I’ll bet that plenty of Russians enjoy this Cold War thriller — Sean Connery charms everyone. Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan tale is a real winner, with a a cast that really shines: Connery, Alec Baldwin, Scott Glenn, Sam Neill, James Earl Jones, Richard Jordan, Peter Firth, Tim Curry, Stellan Skarsgård and Jeffrey Jones. The seagoing tale has marvelous action above the waterline, and effects underwater that impress even when they don’t fully convince. We can see Alec Baldwin’s stardom being confirmed — he’s terrific.

The Hunt for Red October
4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray Steelbook + Digital
Paramount
1990 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 135 min. / Street Date June 29, 2026 / Available from Amazon
Starring: Sean Connery, Alec Baldwin, Scott Glenn, Sam Neill, James Earl Jones, Joss Ackland, Richard Jordan, Peter Firth, Tim Curry, Stellan Skarsgård, Jeffrey Jones, Courtney B. Vance, Fred Thompson, Anthony Peck, A.C. Lyles.
Cinematography: Jan de Bont
Production Designer: Terence Marsh
Art Directors: William Cruse, Dianne Wager, Donald B. Woodruff
Costume Design: James W. Tyson
Visual Effects supervisors: Scott Squires
Model Shop supervisor: Gregory Jein
Visual Effects director of Cinematography (Boss Film): David K. Stewart
Film Editors: Dennis Virkler, John Wright
Composer: Basil Poledouris
Screenplay by Larry Ferguson, Donald Stewart from the novel by Tom Clancy
Produced by Mace Neufeld
Directed by John McTiernan

Here’s a Cold War U.S. versus the Russkies saga that doesn’t offend anybody — it’s got Tom Clancy’s disdain for limp diplomacy, but its heroes are humanists looking for a solution without bloodshed. The cat & mouse sub hunt finds plenty of good guys and a few schemers among the officers and politicians. Ever read about the World War III scenarios reportedly averted by Russian naval personnel  Stanislav Petrov and  Vasily Arkhipov, that refused to fire nuclear weapons?  Their kind are on both sides.

The hugely enjoyable The Hunt for Red October introduced many audiences to the advanced submarine service along with a new kind of miliary espionage. The fall of the Berlin Wall made the film’s heated Cold War deadlock more than a little obsolete, so the show begins with a message stating that the events of the story took place before the Gorbachev glasnost thaw. (A clue to exactly when is a London billboard advertising the musical play Evita.) After forty years of hate directed against ruthless Soviet aggressors, audiences felt relieved by Sean Connery’s charismatic Lithuanian sea captain.

The gruff Scot heads a cast of pros, including the up-and-coming Alex Baldwin as the first screen incarnation of Tom Clancy’s handsome special agent Jack Ryan. He begins as a researcher with special insights about the enemy: his knowledge of the Lithuanian Sea Captain remind us of the German military historian in  Patton, who has an in-depth understanding of the maverick American General.

Straight from his mega-hit Die Hard, director John McTiernan enlivens the high-tech details of submarine warfare without slacking off on the murder thriller aspect or the diplomatic chicanery on both sides. The jump to 4K brings out Jan de Bont’s sharp cinematography, and flatters the film’s visual effects, that use both traditional and early CGI techniques.

With the help of CIA specialist Skip Tyler (Jeffrey Jones), Naval intelligence analyst Jack Ryan (Alec Baldwin) brings an alarming technical advancement in Soviet submarining to the attention of Admiral James Greer (James Earl Jones). Far away in arctic waters, the new invention is making its debut. Senior Soviet sub skipper Captain Marko Ramius (Sean Connery) sets sail in Red October, a new craft equipped with a silent ‘caterpillar drive’ propulsion system. U.S. security strategist Dr. Jeffrey Pelt (Richard Jordan) is alarmed when the Red October disappears from all detection systems. The tension doubles when the entire Russian navy seems to be trying to find the sub as well: it is feared that Ramius may be trying to start WW3 on his own.

(According to the incredibly reliable Wikipedia, ‘caterpillar drive’ is not science fiction but a real thing called  magneto-hydrodynamic propulsion. It’s meant to work like a jet, only underwater … and is also described as noisier than a normal sub turbine.)

