The Rock

***The Rock*** is a 1996 American action thriller film.

## Synopsis

A mild-mannered chemist and an ex-con must lead the counterstrike when a rogue group of military men, led by a renegade general, threaten a nerve gas attack from Alcatraz against San Francisco.

## Plot

A group of rogue U.S. Force Recon Marines, led by disenchanted Brigadier General Frank Hummel and his second-in-command Major Tom Baxter, storm a heavily guarded Naval Weapons depot where they seize a stockpile of deadly VX gas–armed M55 rockets; Hummel loses one of his own men in the process when one of the VX canisters ruptures. The next day, Hummel and his men seize control of Alcatraz Island and take eighty-one tourists hostage. Hummel threatens to launch the rockets against San Francisco unless the U.S government pays $100 million from a military slush fund, which he will distribute to his men and the families of Recon Marines who died on clandestine missions under his command but whose deaths were not compensated.

The Pentagon and FBI develop a plan to retake the island with a U.S. Navy SEAL team led by Commander Anderson, enlisting the FBI's top chemical weapons specialist, Dr. Stanley Goodspeed. FBI director James Womack is forced to offer a pardon to federal prisoner John Mason, in return for information. John Mason, a 60-year-old British national who has been imprisoned without charges for three decades, is the only Alcatraz inmate ever to escape the island, doing so in 1963 through uncharted underground tunnels. After he learns of Womack's involvement in the deal, Mason flees resulting in a car chase through the streets of San Francisco. Mason seeks out his estranged daughter Jade; Goodspeed arrives with a team to re-arrest him, telling Jade that Mason is aiding the FBI.

Goodspeed, Mason, and the SEALs infiltrate Alcatraz. However, Hummel's rogue Marines are alerted to their presence and ambush them in a shower room. All the SEALs, including Anderson, are killed, leaving only Mason and Goodspeed alive. Mason sees his chance to escape custody and disarms Goodspeed, but Goodspeed convinces him to help defuse the rockets after the Marines use explosive devices to flush them out.

Mason and Goodspeed eliminate several teams of Marines and disable 12 of the 15 rockets by removing their guidance chips. Hummel threatens to execute a hostage if they do not surrender and return the guidance chips. Mason destroys the chips, then surrenders to Hummel, trying to reason with him as well as buy Goodspeed some time. Though Goodspeed disables another rocket, the rogue Marines capture him. With the incursion team lost, the military initiates their backup plan: an airstrike by F/A-18s with thermite plasma, which will neutralize the poison gas but kill everyone on the island.

Mason and Goodspeed escape, and Mason explains why he was held prisoner: he was a British SAS Captain who stole a microfilm containing details of the United States' most closely guarded secrets, refusing to give it up when captured because he knew he would be killed if he did. When the deadline for the transfer of the ransom passes, Hummel and his men fire one of the rockets, but Hummel redirects it to detonate at sea. He then reveals that the mission is over and it was all an elaborate bluff, as he never had any intention of taking innocent lives. When confronted by two of his men, Captains Frye and Darrow, Hummel orders them to exit Alcatraz with a few hostages and the remaining rocket to cover their retreat, while he will assume blame. Realizing they will not be paid their $1 million apiece, Frye and Darrow rebel against Hummel and Baxter, killing the latter and mortally wounding the former.

Darrow and Frye proceed with the plan to fire on San Francisco. While Mason deals with the remaining Marines, Goodspeed seeks out the last rocket, which Hummel reveals the location of with his dying breath. As the jets approach, Goodspeed kills both Darrow and Frye, before disarming the rocket. He signals the jets that the threat is over but not before one jet drops a bomb on the island. Though no hostages are injured, Goodspeed is thrