Flight of the Intruder (1991) - Mover Ruins Movies Featuring Wombat (Pt 1 of 2) 

It's nice when the movie actually has this thing called a plot and a script.

Most underrated movie with regard to air combat. Love the intruders. Rest In Peace Brad Johnson.

"The average literacy rate was higher than it is now" Spot on!

VA-35, USS Coral Sea, 69-70. We lost 3 aircraft in training & 5 crew. One ran into a mountain in Virginia, no survivors. Two others had a mid air (clipped wings or something), one survivor. Lost one in combat on Tonkin Gulf, no survivors. On the brown shirts & working. I was a plane captain for a while then realized the dangers of the flight deck (air wing had a few killed there , several seriously injured) so I transferred to the engine fuel system shop. I took a picture of one of our plane captains while he was sitting on the edge of the flight deck. He was exhausted & the pic shows that. It was a rather rough line period. The most grueling thing they did was something called spot & re-spot. Plane would comeback from a mission, get parked (the spot part) then might have to move the bird to another location for some reason or other (the re-spot part). This could happen several times before the next mission. The bird would have to be tied down with tie down chains, un-tied, moved to another location then re-tied. The chains were carried in a canvas sack from location to location and they were heavy. The ship was taking on ordinance (500 pounders & CBUs) about every 2 to 3 days. We had one that had to fly south to DaNang because of a bird strike. The powerplant guys & the airframe guys shared the same shop (if you could call the small work place a shop) so I got the story form one of them. Seems that some large white bird struck the canopy (not the windscreen) on the BN side & blew a large hole in it, bird going inside. First thought, AAA. BN has no aircraft controls, gets concerned about pilot because he is just an observer if the pilot gets knocked out. BN: You OK?? Pilot you? OK here, what happened? Blood under red light looks kind of like motor oil & the bird splattered the stuff all over the inside of the canopy & windscreen as it made a couple of circuits around the inside the A-6. They joked about it afterwards but not at the time. Airframe guys had a hell of a mess to clean up. All the instruments in the plane were analog, the computer was a drum type under the BN seat and prone to failure. I don't know much about the electronics but there were an array of EW counter measures on the center console. The chaff dispenser was just aft of the exhaust of the #1 engine. Chaff packet (looked like a large SOS pad) would get shot out into the jet exhaust turning the chaff packet to form a fine cloud as soon as it hit the exhaust. The plane had no ailerons, it had something called spoilerons. Both wings had spoilers on the upper side of the wings. There was a RAT on the upper part of the left wing that could provide emergency electric service in an emergency. There was no hydraulic backup, if the engines quit turning the bird continues flying in whatever configuration it was in, basically has the aerodynamics of a falling brick. On the scene where the squadron skipper tries to eject the canopy, Don't do dat. The canopy slides aft on a set of rails so if the airframe is damaged the canopy can get jammed leaving the leading edge of the canopy right over the crews head and no way out. Eject through the canopy only. A-6 was built by Grumman and the nickname for the factory was "The Grumman Iron Works" because their aircraft were quite tough. Air wing 15 came back from that deployment minus 19 airmen, mostly aircrew. Some MIA, some KIA- BNR (body not recovered).We also lost an E-2 Hawkeye and the other carrier on line with us (the Constellation) lost a C-2 greyhound with several passengers aboard. I never re-upped. I think that this was filmed on the USS Ranger. The Ranger was another carrier that we shared line duty with. Also we were tied up at Alameda on the same pier. Probably info overload but here it is.

In the book, the engine flame out was caused by Jake accidentally pulling the throttles back into cutoff when the MIG causes him to panic. It's part of the theme of PTSD affecting his ability to do his job.

I really enjoyed this film as a kid and due to that tried to learn all I could about the Intruder. One of the little snippets I picked up was a story about a A-6 pilot after the Gulf War in 91 he got home and was trading stories with his dad who had been an A-6 pilot in Vietnam. It turned out the son had gone to war in the same aircraft (not just the same type the same actual airframe) that his father had.

Yes! Finally! Fighter pilots make movies. Bomber pilots make HISTORY!

