nan | 楠木

The Sum of All Fears is quite an engaging Jack Ryan thriller. In terms of capturing the audience, it can reasonably hold itself against its Jack Ryan predecessors, The Hunt for Red October, Patriot Games and Clear and Present Danger; in terms of a competent Jack Ryan, Ben Affleck however is no match for Alec Baldwin or Harrison Ford.
But fortunately(or unfortunately, depending on how you looked at it), the film does not rely on Affleck being convincing. The story more or less sells itself, and the style of the film, cold, silent and discomforting, is perfect for the story. As a minor spoiler, the nuclear blast scene is perfectly done. There’s no sound, just the visual as we see the shock wave of the blast easily topple the president’s motorcade and bring down Ryan’s helicopter.
The ending 20 minutes of the film, however, falls rather flat on the brilliant construction of the whole film. The climax is more of an anti-climax. But then again, there’s really not much room to maneuver with the given conditions of what the plot had developed into. Still, there could have been much better exeucution.
7/10