Backdraft (1991)

ONE BREATH OF OXYGEN AND IT EXPLODES IN A DEADLY RAGE

Fire-fighters are pretty awesome, can we agree on that? They’ve chosen a job that can mean they go running into a flaming building, which could be rapidly collapsing as they go, wearing a lot of really heavy gear, to save someone who couldn’t find a way out before the fire blocked them in. Yes, fire-fighters are pretty awesome. Despite this, they are rarely the subject of films, certainly pre-9/11. There has only been a handful of big titles to give them sufficient focus, like Ladder 49, World Trade Center, Frequency, or the disaster great The Towering Inferno. However, the first one that people tend to think of when they think of fire-fighter movies is the all-star crack from the early 90s, directed by Ron Howard – Backdraft.

After years of drifting between jobs, Brian McCafferty (William Baldwin) finally decides to follow in the footsteps of his father and become a fire-fighter, although he hits a rough start when he is assigned to the company run by his brother, Stephen (Kurt Russell). The two have never got along, and Brian resents having to answer to his brother. Meanwhile, a series of fires are set, each seemingly started to kill a specific person. After losing his head at a fire, Brian accepts an offer to assist arson investigator Don Rimgale (Robert De Niro) in his attempts to catch the arsonist behind these fires.

Note: I apologise in advance for any puns or quips that involve fire, flames, heat or anything related. It’s as unintentional as it is unavoidable.

Gregory Widen knows how awesome fire-fighters are. He should, since he used to be one. Widen served as a working fire-fighter for three years before becoming a full-time writer, which he was able to do thanks to being able to sell his first script, Highlander, whilst still an undergraduate. During his time as fire-fighter, he witnessed a friend be killed by an explosive backdraft at a scene. This incident, as well as his general experiences on the job, went on to become the basis for his script for Backdraft, which would be his second feature screenplay. The screenplay itself is effectively three different stories – Detective Story, Family Drama, Monster Movie – all set within the high-pressure world of smoke-eaters. On the first level, the Detective Story, it’s a fairly straightforward run. A serial killer is on the loose, targeting specific people for destruction, and using a very specific modus operandi. What this killer does is orchestrate a fire hazard known as a backdraft (where a small amount of oxygen is introduced to a fire-torn, oxygen-starved environment to explosive effect), which then waits for the intended victim and literally engulfs them in an enormous fireball. With people being killed, it’s down to a veteran arson investigator and his new assistant to find the clues and track down the killer before he strikes again. Again, for the most part, pretty straightforward stuff.

The next level is the Family Drama. Here, it’s more about character development, which we like. When Brian McCafferty was a kid, he wanted to be just like his dad, a capable and dedicated fire-fighter. One day, when Brian accompanied his father on a call, Brian’s father was caught in a gas explosion and was killed. From then on, Brian has always had something of a fear of fire. Still driven by a desire to honour his dad’s memory, as well as the gung-ho example of his older brother Stephen, he trains up to become a rookie. Stephen, the lieutenant of Brian’s new company, thinks his brother doesn’t have what it takes, which will end up costing someone their life. The pair, who have never got along all that well, particularly after their father died, start cracking sparks against each other. They each think the other is holding on to some long-buried grudge, which starts to make working together very difficult. They each have their own faulty relationships with women, too. Stephen split from his wife a long time ago, but still has trouble reconciling himself to that, living on his dad’s old boat, like most brooding semi-alcoholics in the movies. Brian doesn’t fair much better, finding a bit of a frosty reception from an old flame who thinks he’s still too immature to be a decent prospect.

The third level is the Monster Movie side of things. In Backdraft, as you would expect, the monster being fought is the elemental force of Fire. A great deal of effort is put into creating the sense that fire is alive. When Don explains to Brian the reality of his job, and that of all fire-fighters: “It’s a living thing, Brian. It breathes, it eats… and it hates.” Monster movies are all about a group of individuals coming together to fight a common, perhaps insurmountable foe, and the fire in this film absolutely carries that. It’s difficult to predict, impossibly brutal, and rages with a ferocity that levels buildings. It’s also very difficult to contain, since it can turn virtually anything into another torrent of conflagration. Upon finishing the script, Jennifer Jason Leigh apparently told director Ron Howard that she wished she could be the fire, since it had the best part… she’s not wrong.

