“Top Gun: Maverick”: Best Movie This Year

Release Date：May/27/2022

Genre：Action/Drama

Director：Joseph Kosinski

Cast：Tom Cruise、Jon Hamm、Jennifer Connelly、Val Kilmer、Miles Teller、Ed Harris

Viola's Rating：9.0

After 36 years of wait, when the audience sit at the theater, hearing Kenny Loggin’s Danger Zone and the electric guitar solo in Top Gun Anthem hit, watching the nostalgic lighting cast upon the fighter jets on the aircraft carrier with goosebumps exploding on their skin, tears in their eyes, moviegoers know that Maverick is back on the big screen.

As the official sequel to “Top Gun,” this action drama follows Pete Mitchell (Tom Cruise) on his journey after more than thirty years of service as one of the Navy's top aviators. He is now at where he belongs, trying to go beyond the normal limits as a brave test pilot and dodging the advancement in rank that would ground him from flying to the sky.

Being released in 21st century, “Top Gun: Maverick” doesn’t rely a lot on backlots, green screens or visual effects. Instead, Cruise insisted on location shooting, which gives the feature film amazing cinematography with each fighter jet equipped ten cameras inside the cockpit and outside the fuselage. All actors played in “Top Gun: Maverick” received official pilot training, and all the attractive landscapes and different terrains shown in the film were captured perfectly with location shooting as if the audience are sitting on the plane and witnessing the view themselves.

Aficionados of “Top Gun” will find “Top Gun: Maverick” very nostalgic with all the vintage signatures such as the fighter jets, Mitchell’s jacket, keychain, his motorcycle, etc. Shots paid tributes to and simulated what moviegoers saw in the previous flick also evoke memories.

Besides the abovementioned Danger Zone and Top Gun Anthem, all scores and songs in the soundtrack is worth looking forward to. Not only classic song from “Top Gun” like  You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling was included, Lady Gaga also wrote a new song, Hold My Hand, for “Top Gun: Maverick.” If the soundtrack of the previous motion picture appeals to you, this one won’t disappoint you.

Aside from all the awesome aspects “Top Gun: Maverick” has, the factor X of the movie’s success is no other than the leading actor, Tom Cruise. He not only played Maverick again, brought the good old memories back to the audience, but also made “Top Gun: Maverick” a “Mission Impossible” picture. Moviegoers get to see Cruise perform all sorts of incredible pilot tricks for real, and this time, as a captain, as a teacher.

All in all, “Top Gun: Maverick” is no doubt the best feature film in 2022 so far, and it excellently handed over to the next generation. No matter whether there’s a sequel or not, Captain Mitchell’s mission has completed successfully.

Picture Credit: IMDb