Cast:
Tom Cruise (Pete "Maverick" Mitchell), Miles Teller (Bradley "Rooster" Bradshaw), Jennifer Connelly (Penelope "Penny" Benjamin), Jon Hamm (Beau "Cyclone" Simpson), Glen Powell (Jake "Hangman" Seresin), Lewis Pullman (Robert "Bob" Floyd), Ed Harris (Chester "Hammer" Cain), Val Kilmer (Tom "Iceman" Kazansky), Monica Barbaro (Natasha "Phoenix" Trace), Charles Parnell (Solomon "Warlock" Bates), Jay Ellis (Reuben "Payback" Fitch), Danny Ramirez (Lieutenant Mickey "Fanboy" Garcia), Greg Tarzan Davis (Lieutenant Javy "Coyote" Machado), Manny Jacinto (Lieutenant Billy "Fritz" Avalone), Jack Schumacher (Lieutenant Neil "Omaha" Vikander), and Bashir Salahuddin (Bernie "Hondo" Coleman) Directed by Joseph Kosinski (#343 - Tron: Legacy)
Review:
"With Top Gun: Maverick I hope it shows people why we make movies for theaters. The film was designed to be enjoyed on the biggest screen with a packed audience."
Admittedly, the original Top Gun (1986) was a film of its time in terms of spectacle and flavor. It was a movie made by committee with the efforts of director Tony Scott, star Tom Cruise and producers Jerry Bruckheimer & Don Simpson. It was a quality movie that lived and died on the heights of its aerial sequences with enough instinct and style. The idea of doing a sequel started in 2010 with Paramount Pictures offering each of the main core of Bruckheimer, Scott, and Cruise to return, although the suicide of Scott in 2012 obviously changed things (as such, the film has a dedication to him in the credits). The screenplay was done by Ehren Kruger, Eric Warren Singer, and Christopher McQuarrie (who has collaborated with Cruise on the most recent Mission: Impossible films) while the story was done by Peter Craig and Justin Marks (the two had first finished a screenplay draft in 2012 after writers like Ashley Miller and Zack Stentz were approached in 2011). Joseph Kosinski had worked with Cruise on Oblivion (2013) and Teller with Only the Brave (2017). He ended up becoming director when he made his pitch to Cruise on what his approach would be to making the film (i.e. the relationship between Cruise and Teller's characters and also the "Darkstar" sequence), complete with shooting practically with a camera system in the cockpit. The crew had to work for months with cooperation from the Navy to get "six IMAX-quality cameras" in the cockpit and also train the actors in pilot training (keep in mind, they also did underwater training before being allowed in a F-18). Shooting was done from 2018 to 2019, but the film ended up being delayed multiple times: once because of needing more time to shoot complex action sequences, another time because of the pandemic and finally because of scheduling conflicts.
As stated by its opening card: On March 3, 1969 the United States Navy established an elite school for the top one percent of its pilots. Its purpose was to teach the lost art of aerial combat and to insure that the handful of men who graduated were the best fighter pilots in the world. They succeeded. Today, the Navy calls it Fighter Weapons School. The flyers call it: You get the idea. It's funny how the movie is in all aspects better than the original feature despite the fact (or perhaps because of it) that it really takes several of the same beats from the previous one, from its opening sequence where a chewing off of the lead character for recklessness before getting sent somewhere he wants to go right down to its own sequence of playing on the beach (complete with a nameless enemy once again, although you can argue over if that is because it isn't necessary or because the movie doesn't want to fearmonger people). You thought Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015) copied previous movies? Try this one for size. It does handle the balance of spectacle and sentiment better in that it actually tries this time to really make riveting drama as a rite-of-passage of movie rather where it bumbled before. Of course, the chemistry between Cruise and the leading woman is better this time around by the simple act of it looking like they care to build a script with one level of depth rather than the script of vague-ness that occurred before. Cruise doesn't seem to have missed much of a beat from before, one filled with confidence in the air to go alongside a semblance of lingering doubt over things in the ground. In other words: it finds a way to let go without becoming cheap about it. Teller is okay, one with collected calmness that matches well with Cruise in simmering tension that at least makes sure he doesn't get lost in the shuffle of playing the pilot angle like a sports movie, only with a bit more chuckles that are on purpose. At least Powell seems to enjoy the role of overconfidence and chuckles, since Pullman and the others exist on the margins for moderate engagement on par with a high school movie. At least the movie utilizes the only other actor to return from the first film to poignant effect. Kilmer had his voice altered due to treatments for throat cancer in recent years (an AI program was developed to mimic what he sounded like), and the movie shows him for a brief time for a useful sendoff that is both the most inevitable part of the movie and yet the least cheesy. Harris and Hamm play the stand-in foils that are basically the equivalent of the characters played by James Tolkan and Tom Skerritt, and they do okay (of course, an over 90-year-old Tolkan might have made me crack of a smile rather than Harris, but that's just me).
The action choreography is nearly what one would expect from a movie in 2022: something good to look at, but this time without as much evident CG to think about, if only because if Cruise is a showman who prefers to do his stunts, then heaven help the idea of trying to cheapen out on putting people in planes with IMAX cameras and let them fly. The level of inevitability could not be higher here, because to me I never really thought there was a semblance of danger present, which seems fitting to match the first film in making one not really think about the danger for just enjoying the ride (in other words, you know damn well Cruise is not going to die). In essence, the product from 1986 has been updated with useful updates that don't make one want to demand a recall. If the violence is going to seem bloodless to the point where war only seems to be the next level of a board game, then at least the movie wings it all the way to the most natural conclusion. Would I want another one of these? No, of course not, but at least as an attempt to hone back to the adventurous spirit of the first film, it at least does a suitable job in exceeding the standards set by the original without losing sight of what mattered most. In other words: it has the showmanship of the original with a degree of intelligence this time around. I don't think it quite elevates the material past "fine", but it will probably age a bit more gracefully in legacy because of its coherence in the face of adventure.
Overall, I give it 8 out of 10 stars.
No comments:
Post a Comment