Top Gun

(Paramount Home Entertainment, 12.14.2004)

Love it or hate it (I love it and hate it), Top Gun is one of the most legendary films of the 80s. With its alarmingly modest aspirations and now trademark, blockbuster visual style -- every Bruckheimer director, from Michael Bay to Antoine Fuqua, has imitated it -- Top Gun set the standard for decades of unwatchable action films. But it's really not that bad. Removed from its time, the film's flag-waving love affair with the American military is as goofy and innocent as any Hollywood concoction from the 30s or 40s. Today, the sting of its conservative leanings is completely lost and all that remains is the over-the-top machismo and hilarious screen presence of Tom Cruise and his onscreen nemesis, Val Kilmer.

The first disc of this extensive new DVD features an appropriately glossy transfer and a commentary with director Tony Scott, producer Jerry Bruckheimer, co-screenwriter Jack Epps Jr., and various naval experts. There are revelations throughout: Tony Scott was fired from the film three times for being too "art-house" (he was initially hoping to make "Apocalypse Now on an aircraft carrier"), it cost only $16 million, and Kelly McGillis was only cast because Scott enjoyed her topless scene in Witness. Unfortunately, the commentary is a little too heavy on military advisors and is likely to interest fans of the Navy more than fans of the movie.

The real attraction is "Danger Zone: The Making of Top Gun," a 6-part documentary of comically epic proportions (included on disc 2). At 2 hours and 27 minutes, "Danger Zone" is significantly longer than the film itself and, as you'd expect, no stone is left un-turned (in fact, some stones are turned more than once).

While some of the content from the commentary is repeated, this documentary is filled with interesting tidbits of its own: Bruckheimer pitched the film as "Star Wars on Earth," Don Simpson called it "the greatest script I've ever read" (with his track-record, that's not necessarily a good thing), Cruise and Kilmer clashed off-screen (Kilmer was the method-acting instigator), and the film's homo-erotic aesthetic was actually inspired by the homo-erotic photography of Bruce Weber. So it wasn't an accident, after all.

The documentary gets lost when the special effects guys start rambling and, like the commentary, it's a little too heavy on military blabbering but, overall, this is an enlightening and in-depth overview of a decidedly no-depth movie.

The second disc also includes "Multi-Angle Storyboards" which allow you to compare storyboards (for 2 key scenes) to the finished film, while listening to Tony Scott bad-mouth his crew.

Finally, both discs include "Vintage Galleries" which feature all kind of dated material from the 80s: 4 music videos (including Kenny Loggins, looking dangerously like Ringo Starr), 7 TV spots, production photographs, 6 minutes of interviews with a child-like Tom Cruise, and 2 featurettes which include the late Don Simpson (who denies, in advance, that Top Gun is political).

While the merits of Top Gun may not be obvious, anyone who sees them should definitely buy this disc. -- Jonathan Doyle