It's easy to make somebody look villainous. You give him a grim dark face, something along the lines of Bela Lugosi, deprive him of any sense of humor, have him speak with an accent, and light his face from below with a hideous green key light. While you're at it, make him a full foot shorter than his American counterpart, played here by John Cromwell who -- and this is a little-known fact -- is the third tallest human being on the planet. All these conventions are adhered to in this movie. The Russian Premier thinks as reasonably as the American president, but it's hard to believe his lines when they come from a mouth with lips that resemble a fresh two-inch incision on somebody's belly.
The real problem isn't making someone look like the enemy. It's deciding who should be the enemy in the first place. The Soviets provided us with bad examples for decades but -- well, they are, let's say, no longer available to Hollywood. As the Cold War wound down, even Ian Fleming had trouble. The real SMERSH had to be changed to the fictional SPECTRE because Fleming's conscious was beginning to trouble him.
In "The Sum of All Fears," the Nazis are resurrected, a kind of generic villain to whom no one will object. How could things possibly go wrong? Is someone going to write an angry letter to the New York Times and say, "Hey -- wait a minute! My grandparents were Nazis and I'm offended"? The movie calls them "terrorists" and throws in, let me think, Aryan supremacists, and some others into the stew, but they speak German and we all know who they are.
The plot? This group of terrorists decides (for reasons I seem to have forgotten) to blow up a nuclear bomb in America, an act which they figure will provoke a response against Russia, who will then respond because they must show their strength, and so forth, until there is a nuclear exchange and the world is basically blown apart. Jack Ryan, or "Doctor Ryan" as everyone calls him, figures out the plot and barely prevents the plan's success.
I enjoyed watching the movie. Great shots of airplanes. Special effects, some of them a bit obvious, involving the exploding bomb in Baltimore during the Superbowl. (Does Baltimore have a pro football team? The Crab Cakes or the McHenrys or something?) There's a big hole in the middle of the movie though. Ben Affleck has a big chin and looks the part. I'm sure he's a good guy but he is lightweight for the part. Both Alec Baldwin and Harrison Ford were able to bring strength and some underlying humor to the same role whereas Affleck hits his marks and speaks. I hated to see Morgan Freeman die half-way through. And John Cromwell is a splendid actor but the part doesn't allow him to do much with his character.
The climax is borrowed from "The Godfather." Nessun Dorma -- the aria de jour -- swells in the background while we see the president and the premier signing some sort of joint anti-war treaty, and this triumphant scene alternates with bloody assassinations.
Tom Clancy is an interesting guy. I've only read "The Hunt for Red October" and I can understand why it was all the rage at the military academies. It was really retro. But it was also filled with exciting bits of technology -- how nuclear powered subs work and all that. He evidently used to spend a lot of time shooting at targets with a large caliber pistol. And I saw him perform for his charity, along with three other celebrities, on "Jeopardy." The other contestants bungled their buttons and stumbled over their answers and joked about their own inadequacies. Clancy didn't do that. He smiled politely throughout, was thoroughly decorous, and answered every question flawlessly and without iterative comment. He demolished the competition. In interviews he's been candid and friendly. I'd like to have a beer with the guy sometime.
The real problem isn't making someone look like the enemy. It's deciding who should be the enemy in the first place. The Soviets provided us with bad examples for decades but -- well, they are, let's say, no longer available to Hollywood. As the Cold War wound down, even Ian Fleming had trouble. The real SMERSH had to be changed to the fictional SPECTRE because Fleming's conscious was beginning to trouble him.
In "The Sum of All Fears," the Nazis are resurrected, a kind of generic villain to whom no one will object. How could things possibly go wrong? Is someone going to write an angry letter to the New York Times and say, "Hey -- wait a minute! My grandparents were Nazis and I'm offended"? The movie calls them "terrorists" and throws in, let me think, Aryan supremacists, and some others into the stew, but they speak German and we all know who they are.
The plot? This group of terrorists decides (for reasons I seem to have forgotten) to blow up a nuclear bomb in America, an act which they figure will provoke a response against Russia, who will then respond because they must show their strength, and so forth, until there is a nuclear exchange and the world is basically blown apart. Jack Ryan, or "Doctor Ryan" as everyone calls him, figures out the plot and barely prevents the plan's success.
I enjoyed watching the movie. Great shots of airplanes. Special effects, some of them a bit obvious, involving the exploding bomb in Baltimore during the Superbowl. (Does Baltimore have a pro football team? The Crab Cakes or the McHenrys or something?) There's a big hole in the middle of the movie though. Ben Affleck has a big chin and looks the part. I'm sure he's a good guy but he is lightweight for the part. Both Alec Baldwin and Harrison Ford were able to bring strength and some underlying humor to the same role whereas Affleck hits his marks and speaks. I hated to see Morgan Freeman die half-way through. And John Cromwell is a splendid actor but the part doesn't allow him to do much with his character.
The climax is borrowed from "The Godfather." Nessun Dorma -- the aria de jour -- swells in the background while we see the president and the premier signing some sort of joint anti-war treaty, and this triumphant scene alternates with bloody assassinations.
Tom Clancy is an interesting guy. I've only read "The Hunt for Red October" and I can understand why it was all the rage at the military academies. It was really retro. But it was also filled with exciting bits of technology -- how nuclear powered subs work and all that. He evidently used to spend a lot of time shooting at targets with a large caliber pistol. And I saw him perform for his charity, along with three other celebrities, on "Jeopardy." The other contestants bungled their buttons and stumbled over their answers and joked about their own inadequacies. Clancy didn't do that. He smiled politely throughout, was thoroughly decorous, and answered every question flawlessly and without iterative comment. He demolished the competition. In interviews he's been candid and friendly. I'd like to have a beer with the guy sometime.