A priori.
The things you bring with you.
You meat-gazing b@stard.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xHklGtW3rwU[/youtube]
That pretty much explains Quentin Tarantino’s exegesis on Top Gun, the theatrical reduction using Hollywood actors in an attempt to understand TOPGUN, otherwise known as the prestigious Navy Fighter Weapons School. Where jolly green giants stride the earth. In nomex flight suits. To general acclamation.
You have to explain these things to black shoes.
I think it’s a “speed of thought” thing.
(And if I’m wrong, they were all Tomcat guys anyway. Simple fighter pilots. Which explains a lot.)
That is rather amusing but, I can tell you that thousands of very talented men and women joined the Navy because of the movie TopGun…
It was a freak of nature in a lot of respects; its general acceptance and allure, however, the truth is that this movie was probably the best recruiting tool for the Navy in a couple of decades.
I remember delivering my 16 year old son to Summer Seminar. We were both totally freaked out by the whole “military demeaner” thing. I remember a Midshipman asking me “hasn’t your son ever been away from home before?” Of course he had… Then she said “Hasn’t he ever seen the movie TopGun?” Well, of course he has or we wouldn’t be here right now. Duh… (thinking these things to myself as my real self was tounge tied)
With that, they swept him away along with the car keys! Took about 30 minutes to get the car keys out of the bowels of Bancroft! I finally left Annapolis hanging on tenderhooks. What would the next 5 days bring?
When I picked my son up from the airport the first words out of his mouth were “I’m all Navy.” End of story…
I was wondering if you were going to deign to respond.
That is just sick and wrong…on so many levels. But then, they are all actors, right?
Loved that movie, and even when I was a kid knew it wasn’t real. Loved it anyway.
When it came out I heard an interview on the radio with a Blue Angel and the host asked him if they really could fly like the scene with the “MIG” at the beginning of the movie. His answer? “Nobody I know could.”
I have it on what might be called good authority that when Tom Cruise was aboard The Pig the betting was he was going to knock his noggin on a hatch someway or another if he didn’t soon understand he was a visitor.
Thankfully, the filming only took a few days and the crew was able to return to more important tasks.
Still, that aside, the movie didn’t make it for me. The whole “jetwash” plot point was wrong, as was the recovery and ejection sequence. Not to mention what appeared to be T-38 Talons or F-5′s done up as Russians and interested in the Gulf?
As movies go it was OK, but for recruiting it’s like watching a NASCAR race from the stands then going to watch Days of Thunder or something. It may get a few more people interested, but we’re selecting on quality, not quantity, and seeing the real thing always beats Hollywood.
– Max
Queer sailors, who ever heard of such a thing? LMAO
Funniest damn thing I’ve seen in a while.
‘Sword fight! Sword fight!’
hee hee
And Lex…curse you for making me look up what a priori means at 11:30 on a Friday night. I’ve spent more time on Dictionary.com since I met you than I have in all the years of my life. And here I thought I had a decent vocabulary. Sheesh.
“Top Gun” was silly. The parody, I think it was called “Hot Shots, Part Deux” was funny, besides which it had some Folland (Hindustan) Gnats in it, the cutest little jets ever built.
P.s. If yer willing to rob the kids’ college fund, I think some of said Gnats come up for sale from time to time.
Hey, the K. and the B. are way cute, they can marry rich guys…
The Gnats had Bristol Orpheus gas turbines in ‘em, maybe thirsty by today’s standards but very reliable and responsive to movements of the throttle (power) handle.
Like USS Constitution, they were (according to Bill Gunston) designed by a Quaker. Quakers make the best weapons, because they’re honest, and don’t cheat on the contracts.
— Annoying to true Naval Aviators – probably.
— Especially annoying those who have served at TOPGUN – likely.
— Volleyball scene – priceless.
Um yeah, did I mention the volleyball scene? Authenticity? meh.
I was (just barely) a teen when the movie came out. My sister drooled all over it, but it made little impression on me–other than cringing throughout the bar singing scene (though the Volleyball scene was kinda nice…
). After reading Lex’s archives got me hooked on naval aviation, I went and rented it just to see the aviation and carrier scenes. Found it very frustrating to discover there was so little of that kind of thing in it, LOL!
Yeah, I’m weird.
