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As the film begins, it may be the darkest hours of the '73 Arab-Israeli War. Israel sends aloft a single A-4 carrying a small fission bomb, a weapon at the ready to be used as a last resort. The aircraft is shot down, its nuclear payload buried in the sand and invisible to the eye. It would be several decades before the weapon is found. When a Bedouin stumbles upon the bomb, he has no idea what he's discovered. He recovers it in the dead of night and sells it to an unscrupulous arms dealer. The dealer, in turn, sells it to a fanatical organization that believes its goals would be achieved by provoking a mutually destructive war between America and Russia. This strategy becomes all the more timely when the Russian president dies and is replaced by someone the American administration believes to be a hard- liner and militarist, President Alexander Nemerov (Ciaran Hinds).

When the new Russian president is sworn in, the Senate Intelligence Committee wants to know more about him. By no small coincidence, Jack Ryan (Ben Affleck) had written a paper on Nemerov the year before, even predicting his ascension. So CIA DCI William Cabot (Morgan Freeman) calls on Ryan for informed advice. Cabot may have a highly placed contact within the Kremlin, but he wisely seeks information from multiple sources. This sets up Ryan's involvement in what will develop into a doomsday scenario. We follow the film's several simultaneous threads as they converge. Ryan is in the early stages of a relationship with Dr. Cathy Muller (Bridget Moynahan). A START Treaty inspection reveals that three Russian nuclear scientists have gone missing, provoking a CIA excursion that involves unleashing a skillful and lethal agent named John Clark (Liev Schreiber). We follow the fission bomb as it changes hands to be restored to functionality and to be transformed into another form. And we watch the moneyed terrorists pulling strings from remote safety.

As anyone who's seen any of the film's trailers or teasers already knows, the fission device detonates on American soil. This occurs much earlier in the film than I expected. The remainder of the action is dedicated to the escalation of the confrontation between the two nuclear powers and Ryan's efforts to break through the red tape and bureaucracy that stand in the way of the truth. High overhead, flying in a Boeing 747 airborne command center, President Robert Fowler (James Cromwell), Defense Secretary Becker (Philip Baker Hall), Secretary of State Sidney Owens (Ron Rifkin), and National Security Advisor Revell (Bruce McGill) argue whether or not to launch a nuclear attack against Russia. Ryan desperately struggles to convey the bomb's origin and the probable identities of those responsible before missiles fly and Armageddon becomes unavoidable.

Harrison Ford had taken over the Jack Ryan franchise from Alec Baldwin and made two successful films, but after participating in the script phase for this project, both Ford and director Phillip Noyce dropped out. Producer Mace Neufeld had a problem and the solution seemed to be - please excuse the use of the overused word - reimagining the Jack Ryan character. Ryan would now be portrayed as a much younger, more inexperienced CIA analyst, just starting his career in the agency. Yet, the events would be set in modern times, not steeped in the turmoil of the Cold War. Ben Affleck would be the bankable star. There was considerable skepticism when his casting was announced, but as the movie-going public would soon discover, this was the successful start of a new franchise.

Director Phil Alden Robinson does a splendid job of bringing this difficult material to the screen, keeping us slightly off-balance by inserting humor early in the film. He does not pander to the audience. His approach for eliciting a response from us during the nuclear blast is to invest the time to focus on ordinary people during a seemingly unconnected event and avoiding the obvious incineration. Subtle and effective. The plot is more involving and tense than either Patriot Games or Clear and Present Danger, despite my admiration of Harrison Ford. Ben Affleck conveys just the right balance of naivete and grit. The fine supporting cast is consistently outstanding, particularly the always believable Morgan Freeman. But I can't help share that a fundamental premise left me distracted throughout. The Israelis are exceptionally tenacious. I simply cannot accept the notion that they wouldn't have exhausted every possible resource to recover a lost nuclear bomb rather than risk it falling into the hands of one of their enemies. I have little doubt that the bomb would have been found and recovered.

Video: How Does The Disc Look?

The film's theatrical aspect ratio of 2.35:1 is presented in anamorphic video. This is a fine transfer, with rare halos and a fine level of small object detail. Textures are ever so slightly degraded by a modest softness. The transfer is a tad dark, with moderate shadow detail. Colors are vivid and noise free. I noticed no mosquito noise or blocking artifacts. This DVD offers a film-like presentation that I'm sure you'll find very pleasing.

Audio: How Does The Disc Sound?

The Dolby Digital 5.1 track is outstanding. The surrounds are quite active throughout, particularly during the many action set-pieces. Aircraft, masses of people in a football stadium, air combat, all are spread sonically around the room. Solid bass, particularly during the film's many explosions, will require a superior subwoofer to take full advantage of the audio material. Sound effects are clean, dynamic, and distortion free. Jerry Goldsmith's thoughtful score, far less bombastic than might be expected in an action-adventure flick, is presented across a broad soundstage with great authority. The dialog remains clear throughout, even when mixed with music and sound effects. Nicely done.

Paramount has also included two Dolby Surround 2.0 tracks, one in English and one in French. The audio is supported by English subtitles and Closed Captions.

Supplements: What Goodies Are There?

There is a surprisingly generous array of extras on this disc. There are no less than seven featurettes, all of which are presented in anamorphic video. The quality is a tad soft, but I applaud their being anamorphic, avoiding the need to change display modes. The shorts are divided into two sections: A Cautionary Tale and Visual Effects. Within the fist section we have Casting (12:56) and Production (17:00). Each has the players and the filmmakers offer their observations about the background of the show, the nature of the story and characters, and the shoot. More than fluff pieces, there's interesting material here, from anecdotes from the set to how the plot evolved as Ford and Noyce left the production.

Within the Visual Effects section we have: Carrier Attack (8:40); A-4 (6:25); Hospital (3:54); Motorcade (3:57); and, Helicopter (4:53). These are very fine and revealing shorts that demonstrate how these various special effects were created. As someone who's drawn to special effects laden films, I was fascinated to learn what was real, what was a miniature, what was CGI, and how some of the effects were accomplished. In all, there's nearly an hour's worth (57:45) of informative featurettes on this disc. The only other visual extra is the film's theatrical trailer, which rather inconsistently is presented in 1.85:1 non-anamorphic widescreen. The 123-minute film is organized into seventeen chapter stops.

This brings us to the two feature-length, screen-specific commentaries. The first is by director Phil Alden Robinson and cinematographer John Lindlay. In the second, director Robinson is joined by novelist Tom Clancy. Clancy is an exhaustive researcher, is detail-oriented, and speaks with substantial authority about armament, military tactics, the intelligence community, and the history of warfare. His participation makes this an unusually worthy commentary. He's a treasure-trove of tactical and strategic minutiae, and he enjoys sharing his knowledge as he and Robinson are inspired by the events on the screen. A stickler for accuracy, Clancy enjoys pointing out every technical gaff. Of course, most authors resent the bastardization of their work, and Clancy complains from time to time about how his concepts were changed for the screen. Robinson usually defends himself well, explaining the rationale behind his changes. Nicely done and informative.

When Robinson sits with cinematographer Lindlay, the discussion remains technical but the subject turns to the art of filmmaking. Artistic decisions, technique, set design, locations, lighting, directorial challenges, and expressions of regret (“If I could do that scene over again…”) punctuate this commentary. As a fan of such explanatory commentaries, I very much enjoyed their chat as well. Neither commentary wastes our time with narration or endless discussions of character motivation.

No theatrical trailers or other promos are provided.

DVD-ROM Exclusives: What do you get when you pop the disc in your PC?

As is the case with just about all Paramount DVDs these days, n o ROM extras have been included.

Parting Thoughts