Film Critique: STEALTH
Cheri Adams
ENG225
Instructor: Matthew Norsworthy
May 15, 2011

Film Critique: Stealth Stealth was made in 2005 and is presented by Columbia Pictures, directed by Rob Cohen, Produced by Mike Medavoy. The Executive Producer was Arnold Messer. The movie starts out with wording and music, similar to Star Wars, giving the prologue of the movie. I feel that the Director’s vision is that he is trying to warn us about what the future is capable of happening, if we put “brains” in computers. In this thesis I will be telling you about the movie so you will be able to understand what is happening. I will also be telling you who is in the movie and what their roles are, the style and directing of the movie. I will also Critique the film regarding the flaws that was done, the editing to the style and the acting. The Original music was done by BT. Music plays throughout the movie; the colors are neutral at the beginning of the movie with certain key items showing full color, in one scene a United States flag is flying on a building. Dean Semler does the Cinematography’s work. His work includes Secretariat (2010) and Mad Max: Fury Road (pre-production) (2012). Stephen Rivhin did the film editing. His most recent work was Avatar (2009), Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End (2007) and Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest (2006). Making a movie is a genuinely collaborative effort. Large films employ literally hundreds of people who work together to create the finished product. Yet as with any endeavor that enlists the labor of so many people, there must be one person with the power and the overall vision to make sure that all the pieces come together as they should (Goodykoontz & Jacobs, 2011). Rob Cohen has also directed XXX (2002) and the Fast and the Furious (2001), he was also producer of XXX: State of the Union (2005) and The Last Ride (2004). He is known for directing high-energy action films. Mike Medavoy has also produced Black Swan (2010), Shutter Island (2010) Zodiac (2007) and The 6th Day (2000) (Sony Pictures Digital Inc., 2007). Rob Cohen likes to direct Action movies, but he will not do sequels. He told the actor’s his point of view concerning what he wanted then he told the actor’s to go for it. The main actors are Josh Lucas, Jessica Biel and Jamie Foxx. The story is of the three best pilots, of 400 tested, was trained to operate the super Stealth warplane to fight the enemy whoever or wherever they are in the world. Then they are sent to a ship, the USS Abraham Lincoln, to meet their new member of the team, a state-of-the-art, fully automated, pilotless, super stealth warplane – inhuman and invincible, is called EDI – Extreme Deep Invader (Columbia Pictures Industries Inc., 2005). The plot of the movie is in chronological order and takes place mainly in the air while in the stealth planes. U.S. Navy pilots Ben Gannon (Josh Lucas), Henry Purcell (Jamie Foxx), and Kara Wade (Jessica Biel) are the best of the best. Captain George Cummings (Sam Shepard) chose them out of 400 pilots to fly the next generation of stealth fighter jets called Talons. After their flight training in the Talons, they have become a cohesive unit and a highly efficient fighting team. Captain Cummings adds a new "wingman" to the team, an Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicle (UCAV) that is being flown by "EDI", a computer with an artificial intelligence brain mounted in a ball inside the cockpit. On their first mission, EDI begins to learn the skills and attitudes of the other pilots, and quickly understands that he can fly the plane better and faster than men. EDI has the capability to process data faster, and under extreme speeds will not blackout. Returning to the aircraft carrier, EDI is struck by lightning, which begins to change the computer's circuits. On the next flight, EDI refuses to scrub a mission despite the potential for massive civilian casualties. Upon return to base, Ben implores Captain Cummings to remove EDI from duty for further testing; Cummings ignores Ben's objections, and EDI's computer tech (who was beginning to suspect EDI was going rogue) is mysteriously replaced by much more docile techs. EDI begins to think for itself, and assigns itself a mission to take out a radical element in China. EDI cuts his link with the flight controller on the carrier, and he will not take a direct order from Ben. Henry locates and chases EDI, and gives it an ultimatum: return to base, or he will take it out. EDI declines to return to base. Henry fires his missiles, misses EDI, and is him self killed by the explosions. There are a lot of criticisms regarding this scene. “This is a film so deeply wedded to cliché that it kills off its leading black character simply to give the white male lead a free shot at the female lead. It even establishes Jaime Foxx's character beforehand as a stud and yet has him express no interest in the gorgeous female pilot played by Jessica Biel.” (IMDb, 2011b) According