These are fun. Off the cuff discussions on movies and streaming series, both new and old together will attempt to bridge the gap between Hollywood industry insider and the casual viewer. This is Alec nine, Ben and you're listening to the Cinema A to B podcast. Today we're going to be talking about a oldie but a goody one of my favorite movies. The Hunt for Red October from 1990. We're going to dive right in. Ben, your thoughts? I just watched it last night again.
I can't tell you what number of viewing this would be. It's and this is another one that catch on TV and just catch bits and pieces. But as far as like what? Total viewings. I'm probably still in the single digits, but it's it's probably high single digits. Fabulous. Still fabulous. Still still an exquisite movie from from 90. And I just noticed when I was starting to watch it.
Yeah. But it's so it's so few times that I've seen this thing start to finish where I've actually caught the opening credits. Mm hmm. And I was surprised. I completely forgot that John McTiernan directed this movie that is, like, forgot. This was like, Oh, wait, what predator? Die hard. Die Hard with a vengeance. Last action hero. Yeah. Darren. With a vengeance. Like this guy was the king of. I mean, die hards, my favorite action movie ever.
And but admittedly, Hunt for Red October is not really an action film, but his fingerprints are all over this thing, like the way he's able to heighten the tension. Mm hmm. Some of the dialog choices seem like. Yeah, like I know from just to branch off on that real quick, but I had a really good laugh because kind of with you, I was, you know, I've seen this a lot, but I was not surprised but couldn't remember that John McTiernan had done this.
And so when Alec Baldwin walks into James Earl Jones's office, when he first flies over whatever, and James Earl Jones goes, Jack, he goes, because you look like hell. And all I could think of was from Predator, where our listeners like Dylan, you son of a bitch, you know? And I was just like, it's like the same kind of cadence and feeling in this. Like, like this is how John must do intros. Like as a real life person, he's just like, Yes. Ben, you son of a bitch.
You look like hell, you know, or something along those lines because it just it felt way too close. Yeah, it's the machismo is is on full display. Yeah. Although it's obviously it's a little more subdued than than the die hard movies or Predator. Obviously, Predator is predators, like the most testosterone filled movie ever made. Yeah. And we're going to have to do an episode on Predator because I love Predator, but I love Predator.
But yeah, he I think in the hands of another director, the tension would have kind of never reached the heights that it does. This is like you almost need an an action director. But he never. He never does that quick cut stuff with the edit like it's never like over edited and I saw all of the really tense moments. Still felt really tense. Hmm. And you get that really cool, like mail or kestrel to drive Russian the whole. Yeah, the Russian. Yeah. And in that way, steamy. Soviets.
Soviets. Yeah. No, that's true. It is. They're. They're Soviet and Scottish. Scottish, Soviet and British and. Yeah, but two, two things. One, obviously the whole like male choir stuff worked really well in this movie because Crimson Tide does the same thing and it works to tremendous effects. And then the other thing was that I love how they do that transition from the Russian to the English. Yes.
Where the political officer is, is he's reading as he's reading Revelation and in it or of or some sort of muddled version of revelation. But yeah, the camera's zooms in on his mouth and then he says the word Armageddon. And then and then he's and then we're in English. Fun, fun fact. Armageddon is the same in Russian. And I mean, it's pronounced slightly differently, I guess shorter than in English, but it's the same word. There's not like a different word.
So that was a nice choice to transition. Yeah. And so it works, right? Because and what's funny is you'll watch this movie from the very beginning, and God bless Sean Connery. He just he didn't care. The man the man never, like, tried to do an accent other than his normal broke. Like, he just doesn't care. And he's such a good actor that it doesn't matter. Yeah. And like, his his Russian is terrible. I mean, just dreadful.
Sam Neill actually puts forth an effort to, like, give you some semblance of a Russian accent, But Connery just doesn't care, and it doesn't matter. And then once you're in that. Once you're in the English. Yeah. His his what Scottish lilt is. Yeah. This is completely on full display. Yeah, it's just everywhere. Sam Neill actually tries to still give, like, a Russian accent to what he's doing, but it's all over the place. I know. It's like half the officers try to do a Russian accent.
And then there's this one guy. There's one guy who's just American, like. Wait, are you talking about. And in the admiral guy who, like, is actually in the home base at HQ or whatever, and like his valet or whatever or is like bus man. Yeah. Okay. So the. Yeah, the valet. Yeah. His assistant. Yeah. This is American accent. Just didn't care. Does he even try one of Ramirez's officers, like when they're all having dinner? Mm hmm.