Nam pilots are a different breed my father lost three aircraft in Vietnam still alive today. He flew cobras in Nam, the only man i was ever scared of and respected growing up and till this day. A true warrior.

👍🏻 My father was one of the voices in the intro. F-105 Thud, 421 TFS Korat Thailand.

In the book, the flameout of the engines when he was evading the missile from the Mig was because Cool Hand actually accidently cut the engines totally instead of just going to idle. Cole noticed but didnt say anything. On the ship they figured he did it purposely and his legend of being "Cool" increased.

As an eighth grader I stole this book from my Dad and read it. Dad was just shy of retiring from the Navy as a twenty year aviator. He went through flight training with Stephen Coonts, but flew A-7s in the fleet.

One of my favorite movies. My buddy who was a Navy A-6 guy was in charge of special effects on this movie, he made the models, coordinated the air to air shots, etc. He is going to be on my podcast in the near future talking about making this movie.

Man been waiting for the mover ruins movies of this for a long time But I had a feeling there wouldn’t be much to ruin and I was right

Hey Mover, fellow AA pilot here. I had the honor of riding the B/N seat during flight tests of the A6 re-wing program. Since Coonts consulted on the movie, the flying scenes are extremely realistic as verified by my experience with the airplane and many conversations with A6 aviators. An A6 simulator was used so no fake instruments or indications like in Top Gun. Uncanny reproduction of radar imagery from the era (they may have used real radar footage). The pilot’s screen shown in the movie was the real instrument called VDI and was a combined navigation/terrain avoidance and targeting system. Extremely advanced for it’s time. Kicking the computer as well as the B/N and pilot callouts are spot on real. The movie may not be perfect but it’s a hell of a lot better than any other air combat movie I can think of and a great tribute to the Vietnam era aviators.

I did 4 tours on the Ranger ('69-72) as a pencil-necked computer geek working in the Intelligence Center (IOIC) up on the O-3 level. There was, in fact, a TV in every ready room. The flight briefs were done from IOIC with a 2-way audio feed to handle questions. When secured from flight ops we switched the feed to the ship's TV/movie channel. We also used IOIC as a secure poker site because only one of the ship's MAA's had sufficient security clearance to enter the space and he LOVED his poker games! One of the briefing maps hinged off the bulkhead to provide a 7-seat, green felt table!

I think Stephen Coonts was also a consultant on the movie, since he wrote the book and flew A-6s. It speaks to the authenticity of the movie. The thing with Willem Dafoe kicking the console after the malfunction.....that was an actual thing.

"Grafton, I thought I grounded you.... Sir, I am grounded..."

This was filmed on board the USS Independence CV-62. All the action scenes were filmed during a two week sea period of the coast of San Diego. Other scenes were filmed in port onboard! Most of the Bigger names in the film were very busy and never really took the time to mingle with the crew! However Danny Glover took time most every day to sit with some of the enlisted crew on the mess decks. Outstanding Gentleman was he! I was lucky to have served on-board the Indy. Those few weeks were great! I even got to return to the Indy when she took over for the Midway in Japan!

I love Wombat's expression as he's watching .. like a 14 year old boy who's girlfriend just invited him over because her mom and dad are out for the night!! 🤣😏

That Sam City bomb run is hard to top as an air combat movie sequence

Willem Dafoe is perfect in this movie and definitely its most redeeming quality for me...🤣 I actually can't say I like this movie as much now as I did when I was younger but your review actually has given me some added appreciation for it.

This was an excellent movie. I also enjoyed Brad Johnson in the much-maligned "Always". I was struck when Brad Johnson died earlier this year, RIP, and thanks for the wonderful portrayals that continue to leave a grand legacy of aircraft and the men that flew them.

Saw this in the movies, I probably 12 or 13 years old at the time. It was such an underrated movie back in the day. Can't wait for part 2.

I remember seeing this in theatres with my gf and her cousin. Dude was stationed on the Lincoln CVN 72, and he was raving at us about this movie, _"We gotta go see this movie, man, I LOVE that airplane! I have seen em come back all shot up, but that jet could take the punishment and bring guys back alive!"_ So we went and saw it, and Ricky (Gf's cuz) said it was the most accurate Naval aviation ever made.