The junior-ranking Ryan proposes another theory based on his knowledge of Ramius: that the sub commander Ramius wants to defect, and bring the Red October with him. Ryan is dispatched to a U.S. sub captained by Commander Bart Mancuso (Scott Glenn), whose sonar expert Seaman Jones (Courtney B. Vance) is tracking a subtle audio trail left by the stealth craft. Meanwhile, on board the Red October, Captain Ramius and his first officer Vasily Borodin (Sam Neill) are keeping their real plans secret from their crew …

The Hunt for Red October remains a high point in the progress of military action fantasies. The well-paced, fairly plausible story is peppered with interesting personalities. The relative newcomer Alec Baldwin shines as a candidate for serious movie stardom — his analyst turned super-spy is the dream of every cubicle dweller eager to ‘get out in the field.’  The hardware on view is impressive as well; Navy cooperation permitted seagoing scenes with real aircraft and surface vessels. The enormous Russian submarine is represented by excellent model work, and effective if somewhat cartoonish underwater scenes.

The all-male cast presents an exciting array of action men, of both the gung-ho and cool customer variety. Desk man Alec Baldwin looks appropriately out of place, gasping for air on the floor of Scott Glenn’s attack submarine, trying to explain his sudden arrival. Scott Glenn assays his standard hard-nosed professional, leavened with a refreshingly open mind. CIA boss James Earl Jones is a jolly spymaster and Richard Jordan a sly negotiator. The show represents our intelligence agencies as competent, creative and cooperative — the only part of the tale we have a hard time buying.

Modern movies sometimes find creative ways to bridge the language barrier. October’s Russians begin speaking in Russian, and then change to English. Actor Peter Firth carries the transition: he says the first half of a speech in English as the camera zooms in … and when it zooms back, both he and Sean Connery have switched to English. It works. It’s a less-confusing refinement of John Huston’s language-switch trick way back in  The Kremlin Letter. In that show, several conversations began in Russian or Polish, and segue’d to English. It’s as if we viewers suddenly understand the new langugage. Later on in Red October, when the U.S. and Russian seamen meet face to face, the language barriers are up again for a few seconds. Confusion is avoided, but we do wonder if we’re hearing English-English, or Russian-English.

The script stays true to Tom Clancy’s vision of Russians — they’re a polished pack of Cold War clichés. Captain Ramius is the epitome of a good Russkie: he’s turning traitor to his country on pacifist principles. Ramius’s second-in-command Captain Borodin (Sam Neill of  Until the End of the World) is charming and soulful. Like all good comrades, Borodin daydreams of living in Montana and driving a pickup truck. Doctor Petrov (Tim Curry of Rocky Horror Picture Show) is easily maneuvered by Ramius to help provide a clever cover for the mutineeers’ defection. The ship’s commie idealogue Ivan Putin (!! Peter Firth of  Lifeforce) makes an early exit, but not before he reveals his total hypocrisy.

Further down the evolutionary chain is Captain Tupolev (Stellan Skarsgård of  Sentimental Value), a sub commander ordered to sink the Red October. Tupolev is presented as a hissable villain, the human equivalent of an attack dog. Yes, it’s only decent that Captain Ramius should steal his own submarine and sneak it off to the Americans. If more Soviets were better Americans, the world would have far fewer problems.

This movie genre worships weapons and military might, with the proviso that ‘all the good stuff’ should belong to the U.S. of A.. Yet it’s far less hawkish than Clint Eastwood’s Firefox. The dozen or so main players are given great characterizations, even ex- presidential candidate Fred Thompson as an Admiral. The Pentagon politicos disapprove of the stealth submarine with the sematic argument that it is a ‘first-strike weapon’ and therefore against ‘the rule book.’  Ramius agrees, which is one reason he defects.

Politically, The Hunt for Red October is a feel-good pacifier, a cheerful militarist fairy tale. Thanks to inherent American initiative, courage and derring-do, we naturally make the doofus Commies look like … doofus Commies. As a movie experience, it’s great fun and superior to most of the shows in its class. Two hours with Sean Connery is always time well spent.

We sure like the supporting cast. The presence of favorite Richard Jordan reminds us that he died much too soon. His character in in David Lynch’s  Dune should have had his own chapter instead of just 90 seconds’ screen time. If planetary justice prevails, some enterprising disc company will revive Victor Nunez’s  A Flash of Green, a 1984 winner with Jordan, Ed Harris and Blair Brown. It hasn’t been seen much since the 1980s.

Suspenseful underwater maneuvers show Ramius’ superior naval skill, and Jack Ryan gets his big action scene going one-on-one in a shootout in the Red October’s reactor room. Ramius warns Ryan to be careful with the gunplay — some things in a reactor room are best not hit by bullets. The advice ‘Don’t puncture the cooling system’ is right up there with ‘don’t cross the streams.’

I haven’t seen another Cold War movie nearly as engaging and compelling as The Hunt for Red October. Every step of the adventure is exciting, and when the action logic becomes strained, we’re carried along by the conviction of the actors. We particularly like the scene of Ryan’s transfer to Scott Glenn’s submarine, by helicopter in the middle of a storm … we fully understand the danger of the situation.

