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The Rocketeer
Theatrical poster
Directed by	Joe Johnston
Produced by	Charles Gordon Lawrence Gordon Lloyd Levin
Written by	Dave Stevens (graphic novel) Danny Bilson (sceenplay) Paul De Meo (sceenplay)
Starring	Bill Campbell Alan Arkin Jennifer Connelly Timothy Dalton Ed Lauter Jon Polito Terry O'Quinn
Music by	James Horner
Cinematography	Hiro Narita
Editing by	Peter Lonsdale Arthur Schmidt
Distributed by	Buena Vista Pictures
Release date(s)	23 June 1991
Running time	108 min.
Country	USA
Language	English
Budget	$40,000,000 (estimated)
Gross revenue	$46,704,056 (USA)
All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile

The Rocketeer is a 1991 superhero adventure film produced by Walt Disney Pictures/Touchstone Pictures^[1] and directed by Joe Johnston. It is based on the comic book The Rocketeer by Dave Stevens about a young stunt pilot who discovers a mysterious jet pack that allows him to fly.

Music for the movie was written by James Horner. The film won a Saturn Award for Best Costume in 1991. It was the third movie directed by Joe Johnston, who later went on to direct movies such as Jumanji and Hidalgo.

Contents 1 Plot 2 Production 3 Reactions 4 References 5 Further reading 6 External links

In the years leading up to World War II, stunt pilot Cliff Secord (Billy Campbell) takes a trial run in a Gee Bee fixed-wing aircraft to prepare for an upcoming air show. During the run, he flies across mobsters fleeing from FBI agents in a vehicle chase. One of the mobsters incidentally shoots at and damages Cliff's aircraft, and the mobsters reach the airfield from which Cliff had taken off. One of the mobsters finds his partner shot dead during the pursuit and hides a mysterious bundle under the seat of an old biplane in a hanger. He flees from the hanger, only to run into Cliff crash-landing his damaged aircraft, which leads to the destruction of the airfield's fuel tank. The mobster, injured by the run-in, is arrested by the FBI and taken to the hospital. Airfield owner Bigelow (Jon Polito) tells Cliff and his friend A. "Peevy" Peabody (Alan Arkin) that they would have to pay for the loss of the fuel tank, bankrupting the pair. In desperation, Secord decides to fly the biplane in the air show and comes across the package that the mobster had hidden, which contains a stolen prototype jet pack from billionaire aviator Howard Hughes.

After unsuccessfully experimenting with the jet pack, Secord and Peevy leave it alone until Peevy can fine-tune its function. When Cliff is late to the air show, his friend Malcolm takes the biplane to perform the stunts in front of the audience as Cliff. When Cliff sees that Malcolm cannot control the derelict aircraft, he dons the unprepared jet pack and a helmet designed by Peevy and rescues his friend. Having been seen by the audience, Cliff becomes a media sensation, and the unknown flier is dubbed the "Rocketeer" by Bigelow. Cliff, keeping his identity secret, visits his girlfriend Jenny (Jennifer Connelly), who is an aspiring actress seeking a larger role in a Hollywood film starring actor Neville Sinclair (Timothy Dalton). Cliff's ineptitude leads to a bungled shot, and Cliff and Jenny are kicked off the film set. Neville, who had hired the mobsters to steal Hughes's jet pack, overhears Cliff's conversation to Jenny about his adventure. After Cliff's departure, Neville is able to draw Jenny back onto the set and requests a dinner date with her.

Neville contacts Eddie Valentine (Paul Sorvino) and negotiates a new deal to dispatch more mobsters after Cliff to retrieve the missing jet pack. Eddie sends his largest goon Lothar (Tiny Ron) after Cliff and Peevy. Cliff is able to escape and find Jenny, discovering that her companion Neville is part of the scheme to steal the jet pack. After escaping a shoot-out with the mobsters, Cliff is arrested by the FBI and meets with Howard Hughes (Terry O'Quinn), who explains that the jet pack is a prototype in an arms race against Nazi Germany. In the discussion, the FBI admits tracking a Hollywood star who is a Nazi collaborator, and Cliff realizes that the collaborator is Neville. Hughes requests the return of the jet pack, but Cliff resists the aviator and the FBI, using the jet pack to go after Neville, who has kidnapped Jenny. Cliff agrees to give up the jet pack for Jenny, and he travels to the meeting spot at Griffith Park Observatory, where Eddie's gang is waiting for him. Cliff attempts to have Jenny released, but when she is not released, Cliff divulges to the gang that Neville is a Nazi sympathizer. The gang, who opposes Nazism, turns on Neville. Neville summons Nazi commandos, who fire at the gang and soon at the FBI squad that shows up at the meeting spot. Neville escapes with Jenny in a German zeppelin, and Cliff pursues them in his jet pack. On the zeppelin, he defeats Lothar and sacrifices his damaged jet pack to Neville. The actor, who is not aware of the hole in the fuel tank, takes off from the zeppelin and is destroyed in the resulting explosion. Cliff and Jenny are rescued by Hughes and Peevy in an autogyro before the zeppelin is engulfed in flames. Hughes rewards Cliff with a new Gee Bee plane to replace the lost one, and Jenny secretly gives Peevy detailed schematics of the jet pack to Peevy for him to design on his own.

