BACKDRAFT
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1991 Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: BACKDRAFT loses points for squandering
a good idea on a prosaic plot structure, but some of its
scenes are breathtaking. I would have liked a better and
more original story, but the film still is exciting. Rating:
high +1 (-4 to +4).
The first movies were all non-fiction. The early filmmakers simply shot the world they saw around them. One of the more common subjects was firemen fighting fires. In 1902 Edwin S. Porter (who the next year made THE GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY) made what is considered to be the first non-documentary film. He took previously shot footage of firemen and edited the pieces together to tell the first fiction story in cinema. He called it LIFE OF AN AMERICAN FIREMAN. As time went by, however, the subject of firefighting showed up less and less. It is difficult to think of a sound film that is mostly about firefighting. Films such as TOWERING INFERNO occasionally have firefighting as a substantial subplot, but rare is the film with firefighters as its main characters. That is perhaps unfortunate since there is great dramatic potential in the idea of the firefighter.
There certainly seem to be enough films about soldiers fighting an enemy who, in the case of most American wars, will be vanquished within five years or less. Firemen fight battles in a war they can never in their lifetimes hope ultimately to win. Films such as GHOSTBUSTERS turn to the supernatural to provide a towering dramatic force that a few brave people, with whatever equipment they can carry, have to stand up to. It is not hard to see parallels to firefighting, in which a person can be called on to fight an enemy ten stories high. As one of the characters in BACKDRAFT describes fire, "It's a living thing. It breathes, it eats, and it hates. The only way to beat it is to think like it.... The only way to truly kill it is to love it. a little." The dramatic potential for a powerful and frightening film about firefighting is there, but unfortunately it is only partially fulfilled by BACKDRAFT.
As the film opens in 1971, we meet a young firefighter idolized by his two sons. He takes his younger son, Brian to watch him fight a fire, not knowing that Brian will also be seeing him martyred by his hazardous occupation. Flash forward twenty years and the older son is now a hotshot lieutenant in the fire department. Lt. Stephen McCaffrey, now nicknamed "Bull," is played (as his father was) by Kurt Russell. The younger son Brian McCaffrey (played by William Baldwin) has been unsuccessful at several abortive careers and now is himself trying his hand at firefighting. Brian is assigned to the same fire company as Stephen is. This opens the way for the first of several themes, the rivalry of the two brothers. Complicating matters is an alderman intent on budget-cutting by shutting down fire companies. And one more complication: there is an arsonist loose setting small but very explosive sorts of fires. Fire Inspector Donald Ringate (played by Robert DeNiro) is doing the detective work to try to track down the deadly firebug.
In the war against fire it is possible to win battles, but the war never ends. There will always be another fire. This is probably why the plot relies so heavily on its arson subplot. A film does not feel right unless it has a conflict which is resolved. Since it is impossible to conquer fire the script, unfortunately, creates an enemy that can be conquered--a single arsonist. That unfortunately turns this film into a rather pedestrian mystery story. Too much of BACKDRAFT is about people against other people; not enough is about people against fire. Too much of the script is very unoriginal, including one sequence toward the end that is very nearly a direct steal from another current thriller (or at least from books by the author of the thriller). While visually this film is a genuine spectacular, some of the touches of the script are very weak. In one scene Stephen is talking to someone on the street while his friends surprise him by hooking up a fire hose and spraying him. It does not seem that there can be an unobtrusive way to hook up a hose four inches in diameter. That sort of thing attracts attention! In the last fifteen minutes the writing and even the acting seriously deteriorate. There are some incredibly cliched scenes. William Baldwin seems to stop at one point during an alarm and he poses on the firepole for Ron Howard's cameras. There is an action sequence to match any in a James Bond film, but it seems designed mostly to give BACKDRAFT a punch finish. It is extremely melodramatic.
The fire photography is very much the star of BACKDRAFT as much as any of the humans. Assisted by Industrial Light and Magic effects crews, the camera shows many different textures of flame. Sometimes the flame is beautiful enough that some audience members may go out and try to duplicate the arsonist's crime. There are many fire sequences, but there are two extended sequences that are particularly exciting. Hans Zimmer's score makes a very impressive contribution to the film also. I would give BACKDRAFT a high +1 on the -4 to +4 scale.
Mark R. Leeper
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