- Tim Riley
- Posted On
‘Hunter Killer’ floats thrills; ‘New Amsterdam’ on TV
HUNTER KILLER (Rated R)
Noting that the producers of “Olympus Has Fallen” are behind the Gerard Butler post-Cold War military thriller “Hunter Killer” comes as no surprise. Once again, the leading man is tossed into a dangerous rescue attempt.
Gerard Butler, who’s also one of the many producers, is a natural fit for the action hero on a mission to save a world leader. His Captain Joe Glass is the new commander of the USS Arkansas ordered to find a missing submarine in the Arctic Circle.
The source material for this thriller comes from the novel “Firing Point,” written by George Wallace, the retired commander of the nuclear submarine the USS Houston, along with award-winning journalist and best-selling author Don Keith.
The book’s action-packed plot, based on Wallace’s extensive knowledge, twisted and turned through a Russian nationalist coup, Black Ops Navy SEAL mission and an attack submarine captain faced with decisions that could ignite another World War.
You could be forgiven for thinking that the plot sounds like it was ripped from the pages of a Tom Clancy novel. In any event, it is loaded with thrills that should work for an entertaining diversion even if many critics scoff at the whole enterprise.
Following the script of Wallace’s novel, “Hunter Killer,” which refers to a special type of naval vessel designed to approach the enemy without detection, involves the necessity of the Americans stepping in to thwart a military overthrow of a foreign government.
In the process of locating the missing US sub close to a Russian naval port, Glass gets word from Washington, by way of Gary Oldman’s grizzled Admiral Charles Donnegan, that a rogue Russian general has kidnapped his country’s president (Alexander Diachenko) in a brazen coup.
Teaming up with Navy SEALs on the ground, Glass, much to the consternation of his dubious crew, makes common cause with the Russian sub Captain Andropov (Michael Nyqvist) that he rescues from a sunken vessel.
As it turns out, without the Russian captain’s help to navigate the treacherous entry, booby-trapped with mines and sonar devices, to the Russian naval base of Polyarny, Glass and his crew wouldn’t come close to surviving the journey.
The traitorous Russian Admiral Durov (Michael Gor), serving as the defense minister, obviously seems keen on igniting a military conflict with the United States while using the absence of the Russian president to justify his reckless offensive.
Meanwhile, the action gets really tense with the quartet of Navy SEALs penetrating the Polyarny camp to liberate the president in a hail of gunfire from the Russian soldiers either loyal to or duped by Durov.
Much of the action, though, takes place in the confined space of the submarine, which not only allows the stoic Captain Glass to command his vessel with a determined rebellious streak but touches upon the conventional but suspenseful tropes of underwater danger.
Fitting for edge-of-the-seat thrills, “Hunter Killer,” coming off more like a throwback to the last century’s geopolitical struggles than a contemporary thriller, is surprisingly gripping action drama that can be fun.
‘NEW AMSTERDAM’ ON NBC NETWORK
If you are not getting enough medical dramas on other networks, such as ABC’s “The Good Doctor” or FOX’s “The Resident” and “9-1-1,” then maybe you have time in your busy nighttime viewing to tune into NBC’s new series “New Amsterdam.”
The question that only you can answer is whether “New Amsterdam” should be added to your must-watch list. But it might take only one episode to figure out that the medical cases seem designed to tug on heartstrings as much as they are intended to stir taut drama.
The leading figure is Dr. Max Goodwin (Ryan Eggold), an iconoclastic practitioner appointed as the unlikely medical director of New York’s New Amsterdam public hospital and who’s bound to run afoul of the hospital’s trustees.
To shake up the lethargy that afflicts a public facility, the good doctor who prefers to be called by his first name fires the entire cardiac surgery unit, putting the staff on edge while the rest of us wonder how long he will last in the job.
Just as quickly, he rehires Dr. Floyd Reynolds (Jocko Sims), an African-American graduate of Yale medical school. It’s just as well because there is a romantic subplot involving Dr. Reynolds and Dr. Lauren Bloom (Janet Montgomery), another key character.
What’s a hospital without a psychiatry department where the chairman is Dr. Iggy Frome (Tyler Labine), a rumpled figure whose appearance and demeanor seems fitting for a weary yet caring college professor.
Every episode introduces various types of patients, each one drawing the attention of Max (how does he find the time?), whose catchphrase is “How can I help?,” from the kid from Liberia with signs of Ebola to a troubled young woman in the care of Dr. Frome.
“New Amsterdam” looks to end each week with tidy resolution of every patient’s ordeal. This might help prevent any thought of hanging in for the long run unless you are wondering about what Dr. Goodwin is not revealing.
Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.
