‘Crimson Tide’ (1995) is a red-letter submarine suspenser

“Crimson Tide” (1995) is the apex of the Nineties action style of shaky handheld camerawork and men seeking the upper hand via authoritative voices and swearing – in clever ways when calm, in tossed-off ways when stressed. While this Simpson/Bruckheimer school of filmmaking would become excessive and fall out of favor a decade later, it’s at its best here, with Tony Scott at the conn.

A big, simple movie

Watched 30 years later, it’s remarkable how “Crimson Tide” is actually minimalist without projecting that vibe. It seems like the big, muscle-flexing war movie it pretends to be, but if you think about it, it takes place mostly on a submarine. The performative bombast and confidence is appropriately reflected in the two leads: Gene Hackman is the captain, Ramsey, and Denzel Washington is his second-in-command, Hunter.

For someone who has been in the Navy, the script by Michael Schiffer and Richard P. Henrick is perhaps ridiculous. To a layperson like me, it rings true. I don’t think the film relies on a viewer’s ignorance, though. Plenty of wide-audience military actioners make a layperson smirk at the silliness (see the following year’s “The Rock”), but we go along with it for the sake of dumb fun.

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That’s never the case with “Crimson Tide.” Partially, it’s because it moves so fast. But we do have time to absorb the conflict: The USS Alabama receives an order to launch its nuclear weapons at Russia, then it gets a mysterious partial follow-up. Ramsey wants to launch the nukes, Hunter wants to try to get the rest of that second message; their underlings all must search their own consciences.

Though the suspense never relents after an amusing start where the veteran and the aspirant meet, we likewise are always thinking about the issues. Does the Navy’s chain of command solve problems or create them, or both? Do – and should – military personnel just follow orders, or is there room for moral judgments? And … what parts of the movie are accurate and what aren’t?

Many characters must make personal judgments. Viggo Mortensen’s Weps, a friend of Hunter’s but a longtime member of Ramsey’s team, finds his conscience tossed back and forth as furiously as a sub caught in an explosion’s wake. (Other supporting roles go to Matt Craven, George Dzundza, James Gandolfini, Ricky Schroder, Steve Zahn, Daniel von Bargen and Ryan Phillippe.)

The tension of almost-war

But “Crimson Tide” doesn’t address the legal consequences. Considering the number of disobeyed orders in this film, I’d bet in reality several of these characters would be court-martialed, some even executed.

It’s unfortunate that Scott and company don’t go there; in the end, I must accept it’s just entertainment. That said, the final message remains harrowing even if it applies only to the film’s fictional world: As of 1996, the final decision on launching nukes now rests with the president. (Yeah, no way that could go wrong.)

It’s interesting to note the other places “Crimson Tide” doesn’t go. We never see the action aboard the enemy Russian sub. We never see the supposed two other U.S. subs in the region. We never cut to boardroom decisions in the U.S. or Russia, nor to terrified citizens watching the news. Instead, cutaway shots are to countdown clocks, sonar screens and depth gauges.

Scott keeps us on the USS Alabama for the hottest stretch imaginable of the Cold War; it’s like the Cuban Missile Crisis from the grunts’ perspective rather than the president’s. These men don’t have the big picture, so the film gives us none either, and therefore we share their feeling of tension.

Things could go haywire at any moment if a scene or line of dialog were to ring false, but that never happens. At least not to the degree that we want to get off the boat, an offer Ramsey makes during one of the intense moments. Of course, these men have no choice. “Crimson Tide” holds us in such taut suspense that we hardly have a choice either.