P.S. Part of my lack of enthusiasm may have been the star. I’ve never liked Cruise because there’s something about him that just sets my teeth on edge; he never loses himself in a role–it’s never Character So-and-So, but it’s “TOM CRUISE(!) as So-and-So” and that always feels “off…” There’s something inherently “unreal” about the man that has never allowed me to lose my awareness of him as a individual, no matter the movie.
Don’t feel bad HF6, I think that even English Majors have to go to the book around these parts.
It seems to be a common occurrence that the good Cap’n stretches our collective vocabularies
One effect of the movie was to make the O’club at Mirimar the hottest ticket in San Diego. But we had strippers in the club in those days too.
Not sure how many music professors read this wonderful site, but some ten years ago I had a colleague who wrote a paper on how the score to Top Gun represented and supported the homo-erotic content of the movie. It was the funniest thing I had read in a good long while, not least because hidden in the joyous academic gobbledy-gook there was actually a defensible thesis. I wish it were online….uh oh i think i found it….beware…be very very ware
(ok so sadly he seems to have added some politics that werene’t there when last I saw this….sigh….it is academia after all…)
http://www.echo.ucla.edu/volume7-issue1/atlas/atlas1.html
Anyway, thank you for your service and thank you again and a happy Memorial Day to you and all of yours.
Heh. I’m not a professor, but do have a master’s degree in music. And yes, there’s a defensible thesis there (the ties between visual edits and musical styles/points of interest are not subtle. And I have to wonder whether the whole milleu of that movie made things difficult for Cruise to suppress his own instincts, haha!).
However, reading the movie as he does, the author demonstrates how little he understands the ironic undertones and swagger of the dialogue. And so I think the title of this post is very apt for that paper. I have to stop and wonder about the sexual knots a person that could write something like that must be tied up in.
Uh-oh, I said “tied up.” I must have a suppressed desire to be a sexual submissive. ROFL!
Knots can be fun…depending on who is involved…I’m just sayin’.
Gee- I waited 15 minutes on dial-up to see that?
A little perspective:
- I was on Enterprise as a squadron Ops-O when they filmed it. Hollywood come to sea for a “slider”. I can report that Tom Cruise is all of 5″ 6″ and had one eyebrow.
- Volley ball- sure- on the beach in Pensacola and anywhere else. Why not? How about the crossing the line tournament in SD? Has that become extinct or gone the way of the PC police?
- Miramar O’Club on Wednesday nights circa mid-80′s? Yeah and as “bad” as any place I’ve ever been for picking up chicks. Something which is just a remanant memory for me now. I don’t think gays would have liked it..”not that there’s anything wrong with that” (sure..)
- Any of you have kids in H.S. sports today? Everone showers at home. Schools are now being built WITHOUT showers and locker rooms. The traditional locker room as pictured, with towel snapping, etc. is in the past. Why? Well I have my theories but I think it’s because of “them”..”not that there’s anything wrong with that”. Not sure if this is significant but I remember going to take a shower on every carrier I was on during the 70′s and 80′s naked..yep- naked and I never thought anything about.
Yeah, I reckon not combing your hair, watching SportsCenter 24/7, drinking fancy non-American beer and playing pansy golf all define manhood nowadays for your standard Metrosexual.
Of course tough chicks can do the job flying fighters (is there anything else?)nowadays.
Were we repressed Gays back then? I’m not sure, it’s sorta like that last scene in “Casablanca” where Rick walks away with the Inspector, but I can believe it is TRUE about those Tomcatters and F.A.G.’s from Lee-More who dwell on the annual digit exam! LOL.
b2
B2,
[somewhat off-topic] As a former teacher, I’m pretty sure the lack of traditional showers/locker-rooms has much more to do with school liability (sexual abuse, hazing, bullying, preserving delicate “self-esteem,” etc.) than anyone’s sexual orientation.
Fbl,
Small world. I was a music major in college. I found it to be an extremely useful skillset when I became an AW. Airborne sonar operator, basically. The ability to pick up on harmonic relationships (on several levels) was a God-send to me, professionally. Also, being able to aurally focus in on one particular instrument from a group of musicians, and pick out what he was playing, paid off in spades.
If I were recruiting for the Navy, I’d be hot for those music-types, especially musicians, for anything related to sonar work.