Great review! Fun fact. The reason the Navy was so helpful was because they were the publisher of the book the movie was based on, so they already had rights to the movie. The author talked about it on the FPP.

Filmed on uss independence cv 62. I was a aircraft handler in V-1. Filmed during work ups 89. VA 96 was squadron. Being on that ship, working on that deck was incredible!

For me "Flight Of The Intruder" was honestly neck and neck with "Top Gun" and "By The Dawn's Early Light" when I was a kid as my favorite aviation movies.

WOW! I didn't realize how "star studded" this movie was. Tom Sizemore (Saving Pvt Ryan), a young Ving Rhames (with hair!!), Dann Florek (Law & Order SVU)!! Impressive!

Not really “ruining” this movie, more like “enjoying the hell out of it”….

It’s a great flick! It was available for streaming, not too long ago. My wife’s uncle was an A-6 pilot. He’s got some great stories. Super cool airplane.

Such a great movie, nothing to ruin, just watch and enjoy. So glad you left the “down town” singing in.

Been waiting for this mover ruins movies for literally years. Fighter pilots make movies. Bomber pilots make history

A buddy of mine was stationed at Cubi Point when this movie came out. The real "Box Man" was base commander at the time and Stephen Coonts came out there for a premiere party.

Ayyy my dad worked on this movie as a model maker! Pretty sure he was the one that painted the miniature planes.

Absolutely love this movie! The Intruder was my favourite aircraft of the era. Sneak and peeks, hop and pops, intel, electronic warfare... the people that flew this baby were legends.

I remember playing the game for this movie on the amiga a lot. It needed a tripple keyboard layout to have all its functions covered and came with a thumbthick manual and also a small book describing the history of the vietnam war. As far i remember it was the first fighterbomber simulation that could be played multiplayer via linkcable.

I just finished reading Treason Flight, a great read. Finally, Flight of the Intruder.

Finally! I always like the guy puking in the Jeepney in Po city "You have room in here for a pizza and a six pack?" Sure thing. "RALPH!". I really can't think of a bad movie from John Milius.

Great movie! I know it wasn't a flying scene, but I can't believe you didn't leave in the scenes in the bar in "Po-city". At least the scene where there's the exchange with the fighter pilot ("Don't ask a man if he's a fighter pilot. If he is, he'll let you know. If he's not, don't embarrass him.") Now why would a fighter pilot leave that out? :)

Avionics Fire Control Tech Troubleshooter/Final checker certified on the A-6E Swip during the early 90s and in Desert Shield/Storm. Our squadron lost a couple planes with a POW aircrew during that time. The kicking of the ACU prior to their downtown Hanoi run was quite accurate. It was junk. As Tech's, it wasn't uncommon to receive the same faulty equipment stuck in the cycle with repeat identical faults, IMUs and A/D Conv as well. Occasionally after replacing the same serialized unit with a good unit the faulty one would take a rolling trip across the flight deck to ensure it wouldn't rotate into the cycle again. No questions asked by Maintenance or Div Officer. The movie certainly portrayed the true life of the A-6 and its workhorse attitude. It was a living breathing personality to many that worked on her and the crew. A lot of love/hate but she wanted to be treated bad to excel at her purpose. Granted it's not F14 or F18 attractive but she could take a huge beating and still fly. We had ones return with huge holes in her wings, AAA hit in the starboard refueling panel, holes throughout and land the crew safely. Everything must eventually die but that plane holds a real special place in her crew and maintenance personnel hearts. Wouldn't trade a second of my life with the plane for anything. Thanks for your vid guys!

"it's better than topgun, the new one" Good point Mover!

You have no idea how happy it makes me to see you finally do this movie! One of my all time favourites. Thank you!!

FINALLY! You did it! I was anticipating to see your review on this movie ever since I've been watching your channel!! Many thanks.

When I was in, our Flight Doc used to ride with us and he loved it. He was an amateur photographer for his hobby and used to like to take his camera along. I was Guard and my civi job was flying a Cessna Caravan at the time for a DZ .We flew to it and he got some great ppictures.

Man, that was great! Nice to see you guys so impressed with some of the accuracy in it, and it was great to see a young Willem Dafoe in it! I remember liking this film as a kid but can barely remember anything about it now, other than the Prowler model kit i used to have.