You're, like, first introduced to him, and I don't remember who it is. He didn't have that. But he has some lines of that. And it's just an American actor. And he just didn't even didn't even try to he didn't even think he saw Connery on set and was just like, Oh, it works for him. I'm not even gonna try the Russian accent. I mention this because that's really that's honestly the only shortcoming in this movie. Mm hmm. That's pretty much it.
It's amazing from start to finish in every other regard. I completely agree. So I got introduced this movie early on in my life because my dad loves this movie. Absolutely loves. I think it's by far his favorite sub film. It's my favorite sub film. It's definitely up there in my favorite films of all time. I think this movie is great. Yeah. So Laura has, interestingly enough, seen pieces of this movie constantly and she may have seen it all the way through but didn't pay attention.
So when we watched it two nights ago, it was really her first time to sit and watch it. And at the end of it I'm like, This holds up, this is fantastic. And she's just like, And it didn't hold up. It wasn't great. Now she focused a lot on the accents, a lot, you know, as someone who studied Russian and it was big into it, she was not happy at all that these people were talking the way they were. So and specifically, she was, you know, the valet. She was talking about Sean Connery.
She didn't really like it. Now, I, I give her some credit, but she's completely not only wrong in this regard. This is a fantastic movie. I mean, it's, you know, a spy. Not really. It's not not really a thriller, but a spy movie that turns into somewhat action, but also has some, you know, geopolitical tensions happening like you talked about earlier.
Like John McTiernan does a great job of kind of adding that all together and not letting it go down the rabbit hole too far in any direction, you know, and allowing these pieces to just unfold and move things along. And I want to tell you that the dialog is still she Laura was joking that she didn't really like a dialog. I'm like, there are so many quotable lines that I still say in my regular, like kind of like you were talking about Shawshank and stuff.
Like I have a buddy that I used to work with. He and I would always, you know, look, I tell you, this is what are these doors and be like? They're going to respond with the doors are the problem you know or just anything or like this one being the silly one being like like I use these I like use these all the time and it's one of my all time, but pretty rarely. And it's it's just great. It's just so enjoyable. I was like even the shot selection.
But really like for me, one of the people who steals the show is Courtney B Vance, who plays Jonesy, the guy aboard the Dallas who does all the sonar and stuff like that, where he's listening to everything, right? Yeah. Like he steals a show for me. Like he does. Like, every time he's he's in a scene. I just. He just eats up that scene. Just does a great job playing this. Oh, you know, it's centric sonar. You have labored to produce a biologic. A what?
A whale on an animal that knows a hell of a lot more about sonar than you do. Yeah, No, the dialog is great. But here's the thing. Here's the thing. Why? I think maybe Laura didn't resonate this. Not only is this a guy's movie, it's. It's full of all guys. Like there's there's literally one woman on screen pretty much which is Which is Ryan's wife briefly at the beginning. Yeah, that's it. And that's it. And his daughter and yeah his daughter, which is.
Which is a cute thing to do at the beginning of the film, but the rest of it is just dudes like think that's what it was right There's yeah this era there's there's no women honor on attack or nuclear ballistic missile submarine this is not now so I came away from it You're talking about performances obviously Alec Baldwin is great and really underrated.
And I guess in the brief research I looked at and I didn't know this, I guess he did approach Harrison Ford for this role first and he turned it down because he he didn't like how much attention was spent on romance with Connery. And so he turned down Connery. Yeah. Yeah. And so Baldwin takes it and does really well with it. And this is my this is my favorite Jack Ryan movie. I think this is his best. The the best. They've gotten in to Patriot Games. This is pretty close.
But this is this is the best thing. And then, I guess. BALDWIN You know, Baldwin didn't get kicked out of the role. He he turned down feature games. He wasn't available. And they didn't they didn't wait for him. He he had a Broadway thing going. And he and he told them he told them, don't wait around for me. And they didn't. Yeah, so they didn't. So then they cast Harrison Ford and it's been a mess ever since. And Patrick Games is really good but clear and present danger.
And then they've just struggled to figure out how to make more Jack Ryan movies that Yeah but so this is like this is the good one This is a good one. I completely agree. Well and so I heard different you know right a different thing in my little short research about why he got rid of why they got they switched to Harrison Ford in clear and present danger was that after the success of Henry Ford October, he asked for more money and that's passive.