The actual coming together of these different plotlines is rather fitting. Arson investigators will sometimes refer to the proverbial “Fire Triangle”, which requires three factors to be in place for a fire to ignite, these being oxygen, heat, and a source of fuel. This thinking seems to have factored into how Backdraft unfolds. Each different story aspect acts as a separate factor contributing to the Triangle, each one feeding into the other to create the explosive effects that we see onscreen. As it is, though, these different factors can seem a little imbalanced at times. The Family Drama parts, though important and holding some good stuff, simply can’t stand up to the intrigue of the Detective Story or the thrilling tension of the Monster Movie. Stephen’s problems with his estranged wife, Helen, do hold some interest, given that they speak directly to Stephen’s increasingly despondent nature. However, Brian’s relationship with his ex-girlfriend, Jennifer, serves little real purpose, with things not so much being tied up as cut off. It feels rather tacked-on, something to justify the need for a plot device.

Things are much better served in the Detective Story, following the two-man investigation unit as they try to find out who’s behind these killings. The character of Don Rimgale, an actual person, is far more intriguing than most people in the familial concerns of the film. A former fire-fighter-turned-investigator, he’s a fierce guy, thorough and methodical. He’s also got a long memory, as evidenced by his appearance at the parole hearing for serial fire-bug Ronald. Ronald has convinced the psychologist and parole board that he’s a changed man, but two minutes with Don and it’s clear he’s far from rehabilitated. The use of the Ronald character serves as an interesting one because it’s him that Brian must go to for help in finding the last piece of the puzzle. There is a distinctly Silence of the Lambs feel about this scene, owing to the entirely creepy (though for completely different reasons) presence of a violent killer being interviewed by a rookie investigator, with something of a quid pro quo exchange happening. The fact that Silence of the Lambs was released earlier in the same year may or may not be a coincidence. Just to make things weirder, Scott Glenn appears in both films.

By far, the most effective scenes are those under the Monster Movie banner, where the good guys are called in to fight the fiery beast at great risk to themselves. Ron Howard wanted to achieve that sense of being in the cage with the animal, so had a cameraman fire-suit up and wander through the carnage with a handycam. It’s sparingly-used, thank God, but it’s effective nonetheless. Being able to see the fires blazing so close to our heroes, and us, goes a long way to making us feel the fear in its presence. We also get glimpses of what happens when the animal strikes, the devastation to body and mind when someone turns their back on it for that split second.

Performances throughout are a mixed-bag. On one end, there are the strong performances, coming from those you’d expect - Kurt Russell, Robert De Niro and Donald Sutherland. Russell gives Stephen a simmering intensity, a jovial nature that barely contains a fierce temper and gung-ho sensibility that borders on the suicidal. De Niro’s Don Rimgale is a no nonsense kind of guy, and De Niro looks like he carries the weight of a backstory we barely see, but only get pieces of. Few people can show so much with so little like De Niro. And Sutherland’s Ronald is thoroughly creepy. Not particularly intimidating, or even imposing, but he can be very aptly described as a fire fanatic, a wide-eyed enthusiast, someone who loves to let the beast out of its cage just to see what horrific damage can be done. His half-laughing admission about burning little girls and old ladies is quite unsettling.

Scott Glenn, Rebecca De Mornay and Jennifer Jason Leigh do what they can to give equally decent shows, but suffer a little from having the focus be primarily on the relationship between Brian and Stephen. Leigh especially gets short-changed, removed from proceedings in a sort of neat, but hardly satisfying conclusion. William Baldwin is perhaps the weakest on show, but it’s still not a bad performance really. He certainly throws himself into the physical demands of the role, but just isn’t always entirely there for the rest of it.

There is one thing that I find unsettling about the film, though. There is a bit of a lack of real resolution in things, despite the appearance of so. The culprit is uncovered, but only partially dealt with. The one responsible for the deaths of three people, along with the attempted murder of three more, and severely burning another, effectively gets away with it. It would seem that more focus is placed on that which served as the catalyst for the crimes, an act of under-handed dealings. This initial crime is dealt with more decisively than the much more violent and dangerous one, which seems to get swept under the rug in the spirit of some moderate notion of honour. Are we to accept that the first crime is the one more deserving of resolution, despite the other crimes being more public and with a higher body count? I understand what the film is trying to say about the importance of a fire-fighter’s job and how they should not be taken for granted, and I understand how things have been wrapped up, but this is not so easy to accept in light of the story. Even most of the relationship woes are settled by a single and decisive turn, with the others being simply ended. In the end, it does feel a little uneasy.

