This film is dedicated in loving memory to Don Simpson -- the last in his line of collaborations with co-producer Jerry Bruckheimer (Top Gun, Days of Thunder, Crimson Tide, Bad Boys, et al.) before his drug-related demise. A fitting monument, it goes about as far as a narrative film can go toward a feature-length music video: smoke, colored lights, slow-motion, throbbing soundtrack, the works. The narrative itself, something to do with a rogue commando team armed with poison-gas missiles who seize Alcatraz in an effort to extort proper military honors and benefits for fallen covert-op troops ("This isn't about terrorism, it's about justice"), becomes a virtual anthology of action plots: Crimson Tide plus Outbreak plus Die Hard plus Die Hard with a Vengeance plus plus plus. The most interesting aspect is the appeal for sympathy on both sides. The first fatality, or first rash of fatalities, changes that, though it doesn't change the amiability of Nicolas Cage and Sean Connery. Cage, as an FBI chemical-weapons expert, has a funny way with a line like "Yeah, okay, that's just about the most awful thing I've ever seen," and Connery seems to be enjoying a small joke on his old Bond persona: his one-time British spy was imprisoned at Alcatraz in 1962 (year of the first Bond film, Dr. No) for making off with J. Edgar Hoover's secret files on the alien landing at Roswell, the assassination of JFK (which didn't occur until the next year, but never mind), etc. With Ed Harris, William Forsythe, Michael Biehn; directed by Michael Bay. (1996) — Duncan Shepherd
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