Movies You Can No Longer Buy Tickets To: The Rock

And no, we're not talking about Dwayne

Although I’m a child of the 90’s, there is an embarrassingly large amount of movies I’ve never seen. Maybe as equally embarrassing is my lack of Sean Connery knowledge and appreciation. That man is a silver fox.

Recently we watched The Rock for the first time. I’ll be honest, going in I had absolutely zero clue what the movie was about and what to expect. We wanted a Michael Bay redemption after we were seriously let down by Ambulance. Spoiler alert: if you haven’t seen it, celebrate.

The Rock opens with a suspenseful montage of wartime scenes and eventually, a team of Marines break into a weapons facility to steal something. Everything seems perfectly planned out and methodical. It appears that they prepared for everything, except what would happen if they would accidentally drop whatever these green balls are and they would break. So, what happens? Of course, one green ball falls and breaks. They apparently didn’t consider that in the realm of possibilities, so the poor guy’s face and skin starts to burn up and its like acid eats his skin away.

I don’t know about you, but if I knew I would be handling a substance that could do that, I think I would have brought some sort of PP&E with me, but these seasoned marines didn't? Oh, come on.

Later, we cut to Nic Cage as Agent Goodspeed (what a great name) as a chemical expert with the FBI. They receive a suspicious package, and obviously it goes off and sprays some toxic gas while they are investigating it in their isolation chamber. We are then expected to believe these “experts” are completely unprepared for this scenario. No one can figure out how to get the emergency sprinklers to turn on and his partner in the chamber has a total meltdown. I’ve been led to believe FBI agents are cool as cucumbers in the face of danger. You’d think he trained and prepared for this moment his whole career, but he completely cracked. What a let down. Goodspeed, on the other hand, a goddamn rockstar. He diffused the attached bomb just in time and saved everyone.

14 minutes into the move and the title’s dropped. The Rock. Oh shit, its a prison! This whole time I’ve been waiting for Dwayne and now we’ve arrived at Alcatraz? What a ride, I am so in.

One thing I want to note—this movie needed more Ranger Bob than the 30 seconds we get to have him.

Our Marines reappear and take hostage of the tour group Ranger Bob is leading. He had conveniently just locked them all up in the cells for fun.

The leader Marine, General Francis X. Hummel, calls the pentagon to make his demands, and up until now, we're led to believe he is the villain. He tells the pentagon they are doing this because there are Marines that have died doing top secret missions overseas and when they die, they are labeled a traitor. They receive no military funeral and no military death benefits or money for their families. He is doing this to get retribution for the families of fallen Marines that were patriots and let down by their county. THIS MAN IS A HERO.

They have attached this deadly VX gas onto rockets and if the government doesn’t pay, they will launch them to different locations and kill hundreds of thousands of people. If the government would have just did the right thing, this wouldn’t be happening. Sounds pretty familiar if you ask me.

Finally, we get to meet Sean Penn’s character, John Patrick Mason, and boy does he not disappoint. He is a criminal that has apparently been locked up for 33 years (and looks it) without any paperwork or record. A ghost.

We don’t know why he’s locked up, but we're led to believe he is a dangerous and serious criminal, but the FBI is prepared to give him a full pardon if he just tells them how he broke out of Alcatraz. Give me a break.

Of course he refuses to corporate until good ol’ Goodspeed talks to him. He negotiates a suite, a shave, a shower and a suit. Goodspeed says he needs a haircut, too, unless he’s in a grunge band. Mason somehow cuts a hole in the interrogation room glass with a quarter and tries to attack the FBI Director, but they still give him what he wants. There’s some history with him and the director, Director Womack is the one that locked Mason up 33 years ago.

While Mason is in the shower at the hotel, he manages to remove the clothesline from the bathroom and again goes after Director Womack. Mason escapes from the hotel room, after he got a nice haircut, and there just so happens to be a hummer being dropped off to the valet just as mason comes outside. Talk about good luck 🙄 Goodspeed comes out and takes someone’s Ferrari and a chase ensues.

They race through San Francisco without care for any civilians or personal property. In true Michael Bay fashion, there is a spectacular explosion with a streetcar. It was amazingly cinematic. If you haven’t seen the movie, I recommend watching it for this scene, if nothing else.