to Jamie Foxx “We actually shot - movies come out [out of sequence].” Back on the carrier, Captain Cummings, is in cahoots with his political advisor, decides to destroy EDI, the pilots, and Dr. Orbit, the creator of the plane's AI, to cover up the fiasco. Kara's plane was damaged in the explosion, and she must return to the carrier; en route, her engines fail, she ejects and is injured on her descent, crashing in North Korea. Pursued by N. Korean soldiers, Kara struggles toward the S. Korean border, which is an ally. Meanwhile, Ben chases EDI and manages to talk it back under control. Cummings tells Ben to head to a remote Alaskan base "not on any map" for repairs, EDI in tow. He comes in hot and survives a crash landing. Cummings has had Dr. Orbit brought there, and orders him to wipe EDI's memory. The base personnel turn out to be under Cumming's thumb. Ben survives an attempt on his life by the "medic" tending his injuries, makes his way to the hangar, and in a blaze of gunfire, stops the EDI memory-wipe. He goes inside EDI, blows open the hangar doors with a missile, and flies off in EDI to rescue Kara while Dr. Orbit also escapes. The explosives that it took to blow this up took over 500 gallons of gasoline in an Alaska airfield. NASA had to be notified of it in advance because it was so big. (Columbia Pictures Industries Inc., 2005) Kara has made it to no-man's land on the Korean border, but it looks like her luck has run out as she is pinned down by enemy fire. Ben and EDI arrive just in time; Ben exits EDI to kiss Kara; EDI, out of missiles, launches itself into a North Korean helicopter gunship to save the lovers, and they make their way to safety. The message that I believe that this movie is trying to send is that the near future, there’s a faction in the Navy that’s pushing for an entire Artificial Intelligence Air Force. That it is more cost-effective, it doesn’t take seven years to train, and they think that it goes down more easily – a bunch of smashed-up plane parts don’t have the same heart tug as body bags. What the military is doing is that this is their job and that’s what this movie says. The Clip that I chose to describe for the lighting was “Lightning Strike” (2011). This is shown when lightning strikes EDI and Ben’s plane. This is happening when there is a storm all around Ben’s and EDI’s plane, they are trying to land the planes on the Ship. It is dark for the most part except when they made certain colors stand out. There were both long shots and medium shots. I would classify this film as a Fast-Action Thriller. Because of the fast flying and fast action fighting. It does not fit any of the genres from the book but if there were a fast action genre then this would be in that genre. The movie company does classify this film as in the Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi & Thriller Genre. The protagonists are the three human pilots and the antagonist is the EDI. (About.com, 2011) The satire throughout the film is military uniform; in some of the short scenes they are wearing civilian clothes. The sound that you hear in this clip is: thunder, dialogue, lightning striking the plane and the sound of going through the circuit boards of the UCAV’s brain, music is playing in the background and the screeching of the tires on the plane as it hits the deck of the ship. You can hear Ben talking to the guy on the Ship and the men as they are putting the net up for the UCAV to land. I thought that during one scene of the movie they are flying so close (15 feet in altitude to be precise) to the rice patties and water at very high speeds. The force of the air being compressed under the jet would have made some major disturbances in the water and yet nothing happened. A few seconds later, they flew a building and ripped the roof tiles off. I would classify this as a big goof. Another goof would be when they are fighting the Russians fighter jet, they could not get away from it. How is that possible when they were earlier going to Mach 5 speed? Why couldn’t they just go into to Mach speed and get away from them? Roger Ebert said, “The pilot ejects. The plane explodes, and flaming debris falls out of the sky and threatens to hit the pilot and the parachute. If the plane is going at Mach 1, 2 or 3, wouldn't the debris be falling miles away from the descent path of the pilot?” (Ebert, R., 2005) When the Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicle is first taken for a test run, Lt. Ben Gannon is heard to say “Let the schoolin’ begin!” right before the fighters break formation, yet on the screens in the command center showing the facial shots of each pilot you can clearly see his mouth is not moving. During the scene in which the plane flies directly toward the ground at a speed of 2070 knots to deliver the bomb, after dropping the bomb and pulling up to fly horizontally through the city streets, there is no damage or anything created from a sonic boom. At that level and speed, the sonic boom would have been tremendous on the ground, even if the plane were designed to minimize the shock wave. The critic’s reviews were severely critical. In the Yahoo Movie critic’s review they gave the movie an average grade of a D+. 