RIP to the great Sean Connery, who passed away yesterday. The iconic movie star first started acting in the 1950s and his career spanned half a century, most notably as the first cinematic James Bond. To commemorate the Scottish legend, I rewatched The Rock, the Michael Bay directed action movie from 1996, which was one of Connery’s last films.
2:30 – The opening credits play out as patriotic music swells over a collage of Ed Harris, as a decorated US Army General pleading with the government for justice for his fallen soldiers. As a kid, I just remember Harris being the bad guy, but the stakes here are set up well and Ed Harris’s Hummel has a legitimate grievance, leading to him being a very relatable villain and a martyr for a cause that we can actually get behind.
5:30 – Under cover of night, Harris’s team sneaks into the government facility to steal the chemical weapons. Michael Bay has said before that he makes movies for teenage boys. No argument here – ten year old me probably thought he was one of the all time great action directors. Honestly, it’s pretty effective here, with the dynamic camerawork and epic score. Bay really could have made more fun, entertaining movies like Armageddon/ Bad Boys/ The Rock if he hadn’t gotten caught up with the Transformers franchise. What a shame.
7:12 – One of the men DROPS THE GREEN TRANSLUCENT BALLS!! The soldiers probably should have been a little more careful with such destructive chemical weapons, but it makes for great exposition and made a deep impression on me as a kid. Honestly, if I saw random green gel balls fall on the street today I would probably start running in the other direction.
15:04 – “Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to Broadway!” Ranger Bob, the tour guide at the Alcatraz, should have his own spinoff movie. Also, it’s pretty cool that they actually shot this on location.
20:17 – Harris calls FBI Director James Womack to state his demands: $100MM for him to distribute to the families of the men who died in clandestine missions. Womack is played by John Spencer!! Leo McGarry was in the FBI before he was Chief of Staff??
34:35 – We finally see Sean Connery, an SAS agent and escape artist with long scruffy hair and a beard, after being “tossed in a cell for 30 years with the key thrown away.” Man, I wish we could have gotten more films from late stage Sean Connery but I’m glad we have The Rock. Whoever thought of making a Sean Connery/Nick Cage two hander has my gratitude. Apparently Cage’s role was first offered to Arnold Schwarzenegger. What would that have been like?
41:57 – While getting his hair cut, Connery manages to flip Womack over the balcony, hanging him on by a thread, as Connery begins his escape attempt. Ah, the haircutting scene. I can’t believe Connery was 66 years old at the time. Dude was still a total badass.
45:14 – Cage, in a stolen Ferrari, chases Connery, in a stolen Humvee, across San Francisco, causing hundreds of millions of dollars in civilian damage. This SF car chase scene is as good as I remember. It is Bay unleashed – absolute, barely controlled, glorious chaos. The vehicle body count is in the double digits.
51:59 – Connery loses Cage, and sneaks off to meet his daughter for the first time. This is a nice, touching scene. I really thought Claire Forlani was going to be a huge star. What happened?
1:00:43 – The teams are finally on the choppers heading out to Alcatraz for their mission to infiltrate. I can’t believe we’re a full hour in and Cage and Connery aren’t on Alcatraz yet. Even more surprising, there hasn’t been a single slow second yet.
1:07:12 – Connery, having memorized the timing of the furnance and spinning gears in the boiler room 30 years ago, rolls his way inside and throws open the doors for the rest of the squad. “Welcome to the Rock!” This movie is filled with great and cheesy one liners and some classic little speeches. It’s pretty clear which parts Aaron Sorkin wrote. Quentin Tarantino was another uncredited screenwriter. Imagine the drafts going back and forth between those guys.
1:13:00 – The infiltration team trips a motion sensor in the shower room as they try to enter, and they walk into an ambush. As a kid, this shower room shooting scene destroyed me every time I watched it. But this time, it’s the exchange between the team commander and Harris that really got me. What a way to build up the tension. The massacre that inevitably follows is heart-wrenching.
1:19:51 – Cage tries to force Connery to continue with the mission, which ends laughably for him: “he’s got all the guns now, sir.” Cage and Connery are such a great combination because Connery lends some gravitas and coolness to the movie, but Cage brings the levity and comedy and slight zaniness. Just a great time.
1:24:06 – “Losers always whine about their best. Winners go home and fuck the prom queen.” C-L-A-S-S-I-C Sorkin.
1:44:42 – The deadline is approaching and Harris starts to waver as his men ask him if they should load up the missile. Ed Harris’s crisis of conscience! A great general and war hero but he probably shouldn’t play poker.
1:52:34 – The President’s voiceover speech as the military is getting ready to bomb Alcatraz… The classic philosophical monologue playing over the montage of fighter jets and innocent hostages.
1:54:50 – Harris realizes that the President has called his bluff, and, unwilling to take 70,000 innocent lives, he orders his men to abandon the mission. But, led by the two hired guns, they refuse to follow his orders. This mutiny is possibly the most dramatic thing to happen in a movie that’s so far been filled with shootouts, chemical warfare, missiles, prison breaks, and car chases. The dialogue is a little cheesy at times (hey, it was the 90s) but this is such solid writing and storytelling.
1:58:00 – Cage and Connery are left fighting the last few bad guys over the final missile. Nick Cage holding up the green gel balls and Tony Todd holding up his knife as they yell “you know how this shit works!?” at each other is incredible stuff.
2:04:06 – Cage forces the gel ball into Todd’s mouth, contaminating everyone in the room. He then stabs himself in the heart with the hypodermic needle. I’m 86.9% sure that this scene is the reason I was scared of shots growing up. That needle is the size of a pencil.
2:10:38 – Cage, newly married, runs out of the Kansas church with the secret microfilm that Connery has hidden. This ending scene is like Raising Arizona meets The Shawshank Redemption.
The Rock is not by any stretch the best Connery movie or even my favorite one, but it’s quite possibly the most fun movie he’s been in – full of action, style, melodrama, and incredible one-liners. Sean Connery, you will be missed.