Just sayin’…
Respects,
Also,
If I was in the business of training potential sonar operators, or folks learning any sort of intelligence analysis, I’d be taking them to a couple of seminars about music appreciation, deconstructing music, etc.
Be surprised what folks could pull outte those types of things.
Respects,
This is the funniest thing since the Navy let the Village People (THE VILLAGE PEOPLE!) use the deck of the USS Reasoner to make the music video for “In the Navy”.
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/187304/village_people_in_the_navy/
The Navy finally figured out the innuendo and decided not use the video as a promotional.
Dunno.
There seems to be a gap between what Hollyweird shows and the reality, and it is getting wider by the month.
Nevertheless, a kewt video.
Yeah Fbl..must be “the hazing not the gazing”! Getting “Atomic Bomb” on one’s jock sure does set up a school for a lawsuit. LOL.
About that self-esteem..I wonder does boot camp have locker rooms? How about OCS- I remember the D.I.: “Outta the rack girls! You have 6 minutes to s&*t, shower and shave!” Can you believe they didn’t have doors on the sh&*ers? How about SERE school?..I remember having to stand buck-naked in the cold desert night while being sprayed with cold water and listening to a lecture on Ho Chi..Oh yeah..that was torture. The locker rooms on the base drill hall where I work out are old-fashioned..now you got me all worried!
We’ve morphed into a nanny state of ninnys!
b2
Yeah Fbl..must be “the hazing not the gazing”! Getting “Atomic Bomb” on one’s jock sure does set up a school for a lawsuit. LOL.
About that self-esteem..I wonder does boot camp have locker rooms? How about OCS- I remember the D.I.: “Outta the rack girls! You have 6 minutes to s&*t, shower and shave!” Can you believe they didn’t have doors on the sh&*ers? How about SERE school?..I remember having to stand buck-naked in the cold desert night while being sprayed with cold water and listening to a lecture on Ho Chi..Oh yeah..that was torture. The locker rooms on the base drill hall where I work out are old-fashioned..now you got me all worried!
We’ve morphed into a nanny state of ninnys!
b2
Umm I *started* to read the comments, but then had to stop. You all are traumatizing me.. I grew up on that movie.. and it is ALL real and I don’t care what anyone says.. it was/is one of the greatest military movies (non-battlefield) ever made.
::sigh:: Val Kilmer.. yummmmm
I’m just going to go back to my fantasy world now.. tank ya vedy much!
dang! a bunch of musicians here –who knew? i do teach a whole bunch of music appreciation/analysis courses but have never thought about tailoring them to sonar operators…hmmm…. and by the way for all you professional listeners out there there is a great book called “The Singing Neanderthals” about the cultural anthropology of music perception — pretty cool — it’s amazing how fuzzy our knowledge of sound perception is yet how specific and marvelous our hearing can be.
AG ~ he IS yummy, isn’t he??? I have never been a fan of Tom Cruise but I loved Val Kilmer in this movie (not as much as in ‘Real Genius’ or ‘The Saint’ but enough). Between him and the jets, I was in heaven.
Umm, marc, there is a theory going around, and it is less shaky than the Tranzi Global Warming Theory, that the auties and aspies are the remnants of of the Neanderthals, those who didn’t get their heads beaten in by the Cro-Magnon Modern-Man badasses.
So, Tim, what’s yer hat size? Mine’s 7&3/4 plus. As Sherlock Holmes said, a head that big must have something in it.
There is or course, no guarantee as to the sillyness, or non-sillyness, of any head’s contents, just that there’s more room in there for all kindsa stuff, ya ‘know?
I’m with AW1 Tim on the usefulness of a musical background in interpreting passive sonar data.
I spent 8 years in Choir and Band in school.
The ability to recognize Harmonics is especially important in Sub hunting and just Identification proposes for passive contacts.
Out of all the annalists that I knew and worked with, the best were musicians. Heck we even had a band made up entirely of Sonar techs on The Badger. It was an excellent way to while away the hours, whilst underway and not on watch.
Tom Cruise is a hobbit. It was and is all about Val Kilmer and Rick Rossovich.
Tom Cruise is a totally brainwashed $cientology zombie. Wasn’t hard to wash a brain that small.