Overall, Backdraft is an engaging and effective thriller, and goes towards showing fire-fighters to be the heroic figures that they are. However, this idea of heroism and honour somewhat clouds the reality of the plot, offering only half-conceived conclusions to what was a pretty good mystery show. The direction is decent, and some of the performances are damn good, but you can’t ignore the feeling of a story barely covered with some level of emotional bias.

Apollo 13 (1995)

"HOUSTON, WE HAVE A PROBLEM."

There was a time when the whole world looked to the skies in the spirit of adventure and hope, not for reasons of religion, but because mankind had shaken off the bonds of Earth and travelled beyond the limits of our atmosphere – space exploration had begun. Though this spawned the rather paranoia-tainted Space Race between the US and Russia, both trying to conquer the outer limits first, the advances of humanity were of greater import. In 1969, this led to one of the truly great achievements of the 20^th Century (or any Century) as the crew of Apollo 11 landed on the surface of the moon. There, astronaut Neil Armstrong produced one of the most famous quotes in history: “That’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.” In 1970, the world would receive another now famous quote from another Apollo space mission: “Houston, we’ve had a problem.”

Less than a year after man first walked on the Moon, Apollo 13 was sent back on another lunar-landing mission. However, before the craft even got there, a catastrophic technical malfunction effectively crippled them. Stranded hundreds of thousands of miles from Earth, the Apollo 13 flight crew, Jim Lovell (Tom Hanks), Fred Haise (Bill Paxton) and Jack Swigert (Kevin Bacon), and the NASA technicians fight desperately to bring the craft back to life and bring the astronauts home safely.

Before we even begin to look at the mission at the heart of this story, we are told of a previous mission that went horribly wrong, Apollo 1, which killed its three crew members. The point is being made very clearly – tragedy can happen at anytime, even to those who prepare for it. If there’s one thing that the film of Apollo 13 wants to do in the first forty-five minutes or so, it’s build up a sense of foreboding, a sense of sinister premonition, a sense that this mission was doomed from the start. It’s something that some of the superstitious folk among us have often said about the Apollo 13 mission itself. There’s the fact that it was the 13^th mission in the Apollo program, that it launched at 19:13pm (13:13 by North American Central Standard Time), that the rupture of the oxygen tanks occurred on the 13^th of April (again, Central Standard Time), that there was a change in the crew a week before blast-off. The film itself builds on this by highlighting other things, too. Crew Commander Lovell’s wife lost her wedding ring down the shower drain before the launch date. Lovell’s car had been having some technical difficulties recently and stalling without warning. These ominous concerns were not lost on the crew, who joked about breaking mirrors and black cats and walking under ladders in preparation for the flight. It doesn’t matter whether or not you’re a superstitious person or not (I’m certainly not), because the film does makes its point that some of these characters may be somewhat superstitious themselves, even if it’s merely a case of not wanting to tempt fate. For example, Gene Kranz, the no-nonsense flight director, maintains a simple ritual of wearing a crisp white waistcoat with mission patch on the lapel for the duration of the assignment.

Although these nods towards less rational sensibilities are important, they take up only a little bit of time in the build up to the film’s central crisis. Much more attention is paid towards the establishment of the characters who must deal with it when it comes. Working from a script by William Broyles Jr. and Al Reinert, director Ron Howard develops a fine array of individuals for us to follow along this perilous journey. Jim Lovell was part of the Apollo 8 mission, the first to orbit the moon, though never got a chance to actually walk on its surface. We feel his awe of such a feat, his sense of mild disappointment that he got so close before without touching it, his humble joy at finally being given the chance to achieve his goal. His wife, Marilyn, is so loving and supportive of her husband and his dreams. She’s a veteran of watching her husband go off into space, so she also remains a firm support for other wives who are new to the whole experience, although she is still uneasy about it herself. Fred Haise is a family man and southern country boy, a fun guy of simple tastes, a little rough around the edges, but a fine pilot. Ken Mattingly is a straight arrow and a driven perfectionist, always pushing himself to get it right. Jack Swigert is a ladies man, a slight outsider as the late addition to the crew, and also with great flight skills and instinct. Gene Kranz is a man who commands respect, but through an understated resolve and calm under pressure. The film builds these characters, and their families (or lack of), so well that when things start to go wrong, you are completely invested and feel genuinely taken by their plight. As things progress, the characters are treated with a great dignity and respect, their actions developed with tight and utterly believable motivations. Even better is that no one is ever given to the overly dramatic bouts of hysteria, with someone eventually cracking up, screaming and crying that they don’t want to die up here. It’s made very clear that these people are who they are and where they are precisely because of their heroic levels of self-control, that they know their best chance to survive is to remain composed and work together. We should all be so controlled as these people.

