DVDs that are over 300... but there are certain films that are out of print on DVD... or they are just too expensive... or they just aren't out on DVD. Films like Barton Fink, Miller's Crossing, Society, Hearts of Darkness (the making of Apocalypse Now)... tons of stuff.

So, I went out and bought a ton of films that I had yet to get on DVD... on Ebay, for a ridiculously low price... when compared to DVD, that is.

So, the first film I watched...

Crimson Tide, 1995

Tony Scott. Did he ride on the coat tails of his brother, Ridley Scott? Ridley Scott got his start super early, in the late 1970's, well before he graced the world with the "1984" Apple ad... shooting both The Duellists and Alien before 1980. Tony Scott would get his chance to direct a feature film in 1983, directing David Bowie (of all people) in The Hunger, which is a cult classic now-a-days.

Directly after that he shot the film that put the Air Force on the map... in regards to people wanting to sign up, people wanting to be pilots... Top Gun was the largest grossing film of 1986, beating out Platoon, Aliens and Ferris Beuller... and showed us that both Scott's had talent when it came to not only directing, but also picking just the right project. Tony Scott would continue to do just that, for a while...

This would also begin Scott's affiliation with the producing team of Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer. They would go on the produce/direct four additional films together, over the next twelve years. Bruckheimer would also help produce Black Hawk Down for Tony's brother Ridley in 2001.

Directly following Top Gun, he would shoot the second part of a popular franchise, Beverly Hills Cop II. I think this is where he would come into his own, stylistically. You can see, in future films (especially The Last Boy Scout) his choices of camera work, lighting, mood... I think all of them stemmed from Beverly Hills Cop II.

Days of Thunder, True Romance... both would make huge impacts, in regards to continuing Scott's style and ability to direct not only action films, or gritty crime dramas... but also to direct his actors well. True Romance is, by far, his best film, in my opinion. Each and every actor nailed their part... due to the material and due to Scott.

Scott would follow up True Romance with Crimson Tide, one of the better all around sub movies to come out of the last twenty years... and there have been quite a few. In fact, I'm hard pressed to think of any that were really that bad...

Michael Schiffer wrote the story (along with Richard P. Henrick) and the script. This was Henrick's first writing credit, in film... and will be having his novel Attack on the Queen turned into what looks like a movie of the week this year. Schiffer has had some screenwriting experience, including the 1988 gang film Colors, Lean on Me and (after Tide) he would go on to write The Peacemaker... the first film to be put out by Dreamworks. This year we should see his film Four Feathers, taken from the novel by A.E.W. Mason and directed by Shekhar Kapur (who directed the Oscar winning Elizabeth in 1998). Should be interesting.

This is a solid story, with all of the elements of rigid Navy command intact. With two strong leading men... and with the structure of command, along with good dialog and suspense... Schiffer pulled off a very intelligent and entertaining story.

There's not much I can say about Gene Hackman. The guy has done it all, and has played some of the most pivotal roles in Hollwyood. From Popeye Doyle to Lex Luthor. I think he's made nothing but successful career choices and absolutely LOVED his work in The Royal Tenenbaums. I thought his role in Behind Enemy Lines was pretty much him running on auto-pilot... but he still brought something to the role.

One of my favorite Denzel films is Virtuosity. Don't ask why... I think he nailed that role like he's nailed so many other roles. Glory, The Seige, Ricochet, Philadelphia... he does some incredible work and is one of the few black actors out today that won't play cliched roles... not overtly cliched, which I respect, a lot.

The two worked seamlessly together. And I think the work that both men did with their supporting cast... it was clear that their presence didn't outshine the supporting actors... and I think that has both to do with their acting ability and the material.

Matt Craven (who will be in next year's Timeline), George Dzundza (Basic Instinct), Viggo Mortensen (Lord of the Rings), James Gandolfini (who also worked with Scott on True Romance, before he made it big on The Soprano's), Danny Nucci (Titanic, The Rock), Eric Bruskotter (Starship Troopers) and a young Steve Zahn (Out of Sight, That Thing You Do)... they all rounded out the supporting cast incredibly well. A large number of them went on to act in other Simpson/Bruckheimer productions...

Cinematographer Dariusz Wolski did an all around incredible job shooting this film. His previous experience (including music videos shot for musicians like Paula Abdul, David Bowie, Elton John, Aerosmith and Sting), specifically on The Crow, displayed his ability to work with heavy CG (that was still in the fledgling stages, in regards to where it is now...) in 1994. He also shot (in 1993) Romeo Is Bleeding and, later on, The Fan (another Bruckheimer/Scott film), Dark City (his second film with Alex Proyas), and three films that I don't think really are up to Wolski's ability: A Perfect Murder, The Mexican and Bad Company (another Bruckheimer film).

