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Based
on one of the many Jack Ryan novels detailing the rise of a CIA
analyst to the summit of power in the United States, "The Sum
of All Fears" is a well-made military thriller that seems to
suffer a crisis of confidence after peaking too early.
A
younger version of Jack Ryan is played here by Ben Affleck who does
a good job of appearing naive and everymannish, but doesn't quite
pull off the believable part. Essentially the same role as Alec
Baldwin's Ryan in "Hunt for the Red October", Affleck's
Ryan is a young CIA researcher who is pulled out of his report writing
to hunt down a missing team of Soviet nuclear scientists.
The U.S. President (James Cromwell), concerned with showing the
firm hand to the Russians over its abuses in Chechnya, is pressured
into playing brinkmanship by his strongarming cabinet. The head
of counter intelligence, played by the always substantial Morgan
Freeman, doesn't quite know what is happening underneath the posturing
but is willing to entertain Ryan's cautious insights.
When
an inspection of a Russian nuclear site reveals the absence of some
critical personnel, Ryan is put on their trail. Meanwhile, there
is a hint of a conspiracy of extreme rightists lead by a German
politician (who helpfully, for the less astute members of the audience,
has a watch with an engraved swastika on its underside).
Even
with all these events and an opening flashback to the Yom Kippur
War of 1973 "The Sum of All Fears" dances along at a fast
pace and never lets us forget that larger events are afoot.
"The
Sum of All Fears" is good when it maintains a tone of crisis,
building the fear of terrorism targetting the United States to the
even greater disaster of nuclear conflict with Russia.
"The
Sum of All Fears" is not quite so good when it dips into James
Bond territory. Although having a foot in politics and a foot in
skulking was always a part of the 'Jack Ryan world', here it seems
forced as if the makers are too worried that the audience will fall
asleep with the political drama and the jet bombers taking off and
landing. Thus, Jack Ryan becomes the unlikely partner of a commando
on a secret mission into the heart of Russia. Later on Ryan even
battles a Bond-like hulking Aryan heavy who could have been recruited
straight out of Spectre.
The
problem may be that Ryan is underwritten in his other scenes where
the credibility of his intelligence analyst character is tested.
Invited early into briefings in the corridors of power Ryan is given
to eye-brow raising outbursts that draw attention but then he never
seems to follow up with actual information to back up his opinions.
As a result, its easy to see later why Ryan has to resort to personally
trying to stop a nuclear war, because everyone in power thinks he's
a fool.
Bond has his gadgets, Ryan just needs
a phone
The
highlight of "Sum of All Fears" is the nuclear terrorist
attack on Baltimore as much for the post-September 11th emotional
context as for the special effects and direction. There is no denying
the central horror of the events around the attack and the feeling
of sorrow in the wake of the devastation. The attack on the World
Trade Towers is almost certainly the touchstone for this scene and
probably no one will be able to remove themselves from that memory
when watching even fictional people about to die.
The
Baltimore attack is so resonant, in fact, that the last third of
the film is quite flat. Although the stakes are higher as the U.S.
blames Russia for smuggling in the nuclear device, following Ryan's
ever more unbelievable exploits in trying to get the attention of
the leadership of the opposing sides just isn't as exciting as a
big bomb going off. Much of what Ryan is trying to do in the latter
half seemingly involves phone tag, trying to phone through to the
right people and communicating by PDA. There must be a running tally
now of the number of times the world was saved by cellphones in
film. I half expected Muldur and Scully to appear and lend Ryan
their phones.
"Sum
of All Fears" also relies a bit heavily not only on previous
Clancy-cliches but also on the seminal nuclear-scenario thriller
"Fail-Safe" in character and content. There are a couple
of shots annoyingly cribbed from that Sidney Lumet classic, though
"Sum of All Fears" does improve in the realism department,
including raising the profanity level of the cabinet meetings to
what you might expect from, say, red blooded George Bush Jr. types.
In
theatres now.
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