The Rock (film)

The Rock
Film poster
Directed by	Michael Bay
Produced by	Don Simpson Jerry Bruckheimer
Screenplay by	David Weisberg Douglas S. Cook Mark Rosner
Story by	David Weisberg Douglas S. Cook
Starring	Sean Connery Nicolas Cage Ed Harris
Music by	Nick Glennie-Smith Hans Zimmer Harry Gregson-Williams
Cinematography	John Schwartzman
Editing by	Richard Francis-Bruce
Studio	Simpson/Bruckheimer
Distributed by	Hollywood Pictures
Release date(s)	June 7, 1996 (1996-06-07)
Running time	136 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$75 million
Box office	$335,062,621

The Rock is a 1996 action film that primarily takes place on Alcatraz Island and in the San Francisco Bay Area. It was directed by Michael Bay, director of Bad Boys, produced by Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer, producers of Top Gun and Crimson Tide, and stars Sean Connery, Nicolas Cage and Ed Harris. The film is dedicated to Simpson, who died five months before its release. This was the first film on which Cage and Bruckheimer worked together. The film received generally favorable reviews from critics.

Plot

A group of rogue U.S. Force Recon Marines led by disenchanted Brigadier General Frank Hummel (Ed Harris) seize a stockpile of deadly VX gas–armed rockets from a heavily guarded US Navy bunker, reluctantly leaving one of their men to die in the process, when a bead of the gas falls and breaks. The next day, Hummel and his men, along with more renegade Marines led by Captains Frye (Gregory Sporleder) and Darrow (Tony Todd), seize control of Alcatraz during a guided tour and take 81 tourists hostage in the prison cells. Hummel threatens to launch the stolen rockets against the population of San Francisco unless the government pays them $100 million from a military slush fund containing money from illegal arms sales, which he will distribute to his troops and the families of Recon Marines who died on clandestine missions under his command and whose deaths were not honored.

The Pentagon and FBI develop a plan to retake the island with a U.S. Navy SEAL team, enlisting the FBI's top chemical weapons specialist, Dr. Stanley Goodspeed (Nicolas Cage), who initially thinks he is to be consulting the team, but soon learns that he has to accompany the SEALs due to his specialisation in chemical warfare. Goodspeed's confidence, already shaky as he is a "lab rat" with minimal combat training and experience, is further tested when his fiancee Carla reveals that she is pregnant.

Recognizing that any surface approach will be seen by Hummel's men, FBI director James Womack (John Spencer) is forced to turn to federal prisoner John Mason (Sean Connery), a 60 year old British national who has been illegally detained for three decades by Womack and his predecessors for reasons which Womack refuses to specify. Mason's usefulness is due to him being the only Alcatraz inmate ever to successfully escape the island, doing so in 1963 through the prison's uncharted underground tunnels.

Although Goodspeed manages to convince Mason to cooperate with the FBI in return for a pardon from the Attorney General, Womack privately reneges on the deal. While in custody at a hotel, Mason takes Womack hostage and then flees. He steals a Hummer H1 and Goodspeed pursues in a commandeered Ferrari F355, resulting in a wild high speed chase through the streets. Mason seeks out his estranged daughter Jade (Claire Forlani), who is the only proof that he exists. Goodspeed soon arrives with a team to re-arrest Mason and reveals to Jade that he is aiding the FBI. Womack is adamant that Mason should only consult the SEALs, confiding to Special Agent Ernest Paxton (William Forsythe) that he does not want Mason loose. However, as Mason has committed his route through the tunnels to memory, Womack has no choice but to let him accompany the SEALs.

The team infiltrates Alcatraz through the underground tunnels with Mason's guidance. However, Hummel's Marines are alerted to their presence and ambush them in a shower room. SEAL Commander Anderson (Michael Biehn) refuses to surrender and Captains Frye and Darrow provoke a gunfight, in which all the SEALs are killed, leaving only Mason and Goodspeed alive. Mason sees his chance to escape custody and easily disarms Goodspeed. However, Goodspeed convinces him to help him defuse the rockets, since Mason's daughter is also at risk from them. Back on the mainland, Paxton demands to know exactly who Mason is. Womack finally reveals that Mason was a highly-trained British MI6 agent and SAS Captain who stole a microfilm containing details of the US's most closely guarded secrets, including the Roswell UFO incident and the John F. Kennedy assassination, refused to give it up when captured, and has thus been illegally held prisoner ever since.

