Recently I took an imdb poll titled: "Favorite 'The ___ and the __' Title?" Among movies to choose from were "The Serpent and the Rainbow," "The Princess and the Frog," "The Fox and the Hound," and others. Unfortunately, the only one of the list of about fifteen titles I had actually seen was "The Quick and the Dead." "The Falcon and the Snowman" was not one of the choices and I don't think I would have chosen it even if I'd already seen the movie when I did the poll.
"The Falcon and the Snowman" is an alright movie. You have two young men in the salad days of their adult lives trying to figure out what they're going to do. One of them, Daulton Lee (Sean Penn), is a hopeless drug dealer while the other, Christopher Boyce (Timothy Hutton), seems to be more focused and centered. Boyce lands a gig that puts him in direct contact with highly secretive U. S. documents and transmissions. He got a job at a company called RTX which is almost like a clearinghouse for all CIA, NSA, FBI transmissions of missions and whatever else.
Boyce gets the bright idea to sell some of these documents to the Russians using Lee as the courier. It's a dangerous game the two play and it's clear they aren't concerned about the consequences.
There didn't seem to be any real rhyme or reason to their actions. Lee clearly was in it for the money, even if he was a mess of a person. Boyce, on the other hand, didn't seem to have a real motivation for selling U. S. secrets other than his own disenchantment with the U. S. government. Ordinarily, that would seem like enough of a motivation, but in this case his disillusionment seemed to develop overnight.
What needs to be stated here is that the time frame is 1973/74 or thereabouts. Nixon has just been impeached and one can only imagine what the public's trust in the government was rated. With this as a backdrop there is a little more insight into Boyce's actions. It didn't seem like quite enough of a motive to make the quantum leap into selling top secret documents, but maybe that was all part of Boyce's character. Maybe none of his life choices required much of a motive.
I, as a viewer and someone of sound mind and body, was looking for more. Because what the two did was so significant I needed more for a motive. Without a strong enough motive the entire plot is equally weak. In all movies, whether it's a good guy or bad guy, we want a strong motive from the character. It allows us to get fully engaged with the movie. Otherwise, with a weak motive, we'll always be somewhat, if not fully, uninterested.
"The Falcon and the Snowman" is an alright movie. You have two young men in the salad days of their adult lives trying to figure out what they're going to do. One of them, Daulton Lee (Sean Penn), is a hopeless drug dealer while the other, Christopher Boyce (Timothy Hutton), seems to be more focused and centered. Boyce lands a gig that puts him in direct contact with highly secretive U. S. documents and transmissions. He got a job at a company called RTX which is almost like a clearinghouse for all CIA, NSA, FBI transmissions of missions and whatever else.
Boyce gets the bright idea to sell some of these documents to the Russians using Lee as the courier. It's a dangerous game the two play and it's clear they aren't concerned about the consequences.
There didn't seem to be any real rhyme or reason to their actions. Lee clearly was in it for the money, even if he was a mess of a person. Boyce, on the other hand, didn't seem to have a real motivation for selling U. S. secrets other than his own disenchantment with the U. S. government. Ordinarily, that would seem like enough of a motivation, but in this case his disillusionment seemed to develop overnight.
What needs to be stated here is that the time frame is 1973/74 or thereabouts. Nixon has just been impeached and one can only imagine what the public's trust in the government was rated. With this as a backdrop there is a little more insight into Boyce's actions. It didn't seem like quite enough of a motive to make the quantum leap into selling top secret documents, but maybe that was all part of Boyce's character. Maybe none of his life choices required much of a motive.
I, as a viewer and someone of sound mind and body, was looking for more. Because what the two did was so significant I needed more for a motive. Without a strong enough motive the entire plot is equally weak. In all movies, whether it's a good guy or bad guy, we want a strong motive from the character. It allows us to get fully engaged with the movie. Otherwise, with a weak motive, we'll always be somewhat, if not fully, uninterested.