Peligro inminente

I don't know of anybody who doesn't like this movie, Clear and Present Danger. There was a funny cartoon I once read called Clear and Present Dangerfield which showed Rodney Dangerfield saying "I get no respect from these terrorists!" Very funny. The movie has some cheesy moments and some patriotic moments John Wayne would be proud of. The book and movie are different but the book, like most of Tom Clancy's books are so long that it's not possible to make it into an alike movie. So therefore the movie is focused on the parts with Jack Ryan and the other characters are hardly in it. Henry Czerny comes across as the top supporting actor in it and earned some roles from his solid underrated performance. Donald Moffat plays a two-faced president better than any actor who would have otherwise played him as a straight up mean dictator. Like in the book, the President has no name, he simply goes by the name the President of the United States of America. Philip Noyce does his job well at directing this picture. And of course this is one of Harrison Ford's last great roles since he did a Tom Hanks and has been desperate for an Oscar ever since. Overall, it's a great movie for anyone to enjoy.

To say you dislike a film like Clear and Present Danger because it lacks substance is like saying you don't like The Lion king because it has Lions in it . It's a Tom Clancy novel and that's what you should expect from something he wrote , so just sit back and enjoys and that's exactly what I did .

Harrison Ford plays CIA Analyst Jack Ryan who is drawn into an illegal war fought by the US government against a Colombian drug cartel.

Despite its many faults , I enjoyed this film . It's ram packed full of action , including massive explosions and a death toll that would rival a small war . Harrison for does what Harrison for does well . He pulls faces to suit the scene without breaking much of a sweat and that's what the public likes about him in the eighties and nineties and still do to a certain extent .

It has dated quite badly . The IT is hilarious and the fashions are a little cringeworthy but I have to say I had a fun two hours watching this .

Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan has had an odd time at the movies. So far 3 actors and as many directors have had a go at him, with varying degrees of success. Hunt for Red October might come up in conversations more often, but it's hard to get past the silliness of Sean Connery pretending to be Russian (and speaking worse Russian than Baldwin's American character).

Clear and Present Danger is where your money belongs. One of Clancy's best Ryan efforts in print, this massive door-stop of a book was condensed by veteran scribes Steven Zallian and John Milius - how's that for a screen writing combo? - into a script that retains a lot of the original's moral complexity while making smart concessions to the blockbuster format. For a blockbuster is what you have before you, and one of the smartest ones out there, where art and commerce were combined in perfect harmony.

As Ryan 2.0, Harrison Ford is perfect in the lead, and it's hard to believe at times, that Clancy didn't have him in mind when creating the character. With a narrative this fragmented, it is essential that the supporting roles be pitch perfect and across the board everyone does first-rate work, with special mention to Willem Dafoe as John Clarke and Donald Moffat at a devious commander in chief.

Philip Noyce builds on his Ryan-debut Patriot Games and shows he is equally at ease with the quiet parts and the loud ones, particularly an RPG-powered car ambush centerpiece. The action beats are used sparingly but with brilliant precision.

All in all, this is smart, tight, believable and expertly executed. It is that rare brainy "action" film that will involve you and have you hanging on the edge of your seat.

The makers of this movie are to be congratulated for turning a Tom Clancy doorstop into a tense, tightly woven international thriller with a top notch cast and believeable plot. Where the previous two Jack Ryan movies depended on stunts and quite unbelieveable plot twists this film concentrates on a grubby little military/political incident (more the domain of intelligence men) and the men of honour and integrity (Ford and an under used Dafoe) trapped in the middle of it.

I also like this movie for its subtle dig at the American establishment and how it assumes it can coerce the weak into doing its bidding.

The Clark character in Clancy's fiction is an interesting one and deserves to be further developed. Casting Willem Dafoe in the part was actually a stroke of genius, and I could easily imagine his character in Platoon doing this kind of work if he had survived Vietnam. The fact that Dafoe is one of THE most underrated actors in Hollywood also means I like this.

The third outing for Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan - and the second with Harrison Ford in the lead - is a tightly constructed political thriller. Condensing Clancy's door stoppers is no easy task, but the makers here, headed by director Phillip Noyce, have manged to keep the pic brisk and intelligent for entertainment worth.

Plot essentially boils down to America's war on drugs and the Colombian cartel at the helm of such operations. Naturally all is a bit suspect in the American corridors of power, leading to corruption and abuse of power that puts Jack Ryan firmly at the front to sift and destroy the bad eggs staining the American Star Spangled Banner.

This very much plays out for those who like a bit of politico subterfuge, whist being ok with long passages of like minded chatter is also a requisite. That we have a fine cast playing out the screenplay (Donald E. Stewart, Steven Zaillian and John Milius) is a big plus that gives credibility to the shifty machinations.

There's a nagging annoyance throughout that this still should be a better film, especially given the overstretched run time of 2 hours 20 minutes, and the computer sections are dubious and the finale is something of a damp squib. However, we are in the company of great pros, both in front of and behind the camera - and also on the page (Clancy's brain superlative). With that in mind it's reasons to seek this out and enjoy if this splinter of political thriller is your bag. 7/10