The Hunt for Red October
Now that I have watched John McTiernan’s “The Hunt for Red October” for this review, I can comfortably say that I truly had never seen it in its entirety before. There were select scenes I found myself watching over the years when it would be turned to, but while I knew the basic story, I’d never seen it unfold before. Considering my familiarity with the two Jack Ryan adventures that came after this, it’s hard for me to truly gauge my thoughts on this one in respect to those.
One cannot really discuss this film without discussing the literary adaptations of not just this film’s original author, Tom Clancy, but- I think- Michael Crichton and John Grisham. At a time when major blockbusters were becoming more reliant on visual effects, these three authors provided Hollywood with material that played to both high concept moviegoers, but also those who appreciated middle-of-the-road pot boilers that allowed for deep casts, not just star vehicles. Because of the nature of his work, Grisham was the best for this, but Crichton (with the films “Rising Sun” and “Disclosure”) and Clancy (with “Red October” and “Patriot Games”) had their work well-suited for this approach also. “Red October” is the most intriguing of those films, in part because it has the most streamlined, compelling narrative of the bunch.
When “The Hunt for Red October” came out, it was around the end of the Cold War. Though set in 1984, the film still feels very urgent as a work where the complexities of the last four decades of American-Russian relations were still being dealt with. In this film, a Russian naval officer, Marko Ramius (played by Sean Connery), steals a stealth nuclear submarine- the Red October- with the plan to defect. The Americans get a hold of this information, kicking off a standoff where the insights of a CIA analyst- Jack Ryan (played by Alec Baldwin)- are crucial to knowing whether Ramius is looking to defect, or begin WWIII. A lot of faith must be placed in the minds of both men, whom are risking more than just their reputations on the choices they make.
This was the third film in a run for McTiernan that solidified him as one of the best action directors in Hollywood, following 1987’s “Predator” and 1988’s “Die Hard.” All three films could not be more different from one another, but each find their main characters in situations that are claustrophobic in how we see their stories unfold. Yes, “Predator” takes place in a South American forest, and “Red October” takes place in the Atlantic Ocean, but given the threats at work in each story, there is little the characters can do to escape their surroundings without confronting the enemy in front of them. In the way that Larry Ferguson and Donald E. Stewart adapt Clancy’s text, the ocean is as much a threat as the political powers on either side of the story, and being confined in submarines means there is no place to go if the scenarios laid out by Ramius and Ryan don’t go exactly as they hope. The only way out is through, and as he did with his work on “Die Hard,” cinematographer Jan De Bont captures the tension of this scenario beautifully in not just how he shoots the settings, but how he shoots the people. Even more so than “Die Hard,” this might be the most suspenseful of these three McTiernan films, if only because the motivations of Ramius are not certain for everyone for most of the film, and it is not certain to those in his command how they will play out.
I miss this era of Hollywood, where a film like this could casually just put together an extraordinary cast that allows us to recognize faces, and because we do, our feelings towards the character immediately feel locked in, or are subverted, as a result. Connery and Baldwin are the clear leads, and it’s great to see- once again- how Connery is able to lean into being a complicated elder statesman who is fully capable of taking action if necessary; as Ryan, Baldwin gets the characters ability to deduce how things will play out, and that is crucial when he is out to sea, and attempting to get to the truth behind Ramius’s actions. We see James Earl Jones as Ryan’s mentor, Admiral Greer, for the first time on-screen (he would continue the role into the Ford films), and we also get Scott Glenn as an American sub captain who takes it on faith that Ryan knows what he is doing; Fred Thompson as an admiral on the USS Dallas who isn’t sure what to make of Ryan; and Courtney B. Vance as a radar operator whom will play an important role in the action. On the Russian side, Sam Neill shines as Ramius’s first officer, who hopes to settle down in Montana, and Tim Curry is terrific as another officer, tasked with making sure the rest of the crew is alright. We also get Joss Ackland as a Russian ambassador whom, in his dealings with the White House, is making it clear whose side he is on when it’s discovered what Ramius’s intentions are. This is a terrific cast, something that would carry over into later Ryan films, as well.
Now that I’m working through my thoughts on “The Hunt for Red October”- which also has a terrific score by Basil Poledouris- as an individual film, it does very much stand above the other Ryan films we’ve gotten over the years. That’s not only because of McTiernan, and the cast, but because- as a story- it captured the anxiety of the thaw in the Cold War in a way that is intriguing and riveting to watch. I’m glad I’ve finally taken it in for myself.
