The Sum of All Fears

2002 Paramount Pictures
Directed by: Phil Alden Robinson: Written by: Paul Attanasio and Daniel Pyne
Starring: Ben Affleck, Morgan Freeman, Bridget Moynahan, James Cromwell, Liev Schreiber, Alan Bates, Philip Baker Hall, Ron Rifkin, and Bruce McGill
MPAA Rating: PG-13; Running Time: 124 Minutes
The Nicsperiment Score: 2/10

Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan book series is part of a thread that defines the 90's for me, along with its 90's cinematic adaptations. 1990's The Hunt for Red October (dir. by John McTiernan), 1992's Patriot Games (dir. by Phillip Noyce), and 1994's Clear and Present Danger (also Noyce) are all not only extremely fun and entertaining films, but give a great sense of the Washington D.C. of the 90's. The series' cinematic ventures into the 2000's are something far less fun and entertaining.
To kick off the next millennium, Paramount handed the Jack Ryan reigns to director, Phil Alden Robinson, for 2002's The Sum of All Fears. Ryan, played wonderfully in the 90's by both Alec Baldwin and Harrison Ford, would now be portrayed by Ben Affleck. 

In 2002, Robinson was best known for the silly but enjoyable Field of Dreams, and the chill-out thrills of Sneakers. His direction here feels pretty anonymous; while McTiernan and Noyce both put their skillful stamps on their films, Robinson's Jack Ryan work feels journeyman at best. Noyce was able to wring out massive walls of suspense in Clear and Present Danger with just a guy on a motorcycle following our hero's vehicle. In The Sum of All Fears, a montage that's supposed to set up a nuclear attack on American soil barely raises the pulse. Likewise, some of the film's following military sorties look like they're just army stock footage. The early 00's CGI is also surprisingly bad, with the aforementioned nuclear explosion looking surprisingly similar to a PS2 cutscene. 

Unfortunately, the new, Affleck-powered Jack Ryan also leaves little impression. Ryan, as created by Clancy, and portrayed by Baldwin and Ford, is a very clear-cut and unique character. This sometimes CIA agent is a morally righteous, do-right boy scout, who can't abide personal or national dishonesty. As portrayed here, he's just kind of a bland, know-it-all. Likewise, his burgeoning romance with Bridget Moynahan's Cathy is a non-starter.
Really, everything here feels like a cut-rate, vanilla version of what we got in the 90's. Even the score from the great Jerry Goldsmith pales in the face of the extraordinarily memorable work done by Basil Poledouris and James Horner in the 90's films. Perhaps worst of all, that great Washington D.C. vibe of the 90's is muted and drab--maybe because The Sum of All Fears was shot in...Montreal?! 

I'd blame 9/11 for some of the morose lack of fun here, but this 2002-released film finished shooting months before that history-altering event took place. The blame is squarely on the filmmakers and the script, which heavily alters Clancy's work. The bad script should be no surprise, though, as it's written by Phil Attansio. Attansio wrote 1998's Sphere, perhaps the worst film adaptation of a good book the 90's has to offer. 

Clancy's work not only explored national fears about the political events of the times, but often worked as a startling prognosticator, with the now deceased author closely predicting the major events of the 9/11 attacks years before they happened. With The Sum of All Fears' villains all flipped around, and much of Clancy's complexities neutered, the plot here is so generic, it's tough to remember, let alone summarize. The main elements left from the book are the ones specifically dealing with the fallout of the Cold War (the book was published in 1991), and the film does nothing to make them apply to 2002. Indeed, The Sum of All Fears nearly feels regressive in its story-telling next to its 90's predecessors. Early juvenile sex jokes, as well as several metaphors involving sex betray an immaturity those 90's films never even hinted at. Every element of The Sum of All Fears is simply a disappointment.