Week 31 – Top Gun (1986)

• Top Gun
• Released: 5/16/1986
• Starring: Tom Cruise, Anthony Edwards, Kelly McGillis, Val Kilmer, Tom Skerritt, Michael Ironside, Tim Robbins, Meg Ryan, Rick Rossovich, Barry Tubb, John Stockwell
• Director: Tony Scott
• IMDB Page

Hi! Welcome back! It’s Week 31 here at 52 Films, 52 Portraits, and we are just chugging along. This week’s film was chosen by my cousin, Drew. Yes, a different Drew. Not me. My cousin, Drew. Drew works as an engineer in Pittsburgh, PA, just an hour or so from Grove City, where he spent most of his formative years. He lives with his wife, Janele. Drew is Mark and Sally‘s son, the oldest and first of the four boys that will be featured on this blog.

Drew and I at Christmas a few years ago.

When I spoke with Drew about this project, he told me that he isn’t really a big film buff, but he does enjoy the occasional film. Still, he doesn’t get around to watching that many in his day-to-day life. He did say that he really liked this idea though, and was excited to participate. He said that he does really like film as a story-telling method. He likes that you can get completely immersed in a film (especially in theaters). He said that the fact that you can experience the complete story straight through without any “distractions or breaks” is what, to him, really differentiates films from other ways of telling a story.

Drew said that when he was growing up, he was really drawn to the fantasy/sci fi series genres. He loved the Star Wars, Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter series. He especially loved watching movies that were adapted from books that he had read and dissecting them after viewing. He would discuss them with his friends/family and pick apart what was true to the source material and what wasn’t. I can remember us all going to see the Lord of the Rings films as during the Christmases they were released, and all of us loved them. We spent hours in my grandparents’ yard acting out scenes from the films and making up our own. Good times.

However, his tastes have evolved as he’s gotten older. He said that his favorite genres these days are action and drama. He prefers to spend his time watching films that will engage his mind and make him think. He likes to try to figure out the plot of a film and try to predict where it is heading. He also admitted that (thanks to Janele) he spends a lot more time watching romantic comedies now than he did previously.

Drew told me that when I asked him to pick his favorite film for this project, he immediately thought of films that he loved from his childhood. Movies that he was able to watch over and over again and still enjoy. He said that this is more uncommon for him now than it used to be, so it was easier to think of movies from earlier in his life. He considered the “feel good” sports film Remember the Titans for this reason and also almost chose The Princess Bride, which may have been the most popular choice among all of my participants.

The film that Drew ultimately chose was the Tom Cruise 80s classic Top Gun. He said that the movie was just so cool to him as a kid. Part of it could be because he went through a phase when he thought fighter planes were awesome, but its also thanks to the fact that it’s just one of those films that is easy to pop on with some friends and enjoy. The swagger of the main characters really spoke to him and the movie never got old. He added that this was all before he came to realize “that Tom Cruise was a pretty weird dude.” Same Drew. Same.

He also said that he hadn’t watched Top Gun in a while, so he appreciated this opportunity to watch it again. Always happy to help on that front!

I’m a little ashamed to say that I had not only never seen Top Gun, but I also had pretty much no idea what it was about. The phrase “top gun” mostly just made me think about going to laser tag as a kid. So. Not much to go on.

Turns out that it is about, as Drew said, fighter planes! And also their pilots. Normally this probably wouldn’t be my type of film, but in the context of the project, I really enjoyed it. It was different than most of the other films on the list, and had a lot of great, iconic elements.

Let’s start with the soundtrack. Thanks to American Idol, I did know that Kenny Loggins’ “Danger Zone” was from the film, but I somehow had know idea that Berlin’s “Take My Breath Away” was as well! When the song came on during the love scene, I immediately had to search to see if this film was the origin of that song. Turns out that it was! Crazy!

I also enjoyed the fact that the criminally underemployed Anthony Edwards (of ER fame) had starring role in the film as Tom Cruise’s buddy and sidekick. He was great in the film, and I really enjoyed getting to see him in something that was released nearly a decade before his debut as Dr. Mark Greene on ER. And Val Kilmer was pretty great as the slimy but surprisingly justified Iceman.

Overall, I definitely enjoyed the film, and it was so very 80s, which was definitely fun. I love watching these films that are such perfect time capsules of their times and yet still so enjoyable today.

Thanks for joining me this week! Please comment and follow below! And come back next week for more Film and Portrait-y goodness.

Next week: The Wizard of Oz