The movie was always a sure winner. McTiernan even generates excitement out of scenes with men standing around listening to sonar ‘signatures.’ Actor Courtney B. Vance is excellent as the Navy’s sonar expert, nailing a basically thankless role. As a tech whiz kid who impresses the audience, he’s Red October’s version of the colorful computer hacker-thief Theo (Clarence Gilyard Jr.) in McTiernan’s Die Hard. Jack Ryan’s insecurity on a normal passenger jet is likewise ported over from Die Hard … New York cop Bruce Willis shares the same discomfort.

When we first reviewed Red October my ignorance of the concept of Passive Sonar was pointed out by knowledgeable readers like John Paul Henry. Valuable contact Avie Hearn took the time to write a note, giving me a good dumbed-down explanation. From August 05, 2008:

Glenn: You may wish to add this to your The Hunt for Red October review notes:

Submarines listen for the sounds of other subs via hydrophones, which are entirely passive. Astute viewers of the film may recall some of the characters’ use of the word ‘cavitation,’ which refers to, literally, a cavity or hole left in the water as a large submerged object passes through it. This creates a continual and distinct sound as this cavity collapses and fills with water after the boat’s passing. Standard screws or ‘caterpillar drive,’ there would still be cavitation, allowing an enemy to know of the boat’s presence.

There is also the matter of the distinctive sound created by a submarines screws (propellers). For many years U.S. submarines had a tactical advantage because the Soviets didn’t possess milling equipment sophisticated enough to produce screws as efficient at cutting through the water as U.S. subs. The more efficient the screw, the less sound it makes for an enemy’s hydrophones to pick up. In the 1980s the U.S. government applied sanctions to Japan’s Toshiba Corp. for having sold exactly that kind of milling equipment to the USSR, even though U.S.-Japanese military-trade treaties expressly forbade them to. As a result, Soviet subs got a great deal quieter, and U.S. craft had that much more trouble finding them.

All good and patriotic Americans may now wish to junk their Toshiba TVs and other audio-video gear and replace them with Sonys. — Avie

Paramount’s 4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray Steelbook + Digital of The Hunt for Red October is the studio’s third 4K release of this title, but the first that CineSavant has caught up with. The movie certainly looks better than what we saw back in the laserdisc days, when the Ventura Blvd. store Dave’s The Laser Place played it on all their monitors to show off their then- state of the art home video equipment. Marketers must have determined that steelbook packaging is a big customer draw, as this new edition doesn’t offer new extras or mention a new remaster. To me it’s the equal of the theatrical experience, missing only the bonus of several moments of spontaneous audience approval.

Jan De Bont’s cinematography really jumps out at us in 4K. Those sub interiors stack levels of darkness around the characters, and the enhanced contrast range of 4K really allows it to pop. Some traveling matte shots that looked interesting in 1990 now stick out — such as the concluding views on the Red October’s conning tower, where the lighting seems a little too optimized.

The same wider spectrum of contrast allows the colorist to leave those CGI underwater scenes as dark as they want to be … when earlier transfers naturally pumped everything up to be more visible. The result is that the underwater effects we called ‘cartoonish’ are less so.

We still want to ‘just say no’ to CGI’s ability to make the Virtual Camera perform crane shot acrobatics. Early CGI enabled terrific, impossible camera moves … that immediately tell the viewer that he’s watching an animated show. The later  Apollo 13 has a similar showoff ‘corkscrew crane shot’ of a rocket takeoff, that pulls us right out of the film. When CGI views imitate camera angles that a normal film crew could have taken, we are much more likely to believe what we’re seeing.

On the other hand, all those easy-to-read underwater shots with hundreds of feet of clear visibility are helpful for the audience to understand what’s going on … so they get a pass.

This edition has only two extras, most likely ported over from earlier releases. John McTiernan offers a full commentary and Beneath the Surface is an okay making-of piece featuring the usual actor interviews. A trailer is included as well. Of note are Paramount’s generous language choices, audio and subtitle: English, French, Spanish and Portuguese … and a lot more.

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

The Hunt for Red October
4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray Steelbook + Digital rates:
Movie: Excellent
Video: Excellent
Sound: Excellent  English, French, Spanish Portuguese
Supplements:
Audio commentary by director John McTiernan
featurette Beneath the Surface
Trailer.
Deaf and Hearing-impaired Friendly? YES; Subtitles: English, French, Spanish Portuguese (feature only)
Packaging: One Blu-ray in Keep case
Reviewed: June 20, 2026
(7533red)

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