Howard is also well aware that the greatest dramatic draw is the crisis itself. Of course, how could it not be? A less assured director would have perhaps tried to cram in more subplots and storylines underneath the main one in order to add even greater weight and complexity to the piece. It speaks greatly that Howard did not do such a thing. The film is complex enough, built out of a tight sense the technical issues that must be tackled on Earth, and the delicate relationship of the three men on board the ship. The level of technical detail itself is enough to create a heavy sense of realism, making it all so absorbing. The script is full of technical jargon and astro-speak, but it never overwhelms the audience, still remaining somehow accessible, even if just in a basic sense. It’s from this kind of realism and adherence to detail that we get some moments of drama and concern in the film. When the crew have to turn off most of their equipment in the hope of conserving battery life and fuel, the possibility for the condensation build-up to short out the electrical instruments becomes another concern to deal with. It’s really a case of one thing leading to another, and it makes for really great drama.

And it’s not even just in the technical side of things that there’s a great sense of detail. The period is evoked so well, with the fashions, the music, the cars. Lovell’s eldest daughter initially doesn’t want to watch her father’s flight broadcasts (all before the disaster strikes, of course) because she’s so upset that The Beatles have broken up. That actually happened, the day before Apollo 13 launched. It’s the small details throughout the film that make it all so immersive and wonderful to watch.

The cast do a superb job throughout. Tom Hanks is able to bring his typical Everyman-ness to Lovell, but yet still make him someone of great poise and character. Ed Harris’ Gene Kranz is a performance of superb control and reserve, delivering lines like “Failure is not an option” with great solid conviction. Kathleen Quinlan also gives a great show, steering clear of the weepy astronaut’s wife thing, showing a core of strength and restraint. She’s not above letting the tears come, but she knows better than to let them take over. Paxton, Bacon and Sinise provide great support, too.

Apollo 13 is a genuinely thrilling, tense and really rather emotional experience, which remains unaffected by whether or not you know how it all turns out. The direction is firmly controlled and incredibly well detailed, with solid performances from everyone involved. It’s often overlooked or forgotten about today, but this is an exhilarating experience and a fine tribute to those involved in a great pursuit of exploration.

American Graffiti (1973)

WHERE WERE YOU IN '62?

Once again in this journey through my movie collection we have come across a director digging into his own youth for his filmic work. Greg Mottola went back to the 80s for Adventureland, Cameron Crowe went to the 70s for Almost Famous, and now George Lucas is heading back to his youth in the early 1960s for his tale of growing up, making out and trying to figure out just what it is a young person wants to do with their life. It’s a time of rock n’ roll music, drive thrus, cruising the streets with your friends in American classic cars. His film was American Graffiti.

Curt (Richard Dreyfuss) and Steve (Ron Howard) have gotten into college and are due to leave in the morning, so they decide to spend their last night of summer riding through the streets and remembering old times. However, Curt is having second thoughts about leaving, while Steve tries to patch things up with his girlfriend before leaving.

American Graffiti may actually be probably the most important film in George Lucas’ career... now here’s why. When Easy Rider was released in 1969 and became the instant hit and seminal classic that it is, it showed a different way of making films. Studios saw that they could make films for cheap and potentially reap great rewards. Universal Studios decided to follow through on this and, hoping to recreate the same conditions that Easy Rider was apparently made under, opted to give five young filmmakers a chance to make a movie under the rules that each film be budgeted as $1,000,000 or less, directors would be given final cut and that the studio would not interfere in the filmmaking process. This was an incredible opportunity. Lucas himself had made one feature film in 1971, his sf cult classic THX 1138, but it was a bitter experience. The studio behind it, Warner Bros., hated it and demanded their seed money back from Lucas’ partner Francis Ford Coppola, who had produced the film under his company American Zoetrope. The money was repaid, but doing so nearly closed down Zoetrope, forcing Coppola to take on another project for the money, The Godfather. Meanwhile, Warner Bros. wanted to make changes to THX 1138, cutting five minutes from the film before releasing it. The film was quite unsuccessful, with Warner Bros. blaming the downbeat nature of the film, and Lucas blaming the studio for tampering with the project. This experience effectively taught Lucas two things: 1) Always have complete control of the film; and 2) Downbeat films aren’t terribly successful.

