With Harrison Ford out, it was decided the Jack Ryan series, which had so far proved very profitable at the box office, was to be rebooted, with Ben Affleck taking over. While the film was a financial success, it proved to be far less successful than the previous films, and it's telling that 11 years later, they're attempting another reboot of the series.
Affleck is likable, but he doesn't have anything close to the presence Alec and Harrison had. He is far outclassed by costars such as Morgan Freeman, Alan Bates, James Cromwell, and taking over from Willem Dafoe, Liev Schreiber as John Clark. It's interesting to note how Clark is introduced, a lone mysterious figure standing in the rain - it's fair to assume Clark, a regular and very popular character in the Ryan books, was to appear in further movies.
To accommodate Ben as Jack, the book has undergone an extensive change, with Jack now a young rookie analyst, yet to be married to Cathy. While the simple premise remains the same - terrorists build nuclear device from Israeli weapon left over from Yom Kippur War and use it to provoke nuclear war between US and Russia, Jack is forced to end the crisis himself by going directly to the Hot Line - one can't help feeling extremely cynical about the change of villains. In the book, the main villains are Palestinians, helped by a former left-wing German terrorist, and an American Indian extremist. In the film we get....neo-Nazis. As good as Alan Bates is as the megalomaniacal fascist Austrian politician, it is difficult to take seriously the scenario.
In fact, the film's biggest problem is this - they are trying to present it as a more-realistic-than-usual thriller, yet at the same time, the film has cartoonish villains, and there are a great number of moments that take us out of realism and into pure fantasy.
As problem-riddled as the film is, one area it does not fail at is entertaining the viewer. If one distances themselves from the previous films, the books, it is still a pretty good thriller that always keeps your attention glued to the screen. It's pace goes along at a fair clip, and there are some standout sequences. The best sequence is obviously when the nuke goes off. No last minute stopping the bomb here, it does indeed go off, and it marks the point where the film changes direction, presenting us with an intense doomsday scenario that keeps worsening by the minute.
Deeply flawed, but satisfying entertainment.
Affleck is likable, but he doesn't have anything close to the presence Alec and Harrison had. He is far outclassed by costars such as Morgan Freeman, Alan Bates, James Cromwell, and taking over from Willem Dafoe, Liev Schreiber as John Clark. It's interesting to note how Clark is introduced, a lone mysterious figure standing in the rain - it's fair to assume Clark, a regular and very popular character in the Ryan books, was to appear in further movies.
To accommodate Ben as Jack, the book has undergone an extensive change, with Jack now a young rookie analyst, yet to be married to Cathy. While the simple premise remains the same - terrorists build nuclear device from Israeli weapon left over from Yom Kippur War and use it to provoke nuclear war between US and Russia, Jack is forced to end the crisis himself by going directly to the Hot Line - one can't help feeling extremely cynical about the change of villains. In the book, the main villains are Palestinians, helped by a former left-wing German terrorist, and an American Indian extremist. In the film we get....neo-Nazis. As good as Alan Bates is as the megalomaniacal fascist Austrian politician, it is difficult to take seriously the scenario.
In fact, the film's biggest problem is this - they are trying to present it as a more-realistic-than-usual thriller, yet at the same time, the film has cartoonish villains, and there are a great number of moments that take us out of realism and into pure fantasy.
As problem-riddled as the film is, one area it does not fail at is entertaining the viewer. If one distances themselves from the previous films, the books, it is still a pretty good thriller that always keeps your attention glued to the screen. It's pace goes along at a fair clip, and there are some standout sequences. The best sequence is obviously when the nuke goes off. No last minute stopping the bomb here, it does indeed go off, and it marks the point where the film changes direction, presenting us with an intense doomsday scenario that keeps worsening by the minute.
Deeply flawed, but satisfying entertainment.