Fire Birds (1990)

**A miserably bungled Top Gun impersonation with helicopters… why?**

Lame Top Gun with helicopters. Almost everything is a straight rip-off. Nic Cage is a much more exaggerated Maverick. Tommy Lee Jones fills the Viper role. Flight school. Overly cocky pilots. Contentious playful romance. Fire Birds so closely replicated Top Gun that it forced a comparison that Fire Birds lost miserably. The cheese factor was cringe. The soundtrack was nowhere near the quality of Harold Faltermeyer’s anthem. David Green couldn’t measure up to Tony Scott’s directing mastery. Even with some of the 90s’ bigger stars, Fire Birds couldn’t burn bright.

This is a helicopter-based version of Top Gun and it has a lot of issues. The unlikability of the characters is enough to make me want to turn this off and the horrifyingly bad attitude that our main protagonist has towards what is framed as his love interest but is portrayed more as a very toxic relationship is gut churning. You then add some really bad pseudo-military jargon and some half decent footage of Apache attack helicopters and you have a slightly below average movie. This isn't fun. It isn't good and it isn't enjoyable. I would not recommend you spend your time watching this.