Harrison Ford’s second outing as Jack Ryan would be his last. Taking over for his mentor Admiral Greer, Ryan finds that he’s been left in the dark about some covert forces that are waging a guerilla war on some drug dealers.
A yacht that belonged to one of U.S. President Bennett’s (Donald Moffat) friends is stopped by the coast guard and it’s discovered that the man and his family have been killed and their bodies dumped overboard.
It turns out that the president’s friend had been skimming money, to the tune of 620 million, from Ernesto Escobedo (Miguel Sandoval), a Columbian drug dealer, and when he found out he ordered the man’s entire family slaughtered.
The president is angry that his friend has been murdered in cold blood and angrily tells national security advisor James Cutter (Harris Yulin) that these drug dealers are a clear and present danger to the United States.
Which indirectly gives Cutter permission to go after Escobedo so he goes to deputy director of operations of the CIA Robert Ritter (Henry Czerny) to begin covert operations against the drug lord. Ritter will only do so if Cutter provides an official document stating this as his “get out of jail free” card.
Ritter enlists John Clark (Willem Dafoe) to head up the operations in Columbia to do damage to Escobedo. Meanwhile Jack Ryan’s (Harrison Ford) mentor Admiral Greer (James Earl Jones) has been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and he appoints Jack to take his place as deputy of director of intelligence.
One of the first things on Ryan’s plate is to go before Congress and request an increase of funds for 70 million dollars, unwittingly allowing Cutter and Ritter’s operation against the drug dealers to be funded. Since Ryan knows nothing about the operation he promises before Congress that these funds will not go for troops or black-ops, both of which they’ll be funding.
Ryan gets suspicious when a bomb destroys the villa where some drug lords are meeting, barely missing killing Escobedo, and it has some traces of being a missile and not a homemade explosive device and begins to dig deeper.
His research causes Ritter to pull the plug on the operation and leave the troops in Columbia high and dry. Ryan then goes to Columbia to rescue those stranded troops or what’s left of them.
Harrison Ford would step into Tom Clancy’s world for the second and last time with this adaptation of the novel. This one seems to have more political power plays than the other two films and sometimes it can get a tad confusing exactly what position the players have.
Ryan also doesn’t use the greatest judgment when he travels to Colombia as a one-man army to rescue the abandoned soldiers.
It’s typical Hollywood action hero as Ryan takes on the drug cartels with the help of a few others. I was especially amused when he just walked up to Escobedo’s hacienda and presented his business card for entry.
There’s also the “evil Jack Ryan” in the form of a Cuban intelligence officer, Felix Cortez (Joaquim de Almeida), who works for Escobedo and charms a friend of Cathy Ryan (Anne Archer) to gain intelligence about her boss.
The President is not exactly portrayed as upstanding and isn’t exactly a righteous figure wanting to rid the world of the drug trade but is more interested in the 620 million that his late buddy left in the bank. The film still has its moments but Patriot Games is the better of the two in my opinion. They do both seem to suffer from being Hollywoodized, Games’ ending and Dangers’ one-man army raid.
Clear and Present Danger is presented in a 1080p high definition transfer (2.35:1). Special features include the 26 minute “Behind the Danger” which is cast and crew interviews, in standard definition. Next is the 2-minute theatrical trailer, in high definition.
Clear and Present Danger is a film full of action and intrigue but suffers a few of the problems that I had with the movie that preceded it. Even with those niggles it’s a good film and I wished that Ford would’ve tried another in comparison to the Ryan film that followed this one.
Clear and Present Danger [Blu-ray] is now available at Amazon . Visit the DVD database for more information.
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