And then they were like, Well, for that money we can just get Harrison Ford as they originally wanted. They did both could be true, I guess. But so either way it's that's how the industry rolls people. So. Oh yeah, crazy in the sense that you wonder.
You wonder if we wouldn't have gotten a better franchise if, if, if Baldwin could have stayed in the in the role engaged with the character because they had to leap from 35 year old Jack Ryan in Hunt for October to 50 year old Jack Ryan in future games Even though Patrick Games is supposed to be an earlier novel, it's like a prequel to this.
But no, the the other performance I want to single out in this movie and watching it again that I was, I came away from it going, Holy smokes, He was so good. Was Scott Glenn as the as the the Dallas captain? Yeah he's great. He's great. And like he's there's so much subtlety with his role but he more like he holds his own up next to Sean Connery and you can't always say that with people know like Connery has a tendency to overpower lesser actors and Scott Glenn was feels like his match.
You know he does all of this. Yeah but in a reserved way. Like he definitely plays his like the two captains are vastly different. Like the way Sean Connery plays Raimi is, you know, and Glenn plays Cisco. MANCUSO Yeah, yeah. Thank you so it's just like you have this kind of much more bombastic Sean Connery flavor to Raimi is where Glen has a very much more reserved but kind of but powerful reserve. Like he radiates that I'm in charge. I don't need to tell people.
I don't need to show people I'm the one in charge. I'm making the decision. The weight of command weighs heavy on my shoulders kind of a thing. I mean, you get some of that from Sean Connery. But Sean Connery, you know, as we talked about, I mean, he was himself basically, you know, and that kind of what was more bombastic. Oh, it does. You know. Yeah. That's why you cast Sean Connery. Yeah. Yeah. You don't try to make him something you use non. I know this book. You are.
Conclusions were all wrong because he acted stupidly. No, but I love this. I have so many favorite scenes. But I love the scene with Scott Glenn when he's on the he's doing Morse code through the periscope. He's like, Yes, it's okay. It's okay, Mr. Ryan. My Morse might be so rusty. I might be sending him dimensions on boat. So, yeah, this, this the movie is the movie is serious, the content is serious, but isn't afraid to have some moments of levity kind of peppered throughout.
And that's totally. MCTIERNAN That's I mean, that's a John McTiernan signature. Oh, another director wouldn't have that. This thing would have been almost too self-important.
Yeah, see, it has those moments where you crack up and then, you know, like I was doing a before we rolled with Baldwin, you know, Connery tells him, Yeah, be careful what you shoot out some of these things on the on the stuff don't react well to bullets later he's call out but he does a great impression of Connery you guys I don't recall bullets either. Yeah yeah it's a fun it's a fun flick. It it's a fun flick.
The only the only thing watching it that I like looked really dated and I still hate is that whole. I love the dialog and the moments really great but it's it's really hurt by the Tamil to screen. Yeah yeah. The blue screen's terrible when they're supposed to be on the top of the sub on that river. Yeah. It just doesn't, it doesn't work. And I'm like, how? Obviously the studios are not going to spend the time and money on a restoration to, to fix that. But I wish they would, Yeah.
I wish they'd just go in and, and do better compositing work so that that scene holds out because it doesn't work. Like I love the dialog that is, quote, quoting Columbus and the the it ends really well it does. It's I mean from even though it starts out really well like everything that you you know, everything that's about to happen never happen or didn't happen or did happen, I forget exactly what the thing was they're talking about. They lost a sub, you know. Oh, yeah.
They say, which you'll notice this. Oh it's a yeah. Okay. So that so the event is inspired by a real naval event, but it's very different.
And what they try to do without putting based on a true story at the beginning of the movie, they do try to get you to buy into, oh, this, this really happened in 84, the Soviet typhoon class, you know, disappeared or No, no. So we have two recurring actors in this that we've recently reviewed that also gave great performances, but really small, small, small parts in a stone. Stellan obviously has to pull off like just as always, fantastic actor just kills it, you know, in this.
And then Jeffrey Jones as Skip Tyler, the guy who lost his leg but you know, was working on subs. And again, we can't give Jeffrey Jones too much love because he's just like yeah, it's he's huge. But yeah he's he gets one of the best monologues in the whole movie. Yeah yeah. When he's when he reveals what these doors could do and what they can, which is totally fictitious by the way, there is, you know, there is no magneto drive.
