August 23, 2016

The Hunt For Red October (Enthusiasms 1)

Peak McTiernan (fresh off Die Hard and Predator). Real submarines for surface exterior shots and kickass models for underwater exteriors. A PG-rated film clearly made for grown-ups.

The classy animated title typography, rippling red from Cyrillic into Roman. (When my junior high social-studies class wrote to pen pals in the USSR, I asked mine to spell out Red October” in Russian so I could scrutinize the letterforms.) Basil Poledouris’s score. (One of the few cassette tapes I owned at age 12.) And that poster! (I couldn’t find a copy to put up on my bedroom wall, so I settled for Crimson Tide.)

Sean Connery’s hair. Stellan Skarsgård’s glowering. Scott Glenn’s eyeglasses. Alec Baldwin’s everything.

One ping only.I would like to have seen Montana.
Most things in here don’t react too well to bullets.

Jack Ryan’s sarcastic impressions of other characters.

This perfectly elegant shot:


Crazy Ivan! Thor’s Twins. Combat tactics. Someplace deep.





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