Yahoo News ‘The Rock’: THR’s 1996 Review
On June 7, 1996, Buena Vista unveiled Michael Bay’s actioner The Rock, which paired Sean Connery with Nicolas Cage. The R-rated film, produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, went on to gross $134 million domestically that summer. The Hollywood Reporter’s original review is below:
An above-average big-bucks action film with enough macho behavior and explosive thrills to please fans of the genre, Hollywood Pictures’ The Rock has the usual problems with credibility, but the ride is so fast and ferociously executed that one has fun with its excesses while admiring the solid performances from its trio of stars.
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On target for a big breakout on its opening weekend, the final Simpson/Bruckheimer production is dedicated to the late Don of high-testosterone blockbusters. Furiously paced and ruggedly directed by sophomore helmer Michael Bay (Bad Boys), The Rock has firepower to spare and plenty of dramatic sparring, but no time for romance or genuine bonding between audience and characters — unless one is as agog over the weaponry and gadgets as the filmmakers clearly are.
Nicolas Cage and Sean Connery, as the mismatched duo of good guys assigned to stop a terrorist attack by a rogue general, however, make this slick and often silly film a thoroughly entertaining rush of high-tech warfare and reverse-prison-breaking on the oft-used setting of Alcatraz Island.
Topical in the rhetoric of lead antagonist General Hummel (Ed Harris), who holds the city of San Francisco hostage to get the attention of the government and demand money and recognition for former covert warriors under his command, The Rock portrays the U.S. military as vulnerable to a potentially disastrous mutiny and hiding many secrets from those on a “need-to-know” basis — which is all of us waiting for the next astounding revelation.
One such secret sprung to help a SEAL team storm Alcatraz, where Hummel has taken hostages and placed missiles loaded with V.X. poison gas and pointed them at the city, is longtime prisoner Mason (Sean Connery). A limey spook cooped up for three decades because he swiped a copy of J. Edgar Hoover’s private files — containing, for starters, the scoop on JFK’s assassination — Mason just happens to have escaped from the “Rock.”
Meanwhile, FBI chemical-biological weapons expert Goodspeed (Nicolas Cage) narrowly avoids a horrible death on the job and learns his girlfriend (Vanessa Marcil) is pregnant and wants to get married. At least this story line is not dominated by aggressive military types and Cage is perfect as a relatively normal guy pushed reluctantly into the stupendous mayhem offered up regularly in this brawny slugfest.
The screenplay by David Weisberg and Douglas S. Cook (Holy Matrimony) and debut writer Mark Rosner is pulp fiction that requires the actors to shout a great deal, but the dialogue is decent given the rich tradition of adventure films. Bay’s fast-cutting style is not unpleasingly reminiscent of eye balling cinematic panels in a loud, widescreen comic book. What’s gained in momentum, however, comes at the expense of insightful characterizations.
A big five to production designer Michael White, cinematographer John Schwartzman, editor Richard Francis-Bruce, and the rest of the crew for creating the film’s rough and jagged milieu without the use of many computer-generated effects. — David Hunter, originally published on June 3, 1996.
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