As long as you're going old skewl, gentlemen, I'd love to see you ruin "Bat-21" Gene Hackman plays Lt. Col. Iceal Hambleton shot down in Nam and something, SERE, something golf course? The Birddog scenes with Danny Glover are fantastically entertaining. Just a suggestion from an old Jarhead Grunt. You might like ruining it.

"You even say 'huh?' you're gonna be talking to yourself... ' cause I'll be gone." Best. Line. Ever.

Finally, thank you so much for this movie. An all time favorite and underrated af.

Part 2 now , Mover. I've always loved this movie.

I read the book back when it came out and fell in LOVE with the A6. This was before I knew what I looked like! The book is 100 time better than the movie. I think the movie is good, but, the ending in the movie had ALOT of dumb things going on as I heard they were running out of money and had to cut alot out of what they wanted to do in the original screen play. I would suggest to anyone who likes the move, go read the book! It's so good and will really give you an insight into navy aviation during the VM War. This was the 1st book that Stephan Coots wrote and he went all to write several more that were just as great! "Final Flight" is about 14's. Cant say enough. Thank you for reviewing this movie. Wish there were more like this.

So glad you finally got to this one! Can’t wait for Part 2!!!

Absolutely enjoyed this! As a military aviation historian this is one of my favorite movies. Still awaiting for part two!

IIRC, what Cole was kicking was the rotary drum that housed the DIANE software's memory (some sort of core rope memory system) which apparently could get physically stuck. I believe it may have been mentioned in the Fighter Pilot Podcast Intruder episode, but not sure.

Best mover ruins movie yet! This thing is so accurate there’s hardly any ruining happening haha

So glad you finally did this movie! I have been waiting a long time for your to review this one!

So glad to see the two of you doing this movie. I loved the book when I read it, and this came out right at the top of the run-up to Iraq I. Hope all's well with you, and thanks for all you do.

I watched this again a month or so ago, probably the 10th time I’ve watched it. Great movie, wish they had continued it. Hard to believe this movie bombed at the box office, no pun intended…

One of my favorite movies of all time, regardless of genre. Willem Dafoe's character was cool.

I’ve been waiting for this one! Thank you!

My step dad was a Vietnam vet and introduced to this movie. This movie is a hidden gem

I remember playing the Flight of the Intruder flight sim in 1990 after reading the book! It was developed by the same company that did Falcon, Spectrum Holobyte. Instead of being the usual arcade movie tie-in, it tried to be a realistic simulator, replicating the actual navigation and bombing procedures. Unfortunately, in spite of the primitive graphics, it was still too demanding for my Commodore Amiga, but I still had fun. It's too bad they haven't made a real Vietnam-era flight sim since then. (I mean, DCS might have the planes, but does it simulate the GCI and SAM systems of the time?)

I saw this flick in the cinema when it first came out, and I just watched it at home (again) last week. I’ve always enjoyed it. As much as I’ve liked Top Gun, Flight of The Intruder always felt more authentic and organic, and less Hollywood. Maybe I need to read the book. I enjoyed the commentary from Mr. Mover and Mr. Wombat, and I’m looking forward to part 2.

This movie holds a special place for me. Thank you for your review/video of this one. I watched and enjoyed it while going down memory lane.

Mover! Great episode, this is one of my favorite movies! I was also on the TR like you, for the ‘17-‘18 cruise with VMFA-312. Very fond memories on that boat.

