Synopsis: The year is 1984 and the Cold War is still going strong. In an attempt to turn the tides, the Soviet Union has developed a new submarine with a revolutionary new practically silent propulsion system. It has been dubbed "Red October" and have just been put to sea for the first time captained by the highly respected Marko Ramius. Then the Soviet government receives a letter from Ramius and only hours later the entire soviet fleet is dispatched to hunt down and destroy the "Red October".
At the same time, American analyst Jack Ryan and his CIA colleagues start to receive some photos and information from their spies in Russia concerning their new submarine. Jack soon notices something special and takes them to be examined. When his boss, Admiral Greer, and the rest of the US government hears that the soviets have a submarine loaded with nuclear weapons that can escape all their regular detection methods things start to go bad pretty fast. Ryan however is unsure, he's read about Ramius and can't make sense of what he's doing, unless he's trying to defect to the US. As the time is running out Ryan is sent the attack sub Dallas to try to locate "Red October" and learn Ramius' true intentions.
Review: The Hunt for Red October has been one of my favorite movies ever since I saw it around 10 or so years ago. It's based on the book of the same name written by Tom Clancy, a name most people will recognize. He's lent it to countless movies, games and "ghost written" books through the years and sort of created his own niche or genre. His stories have been called "thinking man's thrillers" as they usually involve a very well researched, current and relatively believable end of the world scenarios with lots of political and military information spread through it. The book "Hunt for Red October" was his first one and started it all. This movie expands his stories to the big screen and does so in a great way.
It's a great thriller that feels very well put together. The story slowly builds both in suspense and interest as it goes along. It starts off almost as a mystery as you try to find out what Ramius intentions are and then moves more into action-thriller territory towards the end. The pacing is great and even thought there are times where not that much really happen on screen you feel the suspense of the invisible ticking clock. The movie also feels very authentic, even though there are some liberties taken here and there for the sake of keeping the pace up and moving the plot along.
Before I watched this movie I just got done reading the book for the first time. I have to say that the adaptation has been done very well. There are some things missing of course and a lot of background info on the characters that you don't get in the movie, but you don't miss it. The writer has condensed the story to its core and given it a bit of the "Hollywood"-touch and it comes off as a very lean and focused film. If you do read the book however I think you'll get a much closer bond to and understanding of the characters and what other events that happen simultaneously as the story in the movie. I enjoyed the movie even more after I read it at least.
A big part of why I like the movie is the great cast, the two main characters in particular. Alec Baldwin does a very good job playing Ryan as a civilian and kind of regular, though very smart, joe. The fact that he's not just the regular clichéd hero that saves the day all by himself really helps make this movie something special. He pulls it off very well with a bit of uncertainty and nervousness out in at times to make the character more human. He gets a Hollywood-hero moment too towards the end, but Ryan transitions into it so it doesn’t jar. Then, of course, there's Sean Connery. He fits perfectly into the role of Marko Ramius. With a strong presence and authority he is very believable as the highly respected and experience submarine captain, despite his usual Scottish accent. He does have a few Russian lines, but the language is switched a few minutes into the movie to avoid having most of it be in Russian. It's probably for the best since I'd rather have Connery focus his energy on the acting instead of getting the language correct. All round he does a great job with it, especially at the beginning when his intentions are still a mystery. You're not really sure what he's thinking and it's interesting to see the interactions with the crew, particularly Vasily Borodin. He is played by Sam Neill who does a great job with the character.
The movie also has a few other notable supporting actors that play their roles very well. Among them are James Earl Jones, Scott Glenn, Stellan Skarsgård, Richard Jordan and Courtney B. Vance. They all bring some interesting characters to the screen and help the movie seem much bigger and more fleshed out than it really is. If you look closer you will notice that very little information is given about any of the characters except for Ramius and Ryan. The movie mostly focuses on the action, but thanks to the great actors who manages to make their characters distinct and likeable with very little screentime you don't notice the lack of background information on them.
The effects in the movie are pretty good and still hold up pretty well now, 18 years later. The underwater submarine scenes look very realistic and the military clips that are used every now and then are put in seamlessly. Some of the torpedo effects look a bit dated, but it's nothing that screams out at you and takes you out of the film. There's some great sound work in the film too. In the effects scenes it helps give the submarines some more mass and depth, the hull creaks because of the water pressure and the propellers churn away with distinct differences for each sub. It also gives life to the closed-in space inside the submarines and along with the music does a great job keeping up the suspense.
Summary: All round "Red October" is a great thriller. It's not perfect, but it feels very realistic, has a very good cast and, most importantly, is highly entertaining all the way through.
8 / 10
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