It sounds cool but yeah I'm glad that say CIA there is no there is no caterpillar drive. So we're saying yeah but but you know you're right that his his he doesn't get that much screen time but he's so good and he does this whole monologue about building the bomb shelter with his dad. Does it? The Cuban Missile Crisis. Yeah, he's. He kills it. He kills it.
What I loved in the lead up to that scene made me realize is like when you're watching Baldwin come into that drydock it's real Like there's no blue screen there like it's that's the they really shot in that drydock I don't know if the sub is real that could have been a mock up by the way I'm watching the opening going They must have built some crazy floating mock up of the typhoon. Right. Because in it's massive. Like I don't even know if it's completely to scale.
It could be a little bit smaller. It wouldn't have mattered. But I'm watching going, oh, that's, that's nuts. Like they were. They're just CGI, that thing now. They actually built it. Yeah. And then all the model work is so fantastic. Like all the underwater stuff is so good, which they didn't do underwater. It's all with wires, is it? None of that. None of that. At least that's what I read was none of that was underwater. They actually just did it.
It was simulated it with wires and we're in remove the wires and and post. But did he layer something on in front of it to create the the water effects I think simply maybe have to look it up. Yeah. You're telling you're telling me there was no tank that they were. There's no tank. There's it's all models on wires and in the air. So they must have layered in a water effects over everything.
Then because there's some really cool you can see kind of material floating the way kind of open ocean looks like you know, algae and plankton and stuff. I don't know. It's in the image. They fixed it in post. It's crazy. It's crazy. Yeah, they must have been. Yeah, it's the special effects.
Other than that in shot, the special effects are still hold up really, really well again, because it's that physics, the physicality of models, the physicality of actually doctoring something up to use as opposed to just computer graphics, you know, which just never hold up because yeah, models, you know, they look the same from year to year for the most part. You know, it's just how we film them gets better.
Whereas I give you the graphics, obviously it does get better unity or how we do flash, how we do ice, how we do, you know, trees like, like the processing power to do all this stuff gets better so we can do more. I'm telling you, this early nineties period for visual effects is is probably still the best or one of the best eras the Hollywood's ever had.
Because because you know, Terminator two there's there is CGI but very little and a lot of it's practical and then this obviously this is the case you know there might be a little bit of CG rendering going on in this 1998. Might be a little early. Yeah. Visually, it's it's awesome. Now, they did build the inside of the typhoon that is a and it's really a cool side it tilts reminds me of the same technology that Christopher Nolan used in Inception for that rotating hallway.
Yeah, yeah. It did a similar thing. It was on a giant gimbal, basically, and it tilted, so they built that one. But then I did read that the the interior, the Dallas, I believe is a real naval simulator and that most of us in the crew, most of the crew are real sailors. Well, I know the Navy was had a pretty decent hand in helping this, you know, much like with like Top Gun. Yes. Yeah. And another I think the the the what the Akula class that the tuple of Yeah.
Captain's so red that's another that's either another simulator or the interior of a real navy attack sub and they but they slapped these slapped like Russian tanks all over everything. Yeah. And kind of change the lighting so yeah. You get some authenticity in this that shows through the changed. Well it's a cool movie it's just 1990. I mean it's so old now like I just don't whose guy I know back. Yeah, but I have yet to see another movie that is with subs that is this interesting.
I mean, Crimson Tide is great, but that's also getting old. You know, Old Dust Boot is great. I mean, like, there's a lot of good sub movies out there, but this one, there's just it's more than just a sub movie, you know, and adds that extra layer. Yeah. I mean, yeah, interesting. Das Boot was kind of the first one and it's just so long, but the runtime on Das Boot is kind of daunting.
And then there was this in 90 and then what, only five years later you get Crimson Tide and then Harrison Ford, and then the only other one after that was like that what you five, seven one and it's a lesser movie. It's a lesser movie with, with, with McConaughey and Watson. LG also have Harrison Ford did his sub movie with K-19 Widowmaker. It's like, no, it's not. I mean, I'm not saying it was you. You either have that trash see in and Harrison Pearson should have learned from Connery.
I mean, they worked together. Yeah, on Last Crusade. He should have learned from him. Just don't mess with the accent. Just don't mess with the accent. Just be Harrison Ford. It'll be fine. That's what they do for now. Yeah. His Liam Neeson in that, too. Oh, I see. Zo. I think so. I don't know. It's been I, I watched it once and I think like I immediately forgot about it because it was so terrible. It was just terrible. It was not this movie. This movie much like Shawshank.