Mover - im ashamed, you said earlier you would not do Flight of The Intruder because you did not have anyone as a source for the A-6 to verify information, nor did you feel it was worthy of creating. I offered you to contact someone who was an A-6 driver in Vietnam on the A and B models, but you never got back to me. ----------------------------- so i have info from an actual A-6 driver, who was the father of one of my childhood best friends. Right after Coolhand says nag-nag-nag 3:30 - this is the RADAR ALT indicating low level altitude based on the Altitude Bug, the A model lacked the info from the weapons system to indicate safe dropping altitudes for weapons selected. This was not included until the B Model. 505 was an A-6A. 520 flying IronHand was a B model. The RADAR Scope was an authentic scope, however the icons for the search radar are wrong for the era, they filmed the cockpit scenes from an A-6E which is all they had. the A-6A had much more simplistic icons as symbology, not animated, which the A-6E improved upon. the biggest notice was the enemy RADAR, it was not animated like this. it was just a simple icon with some info to determine the type of RADAR. 'Ground Lock' this is the actual screen the BN saw. "Jam em up - were jamming" Morg was punching random keys into the weapons stores management which was not the correct panel for the ECM Controls, that was a panel below and to the left of the SMS panel. 5:00 and 5:07 "YOU'RE TOO HIGH" - actually, he was right on the money according to the Ball. 9:22 - Navy Supported FoTI - Absolutely, they allowed multiple filming sequences with live launches and all with the repainted aircraft and crews on deck. 9:50 - look really close at this Intruder, its actually a TRAM A-6E, but the Ball Turret has been removed at the request of Paramount, and Navy Electronics Techs put a piece of metal covering over the TRAM Turret position, you can see the seam of the plate. Also note worthy was the ECM antennas that are correct for the TRAM, but not the A Model. 11:55 - those 4 blade hamilton props are the best sounding props the US DoD Ever had! 19:45 - Wern't those the fuel indicators, - no, they are the Engines N1, N2, FF and EGT Slider Tapes, just like the B-1's same layout. 21:50 - Boxman's shoot down was a tribute to one of the actual USS Independence's A-6 Crews lost to a SAM shootdown. 23:58 - this was actually quite common for the computers to fail. they were pre-solid state and relied on a significant majority of analog and vacuum tube based systems. they failed quite often, and yes, according to my source, failed exactly like that. Fun fact- the A-6 was the first combat aircraft to feature a advanced failure detection system, known as BACE ( Basic Automated Checkout Equipment ) and was the predecessor to BITS. 23:45 - "I think I got it" this was something BACE could do - yet another first ever for a combat aircraft, it could restart the Computers and potentially recover the failure of the data by checksum checking the data loaded into the computers before a mission. If it recovered, it would restart the mission programming and pickup where the failure left off and do a quick Navigation check, once the aircraft figured out where it was, it resumed the mission parameters. 24:48 - "LAUNCH" again, this is the RADAR Altimeter indicator. it was 100% based on the Altimeter Bug, it was NOT used for alerting to incoming missiles or "Safe Drop" levels in the A-6A. so this would not be flashing red unless they were below the Altitude Bug setting, not by a missile launch which the "MISSILE" was the alerting indicator along with the RWR and Threat Indicator. Fun Fact - These are accurate sounds the A-6 portrayed for various types of missile launches, the sound that was NOT accurate was the MiG-15/17 lock-on. that would be a 4 tone alternating rapid pulse. And most of the MiG-15/17's of the era did not even have a RADAR to begin with, hence why Cole said to lockup the Ground RADAR that was guiding him. If that MiG had its own RADAR which certain variants of MiG-15/17 had RADAR the ground station would have been redundant since the MiG would have acquired them on its own RADAR and no longer needed vectoring. we cannot determine that here as we cannot see the intake clearly enough to see if the small RADAR Bulge is present. 25:30 - All that jinking around must have thrown off the ACU - yup, the jinking from the SAM detonation caused a failure that blew out the ACU Circuit breakers, hence the come back to bomb again, Cole states - Check the ACU Breakers. Coolhand reaches behind the center console and presses in 5 circuit breakers. This is the actual ACU Breaker location, 5 of them. one for each respective weapons pylon.

One of my favorite books & movies, I fell in love with the Intruder after reading the books(sorry Tomcat fans) and always wanted to fly one. I don't know how accurate a lot of the movie is, but I do remember talking to Vietnam Era B/N that said they were told to kick the computer to restart the rotors....the felt that a fair amount of the movie was true to life. While the events might never have happened, the details to support things were spot-on.

I remember watching this at the theater in Ridgecrest, CA. They had a special viewing for our squadron at China Lake. I know that there were portions of the movie where RC models were used and those flying sequences were filmed out there.

Been a long time since I watched the movie or read the book. Guess I need to do both again soon. Thanks for doing this one Mover!

