Flight of the Intruder (1991)

Directed by John Milius. Starring Brad Johnson, Willem Dafoe, Danny Glover, Tom Sizemore, Jared Chandler, Rosanna Arquette, Ving Rhames, J. Kenneth Campbell, Fred Dalton Thompson, Madison Mason. [PG-13]

Late in the Vietnam War, an A-6 Intruder pilot (Johnson) convinces a veteran bombardier (Dafoe) to join him on an unsanctioned mission over Hanoi to take out a surface-to-air missile depot. Pedestrian war film with thin characterizations and a cliché-riddled script (there’s even time to squeeze in a barroom brawl) adapted from a novel by former naval pilot Stephen Coonts. Serviceable aerial action photography, but the visual effects are often awful; less likely to elevate the pulse than make the viewer wish they were watching an equally dumb but far more watchable air combat picture (Top Gun, Memphis Belle, etc., take your pick). Charisma-deprived leading man Johnson (think: a bland Tom Berenger) is a wash-out, Glover can’t settle on a tone for his skipper character, Arquette is wasted in a superfluous romance sub-plot that (graciously) gets hardly any screen time; only a surprisingly understated Dafoe comes close to creating an interesting character. A Vietnam War movie made with the complete cooperation of the US Navy; that should be all the warning that’s needed. Released the day after the combat phase of Operation Desert Storm began—talk about poor timing.

35/100