Using Mason's knowledge of the prison and proficiency in combat, he and Goodspeed quietly eliminate several small teams of Marines and disable 12 of the 15 rockets. Hummel is so enraged that he threatens over the loudspeaker to execute a hostage if the remaining "Navy SEALs" do not surrender and return the guidance chips from the rockets. Mason surrenders to Hummel, trying to buy Goodspeed some time. Though Goodspeed disables another rocket, the Marines capture him shortly thereafter. With the incursion team lost, the military readies a backup plan: an air strike by F/A-18s with Thermite plasma, which will neutralize the poison gas but also kill everyone on the island including the hostages.

After Mason releases them both from their cells, he explains to Goodspeed why he was held prisoner for so many years and adds that he did not return the microfilm because he knew the FBI would "suicide" him if he did. While Goodspeed and Mason search for the final two rockets, Hummel fires one of them but changes the coordinates at the last moment, causing it to crash harmlessly out to sea. Facing Frye and Darrow's frustration, Hummel explains that their bluff failed and that he is unwilling to harm innocent civilians. He orders them to exit Alcatraz with a few hostages and the remaining VX rockets to cover their retreat, while he'll stay, personally assuming blame. Realizing that they will not be paid their $1 million apiece, Frye, Darrow and Sergeant Crisp (Bokeem Woodbine) mutiny against Hummel and his second-in-command, Major Tom Baxter (David Morse).

With Mason and Goodspeed watching from afar, Crisp attempts to secure Hummel on Darrow's orders, but Hummel draws his own gun and holds Crisp at gunpoint. Baxter also appears to side against Hummel but then fires at the three rogues. In the ensuing firefight, Crisp and Baxter are killed while Hummel is mortally wounded. Mason drags him away and with his last breath, Hummel tells Goodspeed the location of the last rocket. Darrow and Frye escape and proceed with the plan to fire on San Francisco. While Mason deals with the remaining Marines, Goodspeed seeks out the last rocket. As the jets approach, Darrow is killed when Goodspeed fires the last disarmed rocket into him and he is impaled on a fencepost. Goodspeed stows the last gas pearls from the warhead and takes a loose one, but is then attacked by Frye who begins to strangle Goodspeed to death. Goodspeed shoves the VX gas pearl into Frye's mouth, breaking the pearl and exposing both of them to the gas. Goodspeed injects himself in the heart with atropine as Frye dies from the VX gas. Goodspeed then lights green flares to signal that the threat is over, but only after one of the pilots fires, sending Goodspeed flying into the sea. The early detonation hits the back of the island and harms no one else.

Mason reappears to pull the unconscious Goodspeed to shore. When he recovers, Goodspeed tells Mason that Womack tore up his pardon and informs his superiors that Mason was killed. Goodspeed tells Mason to go to his hotel room, take a change of clothes and $200 he stashed and run. Mason thanks Goodspeed, and gives him a note that holds the location of where he had stashed the microfilm. Womack arrives wanting to see Mason's body, but Goodspeed says it was "vaporized" by the VX gas. Some time later, Goodspeed and Carla (Vanessa Marcil) visit Fort Walton, Kansas and recover the microfilm with a half-century of state secrets, including who actually killed John F. Kennedy.

Cast

Star Michael Biehn signing a copy of the film's DVD cover during an August 23, 2012 appearance at Midtown Comics in Manhattan.

• Sean Connery as Captain John Patrick Mason, SAS (retired)
• Nicolas Cage as Dr. Stanley Goodspeed, F.B.I. Special Agent
• Ed Harris as Brigadier General Francis X. (Frank) Hummel, USMC Force Recon
• John Spencer as F.B.I. Director James Womack
• William Forsythe as F.B.I. Special Agent Ernest Paxton
• David Morse as Major Tom Baxter, USMC Force Recon
• Michael Biehn as Commander Anderson, USN SEAL
• John C. McGinley as Captain Hendrix, USMC Force Recon
• Tony Todd as Captain Darrow, USMC Force Recon
• Gregory Sporleder as Captain Frye, USMC Force Recon
• Bokeem Woodbine as Gunnery Sergeant Crisp, USMC Force Recon
• Jim Maniaci as Private Scarpetti, USMC Force Recon
• Greg Collins as Private Gamble, USMC Force Recon
• Steve Harris as Private McCoy, USMC Force Recon
• Brendan Kelly as Private Cox, USMC Force Recon
• Danny Nucci as Lieutenant Shephard, USN SEAL
• Vanessa Marcil as Carla Pestalozzi
• Claire Forlani as Jade Angelou
• Anthony Clark as Paul, the hotel barber
• Todd Louiso as Marvin Isherwood
• Sam Whipple as Larry Henderson
• David Bowe as Dr. Ling
• John Laughlin as General Peterson
• Jim Caviezel as F/A-18 Pilot

Actors Xander Berkeley, Raymond Cruz, David Marshall Grant, Stuart Wilson, and Philip Baker Hall make uncredited appearances in the film. At one point Arnold Schwarzenegger was to have played the role of Dr. Stanley Goodspeed. Schwarzenegger turned the role down because he didn't like the script.

