Exploiting Hollywood 1980

Tom Cruise is very concerned about being able to sit in a real fighter jet. He insisted on adding two safeguards to the contract.

One is that he must have a real shot of a fighter jet sitting in the Navy. The second is that these shots must appear in the final film.

Ronald only has editing rights, and Paramount has the final say on the length of the film. So Ronald's promise was not enough, and the two producers sent Tom Cruise's request to Paramount for approval.

Soon, Paramount agreed to Cruise's request and signed a film contract with him.

Ronald felt that the reason why Paramount agreed so bluntly was because they didn't agree on how many seconds of Tom Cruise's actual shot in the fighter would ultimately need to be guaranteed.

And Tom Cruise's original intention of adding this clause may be that he wants to take the opportunity to satisfy himself more and be addicted to the fighter.

Soon, on The Hollywood Reporter, Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer were featured in a preview of a new project to shoot. They mentioned vaguely that new projects were in the pipeline. Ronald Lee is expected to direct.

Ronald did not respond to the newspaper's request for an interview or to comment. The preparatory work has only just begun. The first problem is to solve the script review, and the shooting method of the aerial combat.

The producers brought in two screenwriters, Jim Cash and Jack Epps, to flesh out the script.

Ronald went to "Long Legs" Christy Fox to discuss how to shoot fighter planes and fights in the air.

"Long Legs" Fox is a true aerodynamic expert. She is a researcher at Naval Air Station Miramar, providing technical analysis support to the Navy.

Every Wednesday and Saturday, the bar at the base is crowded with pilots who come to drink and relax.

Ronald met "Long Legs" Fox here, and the two were barely able to communicate over the noise. Longlegs took him to his apartment.

"Long Legs" also has a handsome boyfriend. Today's young people are really trash. "An older pilot drank beer and hated the younger ones.

"Don't pay attention to them, the boys rely on these to vent their excess energy." Long legs are a little manly, and immediately pointed to the pilot who was about to come up, warning them not to be too busy.

"It seems that you are very popular here." Ronald laughed.

"It's up to me to rate their flying performance." Long Legs opened the door of his apartment.

"Here are two models of Navy fighter jets in service. This is a Grumman F-14 Tomcat, this is a McDonnell Douglas F/A-18 Hornet." She took two large model of the airplane and handed it to Ronald.

Ronald really didn't know much about fighter jets, so he started playing with two models.

"This wing can move." Ronald took a delta-wing aircraft, found a switch, pulled it back, and the front half of the delta wing, like a big bird, unfolded forward and became open wing.

"That's the Tomcat. It opens up when taking off and landing at low speeds to get more lift, and when it breaks the sound barrier, it swept back into a delta wing to reduce drag."

"Oh, that's it." Ronald fell in love with the plane at first sight, and it looked better than the other rigid Hornet.

"The vision is very good, and the pilot also likes the Tomcat. It can mount multiple Sidewinder air-to-air combat missiles, and the Vulcan 20mm cannon. The improved model can also mount bombs to attack the ground."

"So, what kind of opponent will the F-14 Tomcat encounter in the ocean?"

"Mainly two, the first is their MiG-21 fighter." Longfoot Christie took two more models from the cabinet,

It's not a toy company's product, like her own model made of wood.

The long feet held up a small plane with a nose and a cone and said,

"The MiG-21 supersonic fighter, most of the fighters of the alliance took off from the shore base, and came to our aircraft carrier formation to harass and reconnaissance. There is a 30mm cannon, which can also be mounted with radar or infrared guided missiles."

"What about this?" Ronald pointed to the big plane.

"This is a Tu-22M backfire supersonic bomber, which can be equipped with anti-ship missiles. Our F-14 Tomcat has the task of fighting him and defending the aircraft carrier formation."

"How to fight such a big plane?" Ronald looked at the size of the bomber, it was so big.

"This is a military secret, I can't tell you. If you want to know, you can join the Navy."

"Hahaha..." Ronald didn't ask anymore when he saw that military secrets were involved.

He took a fancy to the F-14 Tomcat fighter, which is very beautiful in appearance and has variable wings, which is more likely to take wonderful shots in aerial combat.

As for his two main opponents, Ronald still prefers the MiG 21. The backfire is too big, and it is estimated that it is difficult to find a plane to take a real shot.

It was just the two of them, who happened to be the real pros and cons of the movie.

"By the way, our American Navy has MiG-21s, right?" Ronald wanted to ask the Navy how many planes they borrowed to serve as enemy planes.

"Who told you that?" The long-legged expression suddenly became tense.

"No one? If not, we have to build models and use other aircraft to simulate MiG 21? What kind of aircraft do you think is closer to MiG?"

"The MiG-21 is a single-seat, single-engine light fighter, and our Navy's F-5 Freedom Fighter is relatively close to him." Long-legged Ronald didn't bother with the top secret Pentagon, the MiG-21 imaginary enemy squadron. I thought that even a film director might not know this, maybe he just said it casually.

"Well, okay," Ronald wrote down the aircraft model in his notebook, "Why does the F-14 Tomcat have two seats in the cockpit?"

"This is a two-seat twin-engine heavy fighter. The pilot's seat is in the front, and the radar weapons officer is in the back, who is responsible for spotting and identifying enemy aircraft and issuing attack orders."