All in all, this is one incredible movie. The acting is incredible, the story is intense and filled with suspense, and the directing is clean and inventive. I think this film, along with a few others, marked the hay-day of Bruckheimer and Scott, who went on to shoot two other films after Tide... The Fan and Enemy of the State... both of which were sub-par.

The Hunt for Red October, 1990 - laserdisc

I tried reading this book once. I got about 45 pages in... had to put it down. Talk about DENSE! That novel has more intricate detail than anything I'd ever read... and I just could not continue.

Tom Clancy would continue to write novels based not only on hero Jack Ryan, but other worldly military aspects and individuals, including what has been strewn as a prequel (or some such thing), The Sum of All Fears.

Coming out a whole five years before Crimson Tide (and in regards to CG effects, 5 years is a lifetime)... Red October sported a stellar cast and an incredible director who had proven himself one of the best action directors around, John McTiernan. He'd just come off of first Predator and then Die Hard... and used Red October to shoot an incredibly intelligent film...

I hadn't seen Red October in quite a while and, after pushing in the laserdisc, sat down and was shocked at how intelligent the directing is on this film.

With Sean Connery, Alex Baldwin, Scott Glenn, Sam Neill and James Earl Jones... I'm not even going to begin to comment on their past experiences. I will say that this cast is by far one of the best assembled in recent years. Yes, yes... you get casts like this all the time, as in Ocean's 11 or Magnolia... or anything by Robert Altman, for chrissake... but this is a cast that had each character actor being utilized for some of their finest work.

Tim Curry, Courtney B. Vance, Joss Ackland and Jeffrey Jones round out the supporting cast, and each give equal performances (as equal as supporting actors can be) to the main cast.

Larry Ferguson has written some pretty incredible mainstream material. Highlander (1986), Beverly Hills Cop II (1987), The Presidio (1988) and Alien 3 (1992) (which I think is a pretty awesome movie). But, after Alien 3... he went downhill. His material was more contrived and cliched... like Maximum Risk and the doomed Rollerball. He's working on a film that should be out for 2003: Master and Commander, directed by Peter Weir, starring Russell Crowe. Let's hope this is as intelligent a script as some of Ferguson's past scripts.

Co-writer Donald Stewart has adapted two other Jack Ryan / Tom Clancy novels for the big screen: Patriot Games and Clear and Present Danger. He worked on two additional projects... one for tv and one for the UK... and died shortly there after in 1999.

Working from (as I said) an incredibly dense novel... the work done on Red October is some of the best adaptation work I've seen in film. The movie travels along a fantastic pace, straight from the beginning... and the material is written as such that there are surprises around corners... and chances for actors to give outstanding performances. The whole movie flows incredibly.

Mace Neufeld started producing films in the mid-1970's with The Omen. He would help produce other 70's and 80's horror: Omen II, The Funhouse, Omen III, Transylvania 6-5000... hell, even Omen IV: The Awakening (1991). But he would also produce a few neat films early in his career... one of them being the Gene Wilder & Harrison Ford western The Frisco Kid. In 1987 he would produce Roger Donaldson's No Way Out... and it looks like this would pave the way for Neufeld to get October.

Neufeld would go on to produce all of the Clancy films, along with Beverly Hills Cop III (which killed the franchise), The Saint, Lost in Space, Black Dog, The General's Daughter... a strange group of films... none of them really doing very well, but with star power to propell them to at least break even.

The music for the film was created by one of the more original composers in Hollywood, Basil Poledouris. His work has spanned many great Hollywood films, including Conan (which is one of the most copied scores around), Red Dawn, Iron Eagle, RoboCop (best science fiction film ever!), Quigley Down Under, Free Willy, Starship Troopers, For Love of the Game... along with some b-movies, some straight to video and some television. With Conan, October, RoboCop and Troopers... Poledouris was on... and added to the tension of all of these films with incredible work.

There not much I can say about Jan de Bont that hasn't already been said in a number of the reviews I've given... along with this page that I set up about his career.

This would mark his second film with McTiernan. de Bont shot Die Hard in 1988... along with a ton of Paul Verhoeven's (earlier) films, Black Rain for Ridley Scott, Flatliners, Basic Instinct for Verhoeven (again) and Lethal Weapon 3 before going out on his own to become a director. His first time out, Speed, would be one of the biggest money makers of 1994.

de Bont would also direct Twister, Speed 2 and The Haunting. In 2002 he would help produce Spielberg's Minority Report.

Behind the camera, de Bont is a genius. His crisp ability as a DP made him a well sought after commodity for directors... and I think it's a shame that he's not still shooting films... but I guess directing pays more.

All in all, this is by far my favorite submarine movie... and certainly my favorite Sean Connery movie (outside of the Bond series). I think Alec Baldwin made the right decision, not taking on the other two Clancy films... even though Harrison Ford is a great actor... those movies lack the depth and direction that October has, in spades.