As such, when Universal began rounding up projects, Lucas made his pitch. He, along with Gloria Katz and William Huyck, wrote a script that was a nostalgic look back to the early 60s and a celebration of everything about the period. There would be classic cars, young people doing young things, humour, memories and a huge amount of rock n’ roll music. Essentially, Lucas wanted to make an upbeat financially successful movie. Now, by 1972, they had already produced four films – Peter Fonda’s The Hired Hand, Dennis Hopper’s The Last Movie, Milos Forman’s Taking Off and Douglas Trumbull’s Silent Running. Universal were somewhat hesitant about giving the last shot to Lucas, who only had one feature under his belt, which was not a success. Concerns were only assuaged when Coppola, fresh off of the monster hit that was The Godfather, came on a producer. Once more, Lucas was given a shot at the big time.

The production itself was littered with problems. A crewmember being arrested for drug possession the day before shooting started; camera troubles put the schedule off on the first day; their filming licence was revoked because of complaints from local businesses; a fire halted filming; members of the cast and crew were injured or fell ill; and cars would break down. It was troubled to say the least. Even upon screening the finished product, Universal exec Ned Tanen, a notoriously aggressive individual, took a real dislike to the film. A compromise had to be reached whereby the studio could suggest changes to the film, much to the annoyance of Lucas. Nevertheless, it was released in 1973 to widespread acclaim and was even nominated for Best Picture. The reason it did so well, as Lucas well knows, is that the film made people happy. Where THX 1138 was a downbeat financial disaster, American Graffiti was an upbeat success. People loved seeing it and reliving an aspect of their youth, or seeing the youth of the previous generation. It had the music people love, fresh-faced young people, and generally resonated with people in a way that they will always enjoy. People love to look back on their younger years and remember their friends, their old haunts, the good times.

I say that American Graffiti may be the most important film in Lucas’ career because it taught him the value of a film with high positive emotion behind it. People want to feel good and there are fewer better ways than a real feel-good movie. To evoke a world that people can get lost in, with characters they can identify and connect to, with it all ending in a huge surge of happiness and positivity. Plus, the importance of having complete control over the project… really, this was all the information that Lucas needed to avoid Warner Bros. and Universal and take his next project to 20^th Century Fox. Make no mistake, without American Graffiti, there would be no Star Wars.

This is all well and good, but… what’s the film actually like? Is it really any good? The truth is… yeah, kind of. Lucas clearly put a great deal of love into the film. His characters do have that ring of familiarity to them, like you knew some of them when you were at school. The music is so much a part of the film that it evokes the period effortlessly, and there are some really great songs in there. Some of the performances are also great, like Dreyfuss, Charles Martin Smith and Mackenzie Phillips. I particularly liked Phillips since she is easily the funniest thing there. Her attempted drive-by zinger of, “Your car is uglier than I am… that didn’t come out right.” is golden.

On the other side of things, it does feel quite long. It is meant to take place over a single, very long night, but the various storylines and subplots weigh the film down somewhat, which makes it drag. Also, Ron Howard and Cindy Williams aren’t terribly convincing. I do believe that they would be having relationship troubles, but mainly because I don’t buy them as a couple to begin with.

Ultimately, whilst I do get the classic status of American Graffiti and certainly like some aspects of it, I can’t really say that it’s a particular favourite of mine. Its nostalgia and warmth are clear to see, but it’s a nostalgia and warmth for a very particular time and place that is just too far removed from me to connect. I can understand small strands of it here and there as a more general experience of youth and looking to the future, but the diners, the cruising, the whole youth culture of that period just seems too foreign to me. However, that’s really more my problem than the film’s. As it is, it’s a film clearly made with love and evokes that period wonderfully. I just can’t say it carries itself over to me that much.