"I want to shoot that kind of fighting in the air, like the X-wing vs. Tie fighter in Star Wars. Is there any way to think?" with various actions.

"You have three options." Long-legged picked up another plane and signaled.

"Number one, you put a camera on the F-14, so you can simulate the pilot's point of view and get all kinds of first-person views from inside and out of the cabin.

Second, you can install cameras on his wingman, which can simulate aircraft approaching, aerial combat, dogfights, etc. The audience is like watching planes fighting up close.

Third, you can use another plane to shoot next to the two fighting planes, which can reflect the relative positions of several planes and attack tactics. "

"Wow, you have a very deep understanding of photography." Ronald couldn't help but sigh, Longlegs is not only an official researcher of the Navy, how can he know so much about photography?

"In that issue of California magazine, it was about me. The lead photographer was my partner, and we discussed a lot of ways to shoot." Christie Fox laughed.

"I'm so lucky," Ronald looked at Long Legs, who turned out to be the prototype of the heroine who was in love with the hero played by Tom Cruise in the script.

"Then, I don't know if I have the honor to invite Miss Long Legs to dinner?" Ronald also wanted to talk more about photography with the female expert.

"My pleasure." Long-legged Christie supported Ronald's old-fashioned black-rimmed glasses and agreed.

The two found a Japanese restaurant, and Ronald ordered the most expensive items on the menu, then asked Longlegs what to drink.

"Their sake is good."

Sushi and sashimi, served with yellow wasabi and sake, and the two had a great time. Ronald deliberately flattered her and asked her to serve as a technical consultant for the film. Long-legged also thought that making a film was a very interesting thing, so he agreed.

"Anything special about the F-14? We wanted to make the movie an '80s western, but instead of revolvers, the cowboys duel with advanced fighter jets."

"In that case, the F-14 can actually do a very interesting movement." The long legs stretched out two hands, simulating two fighter jets fighting in a dogfight.

"The front is an F-14, and the back is a MiG-21. The dogfight means that the two sides compete to get behind each other, like two dogs biting each other on the ground."

Ronald took out his notebook again.

"The aircraft's cannons fire forward, and air-to-air missiles can only be fired at targets at a certain angle in front. So whoever occupies the six o'clock position behind the opponent can shoot down the opponent."

Ronald thought that the name of this dogfight was really appropriate. He wanted to come from his ancestors, who drove fighter jets with only machine guns. It must be this kind of dogfight in the air.

"Now the F-14 in front can suddenly pull up the nose and then reduce the output of the engine." The hand in front of the long leg suddenly raised its head and flew to this high altitude.

"In this case, the speed of the F-14 will decrease, and then maintain a fighting stance with a large angle of attack."

"And the speed of the MiG-21 at the back remains at the original speed of tracking the front plane, and it will rush..." The other hand with the long leg moved forward quickly, rushed over the head, and reached the other hand's Front.

"Will it rush in front of the F-14 Tomcat?" Ronald showed a sudden realization. In this way, the F-14 Tomcat that was originally in the front, one action became the tail of the MiG 21, and it became a predator at the moment of being hunted.

"Yes, you realized it very quickly, so that the Tomcat can appear in the attacking position." Long Feet withdrew both hands.

"What if the MiG-21 also comes here?" Ronald wondered again.

"That's impossible," Longfoot Christie laughed. "This kind of fighting action with a large angle of attack, like sudden braking in the air, can only be done by a twin-engine heavy fighter. The MiG-21 was caught by the Tomcat like this, I'm afraid There is no escape."

"Hmm," Ronald wrote down again. This meal is very cost-effective. This kind of detail can be put into the script, the audience can enjoy it, and the technology is basically in line with the capabilities of the F-14.

"However, not everyone can do this kind of action. Only those ace pilots with perennial flying experience can do it."

"Why? Isn't it very simple?" Ronald made a motion of pulling the handbrake of the car with his hand. "Isn't this the air brake?"

"First of all, your action is very correct. The throttle valve of the aircraft's engine decreases backwards and increases forwards. But this action is very dangerous." Longfoot stretched out his hand to simulate a fighter jet.

"When you pull the nose up, reduce the engine output at the same time, so just a little nose swing can easily cause stalls and horizontal spirals."

"Horizontal Spiral?" Ronald asked.

"A stall is when the plane doesn't have forward speed, it doesn't fly forward, the nose starts to rotate in one direction, the whole plane is like a top, it rotates on the horizontal plane, and soon you will crash."

"So scary?"

"Yes, in fact, the early models of the F-14 had similar accidents." Long-legs picked out something that could be said publicly to Ronald.

"Great, these are all good stuff to use in a movie story." Ronald asked the boss to serve hot soup and settled the bill.

"By the way, if we need to install cameras on the plane, which department of the Navy should we contact?"

"You shouldn't go to the Navy, you should go to the manufacturer of the F-14, Grumman. They'll be interested."

"Really? Will they help me put a camera on the plane and test it?"

"Yes, trust me, they will definitely help, maybe for free." Longlegs finished drinking the hot soup, stood up with Ronald, and prepared to return to the base.

Grumman's expensive new order was questioned by the Navy. As long as this film can be made to show the elegance and lethality of the Tomcat in front of the American people, it will definitely get the follow-up order.