Top Gun at 35: The Patina of 80’s Cool

On this week in May 35 years ago, a little high-wire jet flying, cockpit action stunting, oiled up volleyball playing, classically formulated mano y mano collision of male competitive machismo and schmaltzy 80’s romance dropped in our laps like a scud missile from the MiGs soaring over the Indian Ocean in the film’s terrifically ridiculous denouement. It was a film about the best of the best. The top 2% of pilots! Many critics hated it. Yet, 356 million Americans lined up and bought tickets to see it at the box office. In the years immediately following its release, the US Navy reported enrollment increases of 500 percent. The film triggered a recruiting boom (aided, of course, by Navy booths strategically set up outside some theatres), which has rarely been equaled since.

The film, of course, is Top Gun, and it’s not real hard to decipher its relevancy at the time of its release. We could add to the above the film debuts of Val Kilmer and one Meg Ryan, for instance. The list of period details which influenced prevailing 80’s American culture are voluminous. Just mention the name of the film to any passerby and watch the series of words and phrases that come tumbling out of their mouths – Bomber jackets and Aviators. Iceman. Maverick. Viper. Jester. That time we picked up an encyclopedia and hunted down what a MiG was (it’s named after the two dudes who invented it, with “i” being “and” in Russian, for the record). Someone would hail the score. Others would roll out Kenny Loggins’ “Danger Zone” or Berlin’s “Take My Breath Away”. The height of Tom Cruise as sex symbol. Buzzing the tower. On and on it goes. Maybe they’d say something else. Perhaps they’d throw any one of the litany of fabulous quotes your way (My money is on “I’ve got the need…the need for speed” for the pedestrian). The point is, they would have feedback for you. And THAT, my friends, is relevance.

But why does this one still matter today? I mean, is this even a GREAT film? Check that, is it even really good? Well, let’s do a deep dive (no pun intended) into the cast, crew, and production of this picture for a few moments. We know the big names which would flash in neon on many a theatre marquis. But, the film actually opens on a powerful introduction of two of its other prime players. No, not Cruise, McGillis, Kilmer, or Edwards. I’m talking about the legend Harold Faltermeyer and Mr. Tony Scott. The pulsating bed of synths in the opening (courtesy of the aforementioned Harold) get us primed for what is coming. Meanwhile, the cameras flying underneath jets, panning across the aircraft carrier and up into the sky let us know what’s in store visually from our audacious director.

The latter fact hints at one of the many reasons why this film still lingers in the collective conscience. Simply put, the action just doesn’t LOOK like an 80’s film. This is a far cry from the claymation terror dogs hopping across the city street in Ghostbusters just two years prior. (Though those dudes are pretty cool coming out of the floor of Rick Moranis’ apartment). Tony Scott gets right in there and shoots this thing like his life depends on it. We’re in the cockpit with all of these guys toting legendary call signs. We’re in the air, spinning around at Mach speeds, feeling the disorientation of the pilots. (In an effort at verisimilitude, the actors actually did some real flying in jets and just about every one tossed their cookies after the experience).

We hear the sounds and feel the tension. We come to know firsthand the precarious balance of adrenaline rush and life-threatening danger which marks these men’s every voyage into the sky. A film watered down by the extremely limited capacity of dated CGI this is not. For that reason, it has aged extremely well. I’m not sure if this is the birth of the Scott blockbuster, but it certainly took him to towering new heights.

A much smarter friend of mine (also another collaborator for TWIM) essentially summed up Top Gun like this: All the dogfights and stuff in the sky work tremendously well. The camaraderie and flight school. The competition to be top dog between these virulent studs. It all thrills and exhilarates. But the romance…just flops entirely. It simply does not work. After rewatching the film this week, I have to say – he’s really not wrong. Pete “Maverick” Mitchell marks the first in a long line of brash hotshot characters Cruise inhabited across about a twenty year span. Charlie (Kelly McGillis’ nickname in the film) is a civilian, but one just a little too erotically charged by deep cut info on Russian planes. So, you know, one thing leads to another, and soon the two are sharing the worst French kiss in the history of cinema (so you’re just gonna touch tongues?) against a backdrop of blue lighting. I don’t feel the need to litigate this at length. Suffice it to say, the two could have used a screening of Body Heat in pre-production.

We can make our guesses as to why the two’s chemistry just does not jibe. Perhaps it was the height disparity between them (which was so great she apparently was crouching in multiple scenes). Then again, I would surmise it has something to do with this. In any case, the truth for me is that though the picture may feature some unintended guffaws, it rarely suffers for it. Top Gunplays as a goofy time capsule today, not overwrought jingoism or out of touch fantasy. It’s amusing and chuckle-worthy, inoffensive and innocuous. Val Kilmer’s emphatic mouth acting, for instance – perchance that’s a quintessential example in this vein. Further, even if this does hint at being a naval infomercial in spots, it’s never pushy or preachy. I find it to be a trifle, great to stare at lovingly. A sugary confection which goes down smoothly.

And let’s face it, the conflict at the film’s gripping conclusion is almost entirely decontextualized. These men are lifted right out of flight school graduation for a day long trek to the Indian Ocean, where they’ll be giving air support to a ship on the water. The order: ENGAGE if you come under enemy fire. It is finally a chance to put these skills honed in a special laboratorial setting to a real-world test. But who are they really fighting geopolitically? Are there Russian’s behind these MiG’s? That’s an awful geographic stretch from the Indian Ocean. We could list several other contenders from the neighboring areas, but the point is that they are never mentioned by name.

That, it seems to me, is the wisdom at the center of Tony Scott’s Top Gun. This is a film that tightrope walks a middle ground between the dreaded extremes of the ultra self-serious and foolishly inane. It injects fist-pumping adrenaline into our very veins and ratchets the aurul excitement up to fever pitch. It thrills our eyes, and worms its way into our hearts too. Its makers understood which formulas work, like the age old (dare I say, Shakespearean) competitive fire between athletes locked in combat, striving to be the tops. Or the power of friendship, the ready-made metaphor of wingmen. Maverick discovers the value of having someone to watch your back, and that learned skill of subsuming personal ego into the greater collective good.

After all, there IS a love story at the heart of this film which unequivocally works. I’m talking, of course, about Maverick and Goose. (Incidentally, the degree to which the tragedy in the second act of this film tears at our heartstrings is further proof of this deep-felt connection). Or even Iceman and Slider’s unity. Jester and his men. What about Viper and Maverick? The brotherhood sells. The loyalty and heat, and the notion of excellence when under fire. Even Cruise’s daddy issues don’t land entirely falsely.

Lumped together in sum, I think we can see a thousand reasons why Top Gun still hangs around. I have not even yet mentioned the sequel we’ll have rolling into theatres (or is it living rooms?) in the coming months. This is a film that is sometimes cheesy, often over-indulgent, and powered by testosterone. It’s also a cult classic which practically defined the era. Armed with quotes by the truckful (“Gutsiest move I ever saw, man.”) and aerial footage we’d still play on repeat today. A slamming soundtrack which mostly isn’t of its era but still reverberates today. Ask me some time to relate the way we used to serenade girls’ dorms on our knees, belting out “You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling.” And, of course, the birth of a bona fide movie STAR. With the firm belief that sometimes it’s better to be populistically good than film school great, Top Gun took flight and remains in our lives still today.