Laikals The greatest movie ever made..!

Ceticultsot Beautiful, moving film.

Kien Navarro Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Skyler Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

SnoopyStyle It's 1939. Howard Hughes (Terry O'Quinn) loses his rocket pack prototype and decides to abandon the project. Actor Neville Sinclair (Timothy Dalton) hired gangster Eddie Valentine (Paul Sorvino) to steal it. Sinclair's thugs are chased by government agents and leave the rocket in a plane. Pilot Cliff Secord (Billy Campbell) and mechanic Peevy (Alan Arkin) find it and start adapting it. Cliff's girlfriend Jenny Blake (Jennifer Connelly) has a bit part in Neville's latest film. After a heroic rescue, the Rocketeer becomes a media sensation. Eddie finds Jenny's picture and Neville kidnaps her. He turns out to be a secret Nazi agent.It's all very old-fashion and undeniably Disney PG. It has a certain charm and a goodness in its classic comic book style. It does need a little bit more action and less of the setups. In that way, this is also somewhat old fashion. Campbell, Connelly, Dalton, Arkin, and Sorvino are all perfectly cast. It's a fine old style action adventure.

maxskyfan-9 PlotThis is the story of how Cliff, a pilot, because the hero known as the Rocketeer. The film starts off with Cliff test flying a new plane that he is going to enter in a national race. Do to no fault of his own the plane crash lands and is lost beyond repair destroying the fuel truck of the local business man. In order to pay for this debt Cliff agrees to fly another plane in the air show that this business man runs. When Cliff inspects this plane he finds a rocket pack in one of its seats. With the help of his friend Peevy (Alan Arkin) he learns to use this rocket pack to save someone's life. Meanwhile two different fractions are searching for this rocket pack. One group is the FBI and the other group is a bunch of mobsters that were hired by Neville Sinclair (Timothy Dalton), a Hollywood actor.Character DevelopmentCliff (Bill Campbell) learns what it takes to become a hero, but he doesn't have to do any soul searching to do it. He doesn't have to sacrifice anything or face any real trials and in the end he is pretty much the same guy he was at the start of the film. Jenny (Jennifer Connelly) does make a more noticeable change. She had stardust in her eyes at the beginning of the story, but by its conclusion she had a different perspective on Hollywood.ActingThe acting was really brilliant in this film. All the players reach high marks all the way down to the bottom of the cast. I particularly enjoyed Bob Leeman's role of W.C. Fields. The acting is on the pinnacle of any current comic book hero movie that you may choose to see, with all the black and white bad guys and heroics and colorful characters you can ask for. There are mobsters with hearts of gold, greedy nickel nursing business men, historical figures, intrepid FBI agents, and a bunch of cartoon Nazis to shot at. This is art mirroring art; Hollywood's looking back onto itself circa 1940.OverviewThis picture could have been made into a sequel. It had all the right ingredients and there was even a seed at the end that hinted that this could be a possibility. Yet I believe the talk was that this picture went over budget and the studio didn't get a good return on their investment so a sequel wasn't in the cards. Still there should have been one. This was movie magic. It had the feel of no other comic book hero movie. Like Batman the Rocketeer didn't have any super natural powers. He could fly, but only because he was wearing a rocket pack, only this was not like any recent Batman film. There was a certain ease and finesse here that didn't go overboard in the telling of it. I don't think the creators of the Rocketeer would have Batman speaking almost unintelligible or have him destroying squad cars and rooftops.

grantss Formulaic and mostly dull. Pretty much your standard action-adventure story. Has a few interesting / odd diversions here and there but mostly fairly standard stuff. Plot, while seemingly sci fi, is actually pretty much a conventional boys-own action-adventure story.Action sequences are OK, but, once again, nothing special. The final scenes are decent though.Kids will probably like it: it has the don't-worry-about-the-plot holes- and-implausibilities thing going for it that children like.For adults, well adult males, the only reason to watch this is Jennifer Connelly...

Phil Hubbs Its a real shame this film bombed so much at the box office, I really can't understand why it did so badly as its one of the best comicbook adaptations around. It captures the all American spirit of the time and harnesses that glorious 30's feel with every frame. Johnston really did superbly well with this film and capturing the very essence of that classic early comicbook/serial type hero and integrating it with that all American WWII wartime effort vibe.Just seeing the old movie poster shows you how much care and attention to detail went into this film. The poster has a fantastic art deco design (from the era) of our heroic lead character, its simple and minimal but does the job a thousand times over, I love it, one of the best posters created. Even the font for the text is absolutely perfect looking.Although the character was created in 82 its an obvious homage to pulp comicbooks and matinée/serial hero characters of the 30's/40's, the idea is simple but it works so so well. The whole film has that Indy feel to it and completes a trilogy of classic pulp comicbook superheroes alongside 'The Shadow' and 'The Phantom'...in my opinion. All characters of the era and all similar in design, typical manly and dashing in smart outfits, saving poor damsels in distress for breakfast.The film is nothing but fun and doesn't pretend to be serious or shy away from the ham n cheese. Dalton is the dastardly caddish villain who is clearly suppose to be Errol Flynn, Connelly is the soppy damsel in distress, Sorvino is the classic American gangster in a tubby Al Capone style ('Eddie Valentine'? perfect American mobster name methinks), O'Quinn plays Howard Hughes amazingly well and Tiny Ron is a character straight out of 'Dick Tracy'. New boy Campbell also does really well as the lead character giving the role a fresh feel and no ego problems which tend to come with big names.The film looks great and has some terrific design work, the rocket pack looks cool and practical with more nice art deco touches...as does the helmet with its rudder fin on the top. Effects were considered very good at the time with lots of high flying thrills and aerial stunts, bluescreen heavily used of course. Nowadays the effects do look rather iffy and obvious but that tends to add to the charm really, it doesn't detract from the excitement in any way. The plot is straight forward but it does get a bit beyond itself towards the finale, like how on earth does a huge Nazi Zeppelin fly into the US undetected? I guess its suppose to be the 30's so who knows, radar not at its best back then huh (well it was in its early days I believe). I must also mention the brilliant animated black n white short in the middle of the flick which shows the Nazi's intentions with the rocket pack. Truly awesome animation that is sharp as a knife to this day, it could easily have been a separate film (or series) in itself.I really can't fault this film in any way, sure its silly but its well worked escapism and an affectionate tribute to the era, anyone of any age would have fun watching this. Without taking anything away from the creators you could almost say its like an adventure from a young Indiana Jones, an early tale from his younger years, a prequel even. I love how they didn't shy away from using the Nazi's as the bad guys despite it being a family film, an important requirement. The Indiana Jones of the skies, fighting the dastardly Nazi's and their incredible machines of war, hell this is really what 'Captain America' should have been like.9/10