Director: Joseph Kosinski
Cast: Tom Cruise, Miles Teller, Jennifer Connelly, Val Kilmer
Have I Seen it Before: Nope. Missed any sort of convenient IMAX screening, and I’ll probably just have to live with that. Drifted into a matinee recently more than a month after the film’s release.
Which felt like a safe thing to do, not just from the COVID side of things, but because this tends to minimize encounters with the absolute dumbest people to emerge from underneath rocks. I’m definitely one of those guys generally less enthralled by seeing a movie with a crowd (although the right crowd—difficult though it is to find—does have its charms), than with seeing bigger movies on the biggest screen possible.
No such luck this time, though. The screening was already crowded when I got my tickets, which should have been my first alarm bell. I was enjoying my popcorn just at the limit of social distancing, and some jabroni takes the seat right next to mine. I’m doing a quick calculation in my head regarding the average vaccination status of a Top Gun audience on a Wednesday afternoon, and at first I think I have three choices. First, slap on my KN95 and abandon all hope of enjoying the rest of my popcorn. Second, just leave before the movie starts.
Both are unacceptable. So, in desperate need of a third option, I broke the social contract of the modern moviegoing experience and moved to a seat for which I had not bought a ticket. It felt simultaneously rebellious and safe, and I got to finish my popcorn. What’s more, I moved to the front row, and that was probably the better way to take in this film anyway.
Did I Like It: Oh, sure. You probably want to hear more about the movie itself. Much has been said about how much better this film is than the original Top Gun (1986). They are right, but I can’t help but wonder if this is because this film is truly that great, or because the original film is not much more than an energetic pageant of the state of masculinity in the mid-80s. This one has an actual story. There are stakes. Several characters go through something resembling an arc. That’s already something. Is the story kind of preposterous and ultimately hinges on the insane idea that an enemy (let’s not name them, because nothing in a film dates it more than identifying the collective bad guy) base has a mostly-ignored, still-in-working-order, retro-bordering-on-antique fighter jet ready for Maverick (Cruise) and Rooster (Teller) to use to make their escape? Yes, but it exists, and there’s a nice little romance between Cruise and Jennifer Connelly to help make the larger preposterousness go down easier.
I think what people are really responding to is the cinematography of the aviation sequences, which are truly an improvement not only for the series, but the idea of aerial photography in general. There were several moments I genuinely wondered how the production obtained the shots they did without just letting Cruise actually pilot priceless warplanes. I don’t think I really want to know.