Box office

Produced at a budget of $75,000,000, the film was a smash hit, grossing a total of $134,069,511 domestically and $200,993,110 internationally, for a worldwide total of $335,062,621. Of the year 1996, it was the seventh highest home-grossing film in the U.S., and the fourth highest-grossing U.S. film worldwide.

Production

Quentin Tarantino was an uncredited screenwriter on The Rock. L.A.-based British screenwriting team Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais were brought in at Connery's request to rewrite his lines, but ended up altering much of the film's dialogue. It was Nicolas Cage's idea that his character would not swear; his euphemisms include "gee whiz." Bay had worked closely with Ed Harris to develop his character as concretely as possible, later adding a sympathetic edge to Hummel.

There were tensions during shooting between director Michael Bay and Walt Disney Studios executives who were supervising the production. On the commentary track for the Criterion Collection DVD, Bay recalls a time when he was preparing to leave the set for a meeting with the executives when he was approached by Sean Connery in golfing attire. Connery, who also produced the film, asked Bay where he was going, and when Bay explained he had a meeting with the executives, Connery asked if he could accompany him. Bay complied and when he arrived in the conference room, the executives' jaws dropped when they saw Connery appear behind him. According to Bay, Connery then stood up for Bay and insisted that he was doing a good job and should be left alone.^{[citation needed]}

The scene in which F.B.I. director Womack is thrown off the balcony was filmed on location at the Fairmont Hotel in San Francisco. The filming led to numerous calls to the hotel by people who saw a man dangling from the balcony.

In the scene in which Paxton demands to know from Womack who Mason is, Paxton utters, "I've heard all the cloak and dagger stories." This line was a direct reference to Forsythe's earlier film, Cloak & Dagger.

Censorship

In the original U.K. DVD release, the scene in which Connery throws a knife through a sentry's throat and says "you must never hesitate" to Cage was cut, although this scene was shown on British television. Consequently, a later scene in which Connery says to Cage, "I'm rather glad you didn't hesitate too long" lost its impact on viewers who had not seen the first scene. Other cuts included the reduction of multiple gunshot impacts into Gamble's feet in the morgue down to a single hit; a close-up of his screaming face as the air conditioner falls onto him; a sound cut to Mason snapping a Marine's neck and two bloody gunshot wounds (to Hummel and Baxter), both near the end of the film.

When the film premiered on German television (RTL), it was shown in two versions: the first version (starting at 8:15 pm) had most of its violence and gore cut, going so far as to suggest that some of the terrorists survived. The second version started at 1 am, and left all scenes intact. This scheme was repeated for the second viewing.

The film also received some censorship of profanity in its Asian releases (except Japan); the terms "fuck" and "Goddamn" are normally omitted or substituted. For instance, whenever Star Movies (a popular Asian film channel) plays the film, Connery's line in which he says to Cage "winners go home and fuck the prom queen" is replaced with "winners go home and date the prom queen", while in another scene where Connery's character is described as a "son of a bitch" the line is replaced with "son of a Brit" in the censored cut.

Awards and recognition

The Rock won a number of minor awards, including 'Best On-Screen Duo' for Connery and Cage at the MTV Movie Awards. It was also nominated for the Academy Award for Best Sound Mixing (Kevin O'Connell, Greg P. Russell and Keith A. Wester). It currently holds a "fresh" rating (67%) on Rotten Tomatoes based on 48 reviews, making it Michael Bay's highest rated film and his only film labeled as "fresh".

The film was selected for a limited edition DVD release by the Criterion Collection, a distributor of primarily arthouse films it categorizes as "important classic and contemporary films" and "cinema at its finest". In an essay supporting the selection of The Rock, Roger Ebert, who was strongly critical of most of Bay's later films, gave the film a 3 1/2 out of four stars, calling it "an action picture that rises to the top of the genre because of a literate, witty screenplay and skilled craftsmanship in the direction and special effects."

External links

• The Rock at the Internet Movie Database
• The Rock at AllRovi
• The Rock at Box Office Mojo
• The Rock at Rotten Tomatoes
• The Rock at Metacritic