Lack of good storyline.

Dreadfully Boring

Too much about the plot just didn't add up, the writing was bad, some of the scenes were cringey and awkward,

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

... and by my count this line was spoken at least seven times here.This is a cold war thriller from Clint Eastwood about a Vietnam vet fighter pilot sent undercover and across the iron curtain to steal a new Soviet super-plane. The first two-thirds of the film are a treat, with a lot of tense scenes of Clint and his sympathetic Russian contacts narrowly escaping capture. The last section is where the film loses steam, with a lot of repetitious, dated fx shots of the jet in action.Warren Clarke is memorable as Clint's chief contact. Also featured are Freddie Jones, Ronald Lacey, Nigel Hawthorne, and Kenneth Colley. As you may have noticed, there are no women listed; this is the rare film with no substantial female presence at all. The real star, though, other than Clint, is the fictional MiG31 "Firefox" fighter jet, invisible to radar, capable of Mach 6 speeds as well as full nuclear armament. The film also borders on science fiction with the jet's thought-controlled weapon systems.It is a 50/50 proposition as to whether you will like this one. For me it was fun to see Eastwood stretch his directorial skills in a different direction, and even more fun if you actually remember the cold war...or were even alive during the cold war for that matter.

I can see how some might think it becomes slow at times but I was so immersed in the suspense I did not notice it. The script, screen writing, and acting were all top notch. The action at the end is tough to beat. Better than any other spy thriller I have seen before. Highly recommend.

Espionage, Intrigue, And Action is how I would sum-up this Clint Eastwood, underrated, film classic. The aircraft in the movie, Soviet fighter aircraft (MiG-31, NATO code name "Firefox"), reminds me of the Stealth Bomber in a round about way. The movie's aircraft is invisible to radar - the real life Stealth Bomber is very low to invisible on radar.This "Firefox" aircraft has weapons on it that are controlled by thoughts of the pilot. This part of the film is also partly based on reality because there is brain to computer technology in real life. See: brain–computer interface (BCI), mind-machine interface (MMI), direct neural interface (DNI), synthetic telepathy interface (STI) or a brain–machine interface (BMI).I found the movie to be believable and just simply a good story. It is refreshing to see Clint Eastwood in a very different role, it's nice to see him play something different instead of the lead in a Western or a cop role.9/10

In his long and iconic career, Clint Eastwood only made four films in the spy/espionage genre. This film, along with 1975's "The Eiger Sanction" are good indicators of why this was the case.The film opens nicely enough, with pretty landscapes through a birds-eye-view (or in this case, a helicopter) slowly zooming in to reveal Eastwood's Mitchell Gant jogging through the Alaskan wilderness. Gant now calls this beautiful isolation home, after the trauma of being shot down during Vietnam and taken prisoner, showcased through some grainy flashbacks that reappear throughout the film as soon as you start to forget about them. Gant is approached for a top secret behind enemy lines mission to steal a new and powerful Soviet jet. We are told that even though he obviously suffers from an extreme case of PTSD, his mother was Russian and he physically resembles the Soviet pilot the plane was built for. It is this ridiculous premise that sets this Cold War relic into motion.Air Force enthusiasts, hardcore Clint fanatics, or fans of 80s Cold War thrillers might find things to like in this film, but with a running time of over two hours and fifteen minutes, it's easier to spot things not to like. Eastwood has more acclaim as a director than an actor, but this might be his worst outing in front of as well as behind the camera. However, it's Freddie Jones' miscalculated performance as a NATO adviser that takes the cake. Warning Gant of the possibility of failure, Jones tells him that he, "...will run out of fuel and die in the Arctic Ocean," with a gleeful smile. In fact, it might be said that Austria gives the best performance in the film as Mother Russia.Even the worst Roger Moore Bond films were better than this. And unlike "The Eiger Sanction" with its politically incorrect humor and character names, "Firefox" takes itself way too seriously. Because of this austere approach, the pacing is rather dull, with the only suspense taking place in a sequence at a train station near the beginning of the film. The film's only car chase is even boring and poorly staged, and the final act, which should have been the most exciting, consists mostly of Eastwood talking to himself in a cockpit. As a general rule, I give any film made before 1990 that features non-English characters speaking English in their home country a pass, this film included. However, there is one sequence involving disguises and English being spoken on a Soviet base that completely took me out of the film. The Russian characters speak in the stereotypical broken English that you would expect, forgetting a word here and there.Like most of Eastwood's films, "Firefox" is darkly lit. Unlike the prince of darkness Gordon Willis, who revolutionized this kind of cinematography with The Godfather trilogy, Eastwood uses it to a murky and unsatisfying effect. If you must watch this film, do so at night, or in a room with no windows.