Like, if it's on, I'm watching, you know, until at least the next commercial or something, wherever it wherever it starts, just because it, you know, much like Shawshank, it's that fun. I can always hop and really enjoy this film. I really like it a lot. Yeah, I, I actually think Red October is kind of under got an under rating on IMDB. It's only a 7.5. I would put it closer to an eight or settle or something.
I mean, if you have Tim Curry in a serious role and he pulls it off, I mean that should at least give you an eight. You know, you'll get the order of Lenin for this Captain. And then the best anecdote I have about this movie is right around that same scene is when when for our listeners.
So for our listeners, there was a there was a third roommate in Los Angeles with Alec and I and his dad is a very prominent close up shot as an extra in on Friday October he does it's when it's basically when they I think they think that the Red October is finally been sunk and they're all on their life rafts and there's a panning quick panning shot and his dad gets a close up and I didn't believe him when he first told us and then I popped it on. I went straight to I was like, holy smokes.
But the funnier, the funnier story is. And his his father's a Ukrainian and the funniest story, most of them weren't weren't Russian. They were most of them were from Ukraine. Yeah. And the joke was that they they purposely messed up shots so that they could get extra days of work. We took they took like, I don't know, it's supposed to be a couple of days worth of work and they turned it into like a week and a half. I don't know if it was a week of shooting. They turned it into like two.
Like they basically got together and there weren't there weren't a bunch of like Russian speakers, native Russian speakers on the crew. And so they all agreed and just talked amongst themselves like, we're just going to screw shots up as much as we can so that they have to just keep shooting. That is not surprising. Yeah, know, it's but it's, it's so much fun. But yeah, I didn't believe him And then I turn it on like, holy. Yeah. E Yeah. E And his name's Alec as well. Yeah.
Yeah. Oh, my goodness. All right. Well, final thoughts you have on on Friday, October two. We could I mean, sure, we can keep going. It's kind of weird to have a category called like sub movies, right? I mean, that's but that's that's what this is. And then it's the best of the bunch. Now, I guess Crimson Tide would be would be the number two spot on that. Yeah. The Crimson Tide is a totally different movie, you know that just it just is it's less it's kind of less expansive.
This is this, right? October feels like a like an epic epic. It just goes all over the place. He starts in London and goes to the US, has that funny briefing with the National Security Council, which is great seeing. When do you leave? Next time write a memo. Yeah, said Speak your mind, Jack. Jesus. Yeah. These are all. Jones gets great lines in there. He does everybody. And he's the only carryover to the other movies as Greer. Yeah, and he's great. If somebody hasn't seen this movie, watch it.
We've we've somehow managed to talk about this movie and not spoil one bit of it. We try not to. Yeah. Like really not any major plot I mean a little bit, but I don't know what kind of genre. Like if people enjoyed that I would recommend this. But it's a little bit of everything. You're right. It's Spy, it's spy thriller, It's got it's got good action drama, you know? Yeah, it kind of has it all in enough. Like comedy to kind of keep you keep it going and somewhat lighthearted throughout it.
So yeah. And I just feel like people are obligated to probably see pretty much the is close to the entire catalog of the late Sean Connery, as you probably can. Yeah. He didn't make that many bad movies. Not really no. And he's he was at the top of his game in this too. He's so there's a subtlety to his performance in this. He was he's kind of a natural.
I just this isn't Yeah this guy was not, like, classically trained and just just had it didn't have to try hard is the definition of a movie star. Yeah I agree. My final thoughts are just see it It's a lot of fun. It's enjoyable. It's kind of a slice of pre, you know, still, you know, late Cold War, you know, geopolitical stuff. A lot of fun. I do. I do want to have one one last aside, it's hysterical. The political officer here, his name is Putin. Yeah, it is.
Which is hysterical which is hysterical. Yeah. And and if you haven't ever watched it, watch it. And if you if it held up and you liked it, let us know if you were like, you all lie to me. This was terrible trash. Let us know that too. You mean you're not going to. But, you know, let us know. Yep. So great.
Great film from 1990. Well, I appreciate everybody watching and listening to another installment of Cinema A to B, and then we are on social media @cinemaatob TikTok unfortunately no, follow us on Instagram and Facebook. I mean follow us on TikTok, if that's where you start your content, if that's your thing, you know, follow us there until, until the US government bans it.
Yeah, and let us know let us know what you what you think of all of these movies and this was a fan request I should mention that this was and we were more than happy to talk about it. I love love Red October. All right. Hopefully we did it justice. Thanks, everybody.