Celluloid Heroes

How did you get in the Navy? How did you get on our side?

Despite having two directors with somewhat clashing styles, being noticeably dated in places and a little too obviously based on a stage play, Mister Roberts still works as a classic comedy and a war movie in which the only violence is committed upon a pair of hapless palm trees. The Tony-winning play by Joshua Logan and Frank L. Nugent had already run for seven years on Broadway when the film was made and Henry Fonda had played the role of Lt. (jg) Doug Roberts 1,300 times before a frame of film had been shot. It’s safe to say that he didn’t need reheasal.

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Your national security advisor has just been executed. He’s a very good negotiator. He bought you another half hour.

Air Force One probably would have seemed like a retread even if it hadn’t followed Executive Decision by a year, but the existence of other film sure doesn’t help.

The plot deals with the hijacking of the eponymous aircraft by a band of Russian “ultra-nationalists” led by Gary Oldman, who want to free their leader, General Radek (Das Boot’s Jürgen Prochnow). The terrorists think that the president (Harrison Ford) has escaped, but he’s really hiding in the bowels of the plane, getting ready to start kicking some Ruskie butt.

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So if it’s just us… seems like an awful waste of space. Right?

Contact is a nobly intentioned but ultimately unsatisfying adaptation of Carl Sagan’s only novel. It details the circumstances surrounding the first clear sign of intelligent life in outer space and their effects on the life of a young and idealistic radio astronomer named Ellie Arroway (Jodie Foster).

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