Product Details

• Actors: Harrison Ford, Sean Bean, Anne Archer, Patrick Bergin, Thora Birch
• Directors: Phillip Noyce
• Writers: Donald Stewart, Tom Clancy, W. Peter Iliff
• Producers: Charles H. Maguire, Lis Kern, Mace Neufeld, Robert Rehme
• Format: AC-3, Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Letterboxed, Widescreen, NTSC
• Language: English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround), English (Dolby Digital 5.1), French (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround)
• Subtitles: Spanish
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: R (Restricted)
• Studio: Paramount
• DVD Release Date: December 15, 1998
• Run Time: 117 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (92 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 6305222878
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #90,264 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "Patriot Games" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Let's see--he's been Han Solo in three films and Indiana Jones in three more. So why shouldn't Harrison Ford take on a new continuing character in Tom Clancy's CIA analyst Jack Ryan? In this film, directed by Phillip Noyce, Ford picked up the baton when Alec Baldwin, who played Ryan in The Hunt for Red October, opted for a Broadway role instead. In this film, Ryan and his family are on vacation when Ryan saves a member of the British royal family from attack by Irish terrorists. The next thing he knows, the Ryan clan has been targeted by the same terrorists, who invade his Maryland home. The film can't shed all of Clancy's lumbering prose, or his techno-dweeb fascination with spy satellites and the like. But no one is better than Ford at righteous heroism--and Sean Bean makes a suitably snakey villain. --Marshall Fine

From The New Yorker

Phillip Noyce's film, adapted from one of Tom Clancy's jillion-selling suspense novels, is a much more effective thriller than it has any right to be. The screenwriters, W. Peter Iliff and Donald Stewart, have eliminated much of the novel's hot air without entirely knocking the wind out of the material; the script tones down Clancy's right-wing ideology and gives the story some straightforward action-movie narrative drive. The plot, which pits Irish terrorists against an Annapolis history professor and sometime C.I.A. analyst named Jack Ryan (Harrison Ford), is ridiculous, boys'-adventure stuff, but the filmmakers almost put it across. Noyce handles the action sequences beautifully: they're lucid and exciting, and their construction has a kind of formal elegance that's oddly satisfying. (He's less successful with the scenes of the Ryan family's domestic bliss, which are meant to establish Jack's credentials as a champion of traditional values.) Ford brings a welcome trace of ambivalence to his character's heroics-a sense that Ryan isn't altogether proud of the lethal efficiency he displays when he's drawn into combat. Sean Bean, Richard Harris, and (especially) James Fox do nice work in supporting roles. This is an expert, entertaining genre picture. Noyce and his team serve Clancy's crude material well-too well, probably. Also with Anne Archer (who's awful), Thora Birch, James Earl Jones, Samuel L. Jackson, and Patrick Bergin. Cinematography by Donald McAlpine. -Terrence Rafferty
Copyright © 2006 The New Yorker

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Superb political drama--Clancy's novel on the screen., June 3, 2003

By 

Roger J. Buffington (Huntington Beach, CA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Patriot Games (Special Collector's Edition) (DVD)

This is one of my all-time favorite political thrillers. This film successfully, and even brilliantly brings Tom Clancy's novel "Patriot Games" to the screen in an effective manner that is a delight to watch. The direction and acting are excellent. The musical score is superb, and this is one of those movies in which the soundtrack almost comes to dominate one's impression of the movie. This is not to take away from a bravo performance by Harrison Ford, who effectively pulls off his Jack Ryan character. I originally had my doubts about Ford as Jack Ryan, but Ford succeeds excellently.

The direction of this film is particularly good. The artistic direction, effectively combined with the haunting, wistful, musical score make this film unforgettable, and several cuts above the usual political thriller. This is a thoughtful, intelligent film but nevertheless contains plenty of fast-paced action. The plot moves smartly, but never features action just for the sake of action.

This is a film that most viewers will enjoy many times.

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Slasher films a poor substitute, July 19, 2004

By 

Brian Hulett "okierazorbacker2" (Oinklahoma) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Patriot Games [VHS] (VHS Tape)

For sheer excitement on the edge of your not-so-easy chair, there's nothing like a good Jack Ryan story, and I think this is the best of them. The plot involves one of the most obsessed bad guys you'll ever see, a fanatically militant member of an IRA splinter group whose attack on the British royal family is thwarted almost unconsciously by Ryan, who is visiting England as a tourist/lecturer. Now ex-CIA, Ryan's family is nearby, and family is central in this tale of the cold-blooded world of international espionage and terrorism. The family angle is one that keeps the story so chilling throughout, as the terrorist's brother is shot to death by Ryan as he ruins their try on the royals, and our star villain then sets out to stalk Ryan and his wife and daughter.

The film moves at an almost perfect pace, and unveils to us some modern aspects of this shadowy world. For instance, even Ryan, played with understated perfection by Harrison Ford, is creeped out by his participation in a nighttime strike on a desert camp believed to be IRA training ground. In this scene he and several other jacket-and-tie types watch soldiers take out this nest of vipers a half-world away, thanks to infrared and satellite technology, all while detached voices calmly note "Target neutralized" and spies dressed like businessmen smile and nod while whispering to one another in thorough detachment from the blood and guts of the operation. All this technology and we are not removed from the days of the rich people perching on hills near the battles of Civil War days, sipping tea while viewing the entertainment.

I cannot give less than five stars to a film that draws me in so completely as this one, making me feel the tension with such clarity and indeed making it so easy to actually hate the villain. Yet the film strikes sour notes with the drunken Richard Harris's half-hearted performance as an IRA bigwig, and with the cliched ending moment of an otherwise superb boat chase at the film's climax. Two distracting moments would mean a score of 9 on a scale of 1 to 10, or, in Amazon terms, 4-1/2 stars. These being minor, a full five stars is quite reasonable. Nearly a perfect action film; even the understated music score is just so right that it can't be imagined being done any other way.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Flashes of light?, August 3, 2008

By 

K. Holt (Lomita, CA United States) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Patriot Games [Blu-ray] (Blu-ray)

I agree that this Blu-ray could have been done a lot better but it is a definite improvement from the SD version. If you are a fan of this movie and HD this is the best you are going to get for at least a while so you have to take it or leave it. I don't regret buying it. I don't know what some of these other reviews are talking about with flashes of light, etc. I have two different players and a 60" and 40" screen and I didn't see any of that on either of them.