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.

I really enjoyed watching the movie. It was filled with just enough suspense and fairly believable action to keep the film rolling along. The movie had a great cast (besides Ford, there's also James Earl Jones, Samuel L. Jackson, Sean Bean, Thora Birch, etc.). The movie involves Jack Ryan (Ford) saving a member of the English elite while vacationing in London and in the process kills a member of the IRA. The brother of said IRA member becomes obsessed with getting even with Ryan and tries to have him and his family murdered.

The film doesn't paint the IRA in a positive light at all and that in turn leads to some people thinking all Irish people are "bad". That's just not true. The Irish are great people and the IRA has done a few good things over the years. Nevertheless, the organization still has a reputation for being a terrorist group and unfortunately most of their good deeds have been overshadowed and outnumbered by the bad.

Anyway, PATRIOT GAMES is a decent action adventure/suspense movie. It's a good film to watch when you're not sure what you want to see.