Goodspeed catches up to Mason where he stopped to reunite with his daughter. He is pretty cool about the whole thing and just brings Mason back with him. Mason, Goodspeed and the rest of the FBI team are in the prison ready to rescue the hostages and disarm the rockets. They are in a room where the only option is to literally go through fire and Mason says: WELCOME TO THE ROCK. I have chills.

Mason gets through the fire and comes back to let the rest of them through. He tells them to go so many paces to get to the next spot, the shower room. Wtf is a pace? I don’t even know what a meter is. They get to the shower room and it’s an ambush. The Marines completely annihilate the FBI team leaving only Mason and Goodspeed to save the day. Throughout the battles, there is another amazing explosion in the tunnel system. Michael Bay really doesn’t disappoint with dynamite.

As Mason leads Goodspeed through the prison, I’m really impressed that he can remember everything so perfectly 33 years later. I can’t even remember how to get out when I go to my doctor’s office. Either way, Mason and Goodspeed do a great job of fighting off the Marines, and at one point an air conditioner/fan unit falls on one of the Marine’s head and it was brutal.

They make their way into a railcar that turns into quite the adventure. Very Snow White and the 7 Dwarfs. It was pretty fun, I enjoyed it.

A Marine throws a grenade into the railcar and Mason picks it up and throws it back. It made me stop to think, how often does that really happen? The movies make it seem like that happens all the time, but I’m just not so sure. I asked Jocko Willink because I’m sure he knows, but he has yet to answer me.

Throughout their journey through The Rock, we learn that Mason was an operative with British Intelligence and he had state secrets backed up on a microfilm hidden somewhere. When he was captured for something, the US government tried to get him to give up the location of the microfilm and he refused. That’s why he was locked up. He’s not a real criminal at all. I’d want to kill Womack, too.

Goodspeed gets caught by one of the Marines and he explains that he is a chemical specialist for the FBI. He asks ‘glass or plastic, plastic or glass?!?’ the Marine doesn’t understand the question. Goodspeed explains, if the rockets go off and the winds change, we’ll all end up in either a glass jar or a plastic bag. Wow. Thats profound. Is this peak Nic Cage??

Time runs out and the Marines are forced to either launch the rocket to show they aren’t bluffing or fold. Hummel is visibly torn between wanting to get justice but doesn’t want to kill innocent people. What’s he going to do?

OH MY GOD, they launched the rockets. They’re actually going to kill thousands of people. I really thought Hummel was a good guy. I am on the edge of my seat. At the last minute, Hummel changes the coordinates of the rocket and it goes into the Pacific Ocean. Whew, I knew he was a good guy.

The Marines are pissed. They think Hummel was wrong and is too weak to lead. They wanted the rockets to kill as many people as possible. What a change of events. I thought the Marines were a united front and now they’re pinned against each other.

There were a few more horrific deaths, including one with a flagpole and one where a VX bulb was shoved down a Marines throat. I’ve added that to my list of worst ways to die.

At the last minute, Goodspeed disarms the last of the rockets and puts up flares to tell the FBI not to bomb The Rock. The fighter planes have already been deployed and given the order to bomb, will they see the flares in time to call it off?? I am so nervous.

The planes come in and at the last minute, someone sees Goodspeed holding the flares. Its too late though! One of the pilots already dropped their bomb. We see it hit right near where Goodspeed is kneeling. Is this is? Is Goodspeed dead? I can’t believe they dropped it before the official order was given!

After an eternity, Goodspeed reemerges, unharmed. He talks to Mason and tells him to go to his hotel room where there is money and extra clothes. He’s going to let him go live his life and tell the FBI he died. What a guy. In return, Mason tells him if he is looking for a journey. Fort Walton Kansas. More specifically, St Michael’s Church, front pew, right leg. They part ways and Womack emerges; Goodspeed does indeed tell him Mason is dead.

We cut to Goodspeed’s baby mama sitting in a getaway car and Goodspeed running out of a church with a pew leg being chased by the priest. The movie ends with Goodspeed asking if she really wants to know who killed Kennedy.

I’d like to believe this was the prequel to National Treasure and him finding the microfilm led him on the journey to be a treasurer hunter. The logical progression would be Stanley Goodspeed found the microfilm, faked his death and reinvented himself as Ben Gates. A pretty elaborate back story to do this whole movie, but Michael Bay doesn’t like to disappoint…too often. What do you think?