30th Anniversary

This movie opened in theaters on Friday, May 16, 1986 and turns 30 years old today. I came on IMDB today to start a thread about this, and saw on the IMDB homepage that there was an article about it, which I was glad to see.

I was 18 when it came out and near the end of my senior year of high school. Alot would be happening for me in the next few weeks and months, as I would be graduating from high school, learning how to drive, and going off to college. I remember when it was in theaters that summer, though didn't go to see it. I'm not sure why, probably because we (my mother, sister, and I) just did not go to the movies that summer because nothing appealed to us, or so we thought. We were talking at home one day in late June, 1986 about possibly going, but my mother said there was nothing out she wanted to see. My sister suggested Top Gun, saying it had Kelly McGillis in it and she was in Witness the year before and my mother had liked it so much (it was her favorite movie ever), and my mother replied that she was good in that role but she didn't know how she'd be in Top Gun. We did end up going to the movies once that summer, on July 17 to see Ruthless People. And I went twice by myself later that summer, in mid August after I learned how to drive and got my liscence (which occured on August 6, 1986). I went to see Friday the 13th Part VI on August 12 at The PIX and A Fine Mess on August 14 at The Cinema, driving to them on those afternoons. I mainly did that because these were two big single screen theaters that had been there for decades and I knew would be closing soon, as these single screen theaters were on the way out. And in fact they both did close just two months later, in October, 1986. But I likely would have seen Top Gun at one of them then had it still been playing, though it was probably out of theaters by that time. I don't actually know if it had been playing at one of these theaters earlier that summer, though I think there was a good chance it was given how big a hit it was.

I then did not see Top Gun until early September, 1989, over three years later, when I rented it out from one of the video stores we belonged to and watched it several times on our VCR. I liked it alot, it easily became my favorite movie of 1986 and got on my favorite movies of all time list (still, thirty years later the only movie from 1986 on this list). My mother watched it with me one of those times then and she also liked it and thought it was very good, and commented that it was probably even better on the big screen with all the ariel activity.

We then sold that house and moved in January, 1997, and I was homeless until 2010 and had no way to watch anything on home video, but in September, 2010 got an apartment and a TV and DVD player, and then brought alot of movies on DVD, including Top Gun, which I brought from a Target for just five dollars in fall, 2010. I have since watched it several times on DVD, and may do so again tonight for this anniversary. And I also got the chance to see it on the big screen and kind of make up for missing it in the summer of 1986, because in February, 2013 it was rereleased to a few theaters in IMAX, and came to my main theater, a Regal 22, and I went there and saw it twice back to back on Saturday, February 19, 2013, the only time I have ever seen anything in IMAX.

I also had a first cousin whom I was the same age as and was close to growing up, and he knew since early high school he wanted to be a Navy fighter pilot like depicted in Top Gun, and in college he enrolled in the Navy ROTC program for this, and majored in engineering, and in May, 1990 he graduated as an ensign, then spent the next two years (1990-1992) at the Navy's fighter pilot school in Pensacola, FL training for this. He finished this and obtained the rank of Lieutenant Junior Grade in mid 1992, then was stationed at Wimbly Island in Washington State for the next six years, until 1998, serving six months out of the year in port and the other six months at sea on an aircraft carrier. He then was stationed one year in Norfolk, VA and in 1999 got out of the Navy and left this flying behind. We have communicated occasionally through the mail since 2003, and in a 2007 email I told him about Top Gun and he replied that he and some friends saw it several times in the theater in the summer of 1986 and it was a real inspiration for them, though they had in fact planned to become Navy fighter pilots and enrolled in that program quite a while before this movie even came out, and I knew that was true. But happy 30th birthday to this movie today.

"I happen to be a vegetarian". Lex, from Jurrasic Park