This should have been called "Mover Enjoys Movies" instead. It's a good movie.

Stephen Coonts, who wrote the book the movie was based on, was an actual A6 pilot in Vietnam, apparently with 1600 hours on A6s, and 305 carrier landings. The movie used A6-Es, rather than Vietnam era As and Bs.

nice work, Mover & Wombat. I loved this flick ... y'all are fairly entertaining yerselves. :P thanks for putting thisone on the channel.

Loved the movie and Love the intruder!! I was in the corps from 80 to 84..Watched them in action!! One great plan in them days!

One of the reasons it's better than Top Gun is because it's from John Milius.

Give me this movie over any top gun movie. Love the F14 but the comic-book flying of top gun kind of lets it down.

Amazing one Mover & Wombat. You really brought great vibe, and I'm too hyped now to watch this movie of beautiful Intruders!

One of my favorite aviation movies from the 90's. Looking forward to Part 2.

When do we get Part 2?

Love the channel Mover!!! Remember requesting this movie!! Thanks for doing it.

Haha... I personally know Jared Chandler (aka, Razor) who is prior service US Army. My USMC unit worked with his Army unit as OPFOR against USAF security forces at Edwards Air Force Base. We won of course. He still works for Hollywood and did the redesigned deployment patch on Maverick's leather jacket. It was almost used in Top Gun: Maverick, but Paramount dropped it for the original patch with the Japanese and Taiwan flag. Jared was pleased the studio didn't cave-in to China's demands.

Soon after the movie was made, I talked to the pilot/owner of the Skyraider that flew wingman in the movie. They shipped the AC from Texas to Hawaii to film the final scene. If you look carefully, you can see a window in the fuselage: it was originally an AD-4 night fighter with a radar operator in the fuselage.

This is great, gonna dl the movie and watch it again! Glad you brought Wombat with ya on this one!

at last, this is so good. The book was good, but I remember seeing the film at the cinema and I was blown away, the A6 was amazing, Grumman made some amazing planes

I loved this breakdown. My college RA's dad was a marine corps Intruder pilot. Col. out of Orange County. It cracked me up from the old hydraulics, he was all upper body strength and little legs.

I've been waiting for this one for sooo long... This is one of my favourite childhood movies, so let's see how it goes!

I've been waiting for this one. Definitely one of the greats, and yes, the Intruder is STILL a sexy plane. You're 100% right: those pilots and NFOs were a different breed.

Yes! I was waiting for this!!!

Great video! When will we get Part 2?

Thanks a lot for that one Mover - looking forward to Part 2 ☺👍

Outstanding, can't wait for part two.

Thanks mover I've been asking you to do this one for ages

Great book and great movie.. One of the few that I actually bought. When I saw you were doing this one, I thought this should be good.. RIP Brad Johnson. Thanks for the video.

This was great, can't wait for part two

This was fun to watch! I'm not military, but appreciate our service men and women and the things they do to protect our freedoms. My sincere thanks to you both. FOTI is one of my all time favorite movies and I've always enjoyed it more than Top Gun, maybe because my dad served in Vietnam. I read my dad's copy of the book first as a pre-teen and then saw the film and loved it. Gotta admit - my affection is in no small part due to the A-6 which I just think is the coolest, most badass looking airplane. It gave me great pleasure to see Wombat's enjoyment of this film and also hear someone else comment on how cool the A-6 is. Most think it's ugly but I think it's a beautiful aircraft.

The cover of the paperback of this book WORKED. Totally caught my eye in the grocery store back in the day. So glad. Awesome book; vivid descriptions of flying. Good story also.

I was waiting for Mover Ruins Movies to review FLIGHT OF THE INTRUDER (1991). It's one of my favorite movies and can see why! Thank you!

"Those guys in Vietnam were just a different breed" Yeah, I realized that when some oldhead aviator was talking about trying to find a 4th award silver star sticker for his car. Just...nice.

Looking foward to part 2!

So happy to see this come up!!!!

Yaaassss finally! Love this movie. Looking forward to part 2 of the review.

This is an excellent movie I hadn't seen in a few years. It's one of about 100 military related films I have in my library. Watching it now. Thanks.