Steve Miner was the first filmmaker to option the movie rights to Stevens’ comic book but he strayed too far from the original concept. Screenwriters Danny Bilson and Paul DeMeo originally approached Stevens to work on the film Zone Troopers but he had to pass due to other commitments. They were given an option on The Rocketeer’s screen rights in 1985 because Stevens liked that “their ideas for The Rocketeer were heartfelt and affectionate tributes to the 1930’s with all the right dialogue and atmosphere. Most people would approach my character contemporarily, but Danny and Paul saw them as pre-war mugs.”^[2] Their script kept the comic book’s basic plot intact but fleshed it out to include a Hollywood setting and a climactic battle against a Nazi zeppelin. They also tweaked Cliff’s girlfriend to avoid comparisons/legal hassles to Bettie Page (Stevens’ original inspiration), changing her name from Betty to Jenny and her profession from nude model to Hollywood extra (a change also made to make the film more family friendly).

Bilson and DeMeo submitted their seven-page outline to Disney in 1986. The studio put their script through an endless series of revisions and, at one point, the screenwriters talked to Stevens about doing The Rocketeer as a smaller film shot in black and white. However, the involvement of Disney resulted in a significant increase in budget as DeMeo said, “You can imagine the commitment Disney was making to develop a series of movies around a character. They even called it their Raiders of the Lost Ark.”^[2]> With Stevens input, Bilson and DeMeo developed their screenplay with director William Dear who proceeded to change the zeppelin to a submarine.

Over five years, Disney fired and rehired Bilson and DeMeo three times. DeMeo explained that “Disney felt that they needed a different approach to the script, which meant bringing in someone else. But those scripts were thrown out and we were always brought back on.”^[2] They found the studio’s constant tinkering with the screenplay to be a frustrating process as executives would like “excised dialogue three months later. Scenes that had been thrown out two years ago were put back in. What was the point?” DeMeo said.^[2] Disney’s biggest problems were with all of the period slang peppered throughout the script. Executive were worried that audiences wouldn’t understand what characters were saying.

One of Bilson and DeMeo’s significant revisions to the script over the years was to make Cliff and Jenny’s “attraction more believable...how do we bring Jenny into the story and revolve it around her, and not just create someone who’s kidnapped and has to be saved?” DeMeo remembers.^[2] The numerous project delays forced Dear to leave the production and Joe Johnston signed on. Johnston was a fan of the comic book and when he inquired about its movie rights was told that Disney already had it in development. He approached the studio and was quickly hired to direct. The filmmaker said in an interview, “One of the great appeals of Stevens’ work was his attention to detail, which really placed the reader in the period. I’ve tried to do the same thing cinematically.”^[2]

In 1990s, Bilson and DeMeo’s third major rewrite finally got the greenlight from the studio. However, Disney also acquired the rights to the Dick Tracy film from Universal and this worried DeMeo who was afraid that the studio would dump The Rocketeer in favor of a much more high-profile project. However, when Dick Tracy failed to perform as well at the box office as Disney had hoped, his fears subsided. Pre-production started in early 1990 with producer Larry Franco in charge of securing locations for the film. He found an abandoned World War II landing strip in Santa Maria which they used to build the mythical Chaplin Air Field. The Rocketeer’s attack on the Nazi zeppelin was filmed near the Magic Mountain amusement park in the Indian Dunes.

Bill Campbell wasn’t familiar with the comic book when he got the part but quickly read it in addition to books on aviation and listened to period music. The actor had a fear of flying but overcame it with the help of the film’s aerial coordinator Craig Hosking. To ensure his safety, Campbell was doubled for almost all of the Rocketeer’s flying sequences.

Bilson and DeMeo approved of everything that was put in the movie and enlisted Stevens’ help designing the Central City Police badges and initial revisions to the Rocketeer suit. For the Air Circus scene at Chaplin Air Field, 700 extras and 25 vintage planes were employed. Hosking remarked in an interview, “What makes The Rocketeer so unique was having several one-of-a-kind planes that hadn’t flown in years,”^[2] including a 1916 Standard biplane and a GeeBee racer with a radial engine and stubby wings. The film ended up going 50 days over schedule due to weather and mechanical problems. Production wrapped on January 10, 1991 after five months of filming.

Released on June 21, 1991, The Rocketeer grossed $46,704,056 in US domestic returns.^[3] The website Rotten Tomatoes (launched in 1998) lists the film with a 72% "fresh" rating based on all polled critical reviews.^[4] It also has a 5.9 rating at the Internet Movie Database with 8,375 votes.^[5]

Disney executives were disappointed in the box office take (and sales of related merchandise) and very early hopes for a sequel were quietly squashed.

• Peter David (June 1991). The Rocketeer (Mass Market Paperback), Novelization of the film, Bantam Books. ISBN 0553293222. 

• The Rocketeer at the Internet Movie Database