Backdraft
Used to be a time when the name âRon Howardâ being promoted as the director of a major movie would be a sort of curiosity piece for audiences who would come out to see if the beloved Opie (not to mention the immeasurably dorky and awkward teenage boy from American Graffiti and Happy Days) had actually made something that was worth watching. In time, the movies he did got better and better all the way up to an Oscar win in 2001. Howard seemed to smartly know early on that with his demeanor, he wasnât exactly going to be an A-list movie star, so the directing angle became something that got more and more solid for him until he was universally recognized as one of the best in the business all while always having the name value on a directing credit from the very beginning due to his 70s acting career that guys like Spielberg, Scorsese and Coppola also had which were always worked into the marketing campaigns. Itâs hard to say where it was that he turned the corner completely into being an A-list filmmaker (most of his films never had much trouble making money) but this 1991 effort could very well be it. A long, epic story about the firefighting profession with a very big name cast and featuring one of the many underrated (and unrecognized for awards consideration) performances by Kurt Russell, here playing Stephen McCaffrey, a balls out, devil may care fireman who rushes headlong into the blazes he takes on without the benefit of an oxygen mask or literally any fear whatsoever, almost always coming out as the hero of the day even as his own personal life and marriage is in a shambles. The film opens with his father (also played by Russell) answering a fire call back in 1971, only to be blasted to smithereens in full view of his younger son who grows up to be William Baldwin, having been so traumatized by the sight that most of the time he could only wish to be a man on the level of his big brother. Which strikes up the filmâs biggest weakness right off the bat, that being the melodrama that comes from having a sibling rivalry as the focal point of the story as even though the firefighting sequences staged by Howard here are pretty amazing, the sight of having Russell and Baldwin arguing every other scene gets to be a bit tiresome, which almost makes it a relief when Baldwin is transferred out of his unit to a more bureaucratic position, working as an assistant to the cityâs fire inspector (Robert DeNiro) whoâs got quite a case on his hands as various rich people in the city of Chicago are being blasted to death by a âbackdraftâ, a sudden burst of flames that comes to life usually when a door to a room is opened and oxygen goes inside, brutally wiping out the intended target and blowing itself out just as quickly so that no one else is affected by it. DeNiro ascertains that it would require an expert, extensive knowledge of fire itself to coordinate such a blast and this leads him and Baldwin to seek insight from Ronald Bartel (Donald Sutherland), an incarcerated arsonist and infamous pyromaniac who maintains a romanticized view of manâs relationship with fiery flames even as he primarily used his obsession for profit to light places up as insurance scam jobs. Sutherlandâs gleeful delight in playing this evil character would easily qualify him as having given the filmâs best performance, but unfortunately Howard goes down the wrong path with him late in the film by turning him into a quasi-Hannibal Lecter type complete with a literal quid pro quo exchange between him and Baldwin.  Other characters in the mix include Jennifer Jason Leigh as an old flame of Baldwinâs now working at City Hall who gets him the job working with DeNiro while they rekindle their romance, Scott Glenn as a fellow fireman and best friend of Russellâs, Rebecca De Mornay as Russellâs estranged wife who is trying stay separated from him because she couldnât bear the heartbreak if something were to happen to him on the job what with all the (unnecessary?) risks that he takes, Jason Gedrick (who was famous for about 5 minutes for starring in the 80s musical bomb Rooftops) as the new, cocky young member of the squad and J.T. Walsh as a slimy alderman (with aspirations for being Mayor) who may or may not be involved with the series of gruesome burning deaths happening in the city (and who also happens to be Jennifer Jasonâs boss).  Quite frankly, the sibling rivalry stuff and the drama with Russellâs wife along with Baldwin and Leigh pale next to DeNiro (bringing a quiet intensity to his role that thankfully doesnât overwhelm the entire film) and Baldwin investigating the case at hand, but really Howardsâs genius (in the age before CGI) was in the depiction of the hot and dangerous fires throughout, made all the more real because, well, they WERE real, many times requiring one or two takes for scenes within it because while the best they could do was make it burn slow, once the set was basically ruined from the flames then there wasnât much more that they could do with it, even having both a camera and the cameraman wrapped in a flame retardant suit while running around in the inferno.  Moreso, the film saw Russell, Baldwin and Glenn wind up getting credited as actual stuntmen for acting their way through and around the fire, making for some thrilling and riveting footage knowing that these actors were literally risking their lives to make their performances the best (Glenn was even knowingly set on fire at one point). Whatâs also fascinating is that while you have a number of characters who would be qualified for consideration as the movieâs primary villain (Sutherland, Walsh, the mystery arsonist), to hear both DeNiro and Sutherland tell it, the real main villain of the movie is the element of fire itself with some spaced out philosophical talk from both men that nonetheless is effective in portraying fire as the ultimate evil simply because it is the ultimate destroyer. That explains why people like Russell and Glenn run headlong into it to protect and save any lives in danger and extinguish it as quickly as possible because when compared to crooked politicians, serial killers or foreign terrorists, fire really IS that malicious a force to them, something whose ability to just burn and destroy everything in its path without prejudice makes it almost pure in its raw, unforgiving ferocity, something that is only best when being completely controlled and contained. If anything, that is the true theme of the film that Howard finally allows to seep in when all else fails, finally giving the proceedings an air of legitimacy that all the human drama really couldnât, even as Howard (who is said to have a tendency for corny situations to emerge at the most inopportune times) actually goes so far as to have two characters drop everything and start having a heated discussion in the midst of an especially nasty blaze at a chemical plant, leading to the inevitable when their lengthy conversation is finally interrupted by the floor underneath them opening up with flames because they were just too busy yelling at each other instead of doing their jobs (not to mention it was over a subject that they could have saved for later on at the firehouse after they had taken care of the immediate business) but at least this contrived development does help set up the emotional climax which proves that while Howard does traffic freely in sentiment and clichĂ©, he also is very good at invoking an emotional response from the viewer as well, refusing to allow his audience to go into paralytic shock from boredom even if he likes to pile on the cheese as well. At least the cavalier, ball busting attitudes amongst the firemen characters is enjoyable to watch, a bunch of hard working guys who risk their lives every day but can still see themselves having a good laugh at each otherâs expense, which makes for a welcome contrast from Walshâs two faced politician and De Mornayâs wife character who doesnât understand that throwing a good man like Russell out of her life for the reasons she stated isnât going to change anything that happens in the future because she obviously still loves him and will still be affected by anything that happens as well. At the very least, what Howard did here was to make a movie that inordinately raised the profile for the firefighting profession and brought attention to the risks that they take in a very realistic fashion and for that this movie will continue to stand the test of time for anyone wanting to get a whiff of what the fireman life really isâŠ
8/10