'Stealth' has got the right stuff -- guns, guts and good looks. But instead of flying high, it sputters to get off the ground. The only highlight is a backstabbing computer named Eddie. July 29, 2005 By Mick LaSalle, Chronicle Movie Critic. Chris Barsanti of filmcritic.com states,” Almost apocalyptic in its stupidity, Stealth would have us believe that Navy fighter pilots can rampage through foreign countries destroying enemy combatants at will, with nary a repercussion to show for it. By the end of this film, the principals have been responsible for such a wide swath of destruction that even the densest of viewers is quite aware that the United States would have been at war with Myanmar, Tajikistan, Russia, and North Korea.” (Yahoo.com, 2011) Josh Lucas said, “You’ve got to remember, too, this movie - there is a chemistry that happens in this movie which is really created by the director in the sense that we’re all working on different sound stages at the same time. We’re not together. It looks like we’re together, but there are three planes on three different sound stages and they’re all being videoed in the same way, so it looks like we’re working. But really everyone’s half a mile apart. It was difficult.” (Columbia Pictures Industries Inc., 2005) What did the actor’s bring to the character? Jamie Foxx brought humor to his character. Jessica Biel, brought her sexiness and strong attitude. According to Jessica Biel “ This character is definitely me” (IMDb, 2011b). Josh Lucas brought his seriousness and knowledge. Josh Lucas went to Flight survival training school to really get into his character (IMDb, 2011b). Rob Cohen told the Actor’s “Here’s your character, here are some things that you may be able to enhance it. Make it different, use your talent and idea and come with your thing”. This was definitely not these actor’s best movie they have ever been in. For Josh Lucas, his best movie was “A Beautiful Mind”. For Jessica Biel it was “I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry” and for Jamie Foxx it was “Rio”. Rob Cohen’s best movie he ever made was “Fast and the Furious”. (IMDb, 2011a) This film cost $138 million to make, but was panned by the critics. It was the biggest Box Office bomb making only $76,932,872 worldwide, of which $44,816,126 was of foreign, one of the biggest losses in cinematic history. This film only ran 5 weeks before it was taken out of the Theaters. (IMDb, 2011b) For most of the flight scenes, the artists at Digital Domain used "EnGen" (Environment Generator) to create the virtual landscapes, also used on The Time Machine (2002) & Star Trek: Nemesis (2002). An earlier version of the program, called "Terragen", is on-line available for free. (IMDb, 2011b) In conclusion, Stealth is not talking about politics; it just questions the how, the why and the use of technology. This film had its flaws but it also had some interesting things that make you think about what could happen if machines did have a brain. If you did not have any knowledge of planes or ships you most likely would not notice the mistakes that was made. I actually thought that this movie was good. I heard/read some reviews before seeing this movie, and most of them gave it a bad critique, but I usually find myself disagreeing with most critics out there so I saw it. The action/special effects were really good if you don’t know what you are looking at. The story line may be unbelievable, but that is what fiction is for. I doubt that something like this will happen in real life (I'm referring to the Navy’s lack of regard for collateral damage in this movie). Over all, I'm glad I got to see this on the big screen and again on video and viewed all the effects there. Sometimes you just got to let loose and enjoy the show and not over analyze movies, otherwise it looses its entertainment value.

References
About.com Lightning Strike (2011) Retrieved from http://movies.about.com/od/stealth/a/stealth022205.htm
Box Office Mojo, IMDb Company (2011a) Retrieved from http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?page=main&id=stealth.htm
Columbia Pictures Industries Inc. Retrieved from DVD Case (2005)
Ebert, R. (July 28, 2005) Retrieved from http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050727/REVIEWS/50713001/1023
Goodykoontz, B., & Jacobs, C. P. (2011). Film: From Watching to Seeing. San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education, Inc. Retrieved from https://content.ashford.edu
IMDb.Company (2011b) Lightning Strike Retrieved from http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0382992
Sony Pictures Digital Inc. (2007) Retrieved from http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/sony_pictures/stealth/high.html Yahoo Movies (2011) Retrieved from http://movies.yahoo.com/movie/1808589476/critic