Top Gun: Maverick

Leave it to Tom Cruise to always gift us the best of the best breed of action films of any generation! From the classic techno score including trickles of ‘Danger Zone’ accompanying the title credits and the excerpt explaining what Top Gun actually is just like in the Tony Scott’s original, you can’t help but feel you’ve been teleported into the nineties. Pete ‘Maverick’ Mitchell (Tom Cruise) is summoned back to the Top Gun academy to coach a group of elite students before they undergo a life-threatening, near-impossible mission. Not only is this his final chance at a instinct-following-rules-breaking life, he has to come into terms with the death of his friend Goose (Anthony Edwards) nearly four decades later by finally confronting the son, Rooster (Miles Teller).

Just like in the 1986 flick, the dogfight geography and perspectives in the sky start off problematic / unclear at first, but quickly dissipates away before you know it! Once you are in the action, you become part of the ride, which is even more impressive knowing the actors themselves have undergone extensive fighter jet training alongside Tom Cruise including ways to handle their respective cockpit cameras! The final mission, vivid with its objectives, strategy and ‘miracles’, allows us the regular viewers to tag along the quest and genuinely feel the heightened tension without too many jargons preventing us from doing so. From the chopper attack on Mav, enemy plane theft, dogfight finale that mirrors Mav’s and Goose’s last moments together to the surprise fighter ambush before Mav’s plane is halted with a net and wrapped in a neat little bow by Lady Gaga’s ‘Hold My Hand’, Top Gun: Maverick has one hell of a seat-clenching climax! The 2:15 target, Coyote going unconscious, Mach 10 trial and the push beyond it are great intense sequences too!

Amidst the larger-than-life stuff the show has, it is the simple, day-to-day relatable human interactions between the characters that keeps the movie grounded and gives it its heart! This could primarily be seen through the underplayed relationship between Pete and Penny (Jennifer Connelly). Their short-and-sweet boat lesson, bar encounter, bar elimination and Penny leaving the door open as an invitation to enter her are the easy examples. Pete being spotted by the daughter after this is hilarious as well! Altercation and argument between Hangman (Glen Powell) and Rooster, or the ones Maverick has with Rooster are equally good. Beach football to understand the spirit of being in a team and to see Iceman or rather the actor Val Kilmer again after so long cools your heart for sure!

Claudio Miranda’s cinematography is posh, providing some of the most beautiful perspectives as sharp angles! The way he has filmed the scale of the terrains, the landscapes and the vistas across the sky simply tells us how tailor-made Top Gun: Maverick is as a big-screen spectacle! Film editing for the majority of the picture is smooth and seamless, which heavily suggests Eddie Hamilton is an editor with immensely accurate sense of timing! He knows how to deliver the flight training sessions and the lessons learnt from it in one back-to-back package which makes the presentation smoother and faster! Most of the dialogues are strong and punchy, and with the slight hint given in the beginning by Ed Harris’ ‘Hammer’ that they do not need pilots anymore in this day and age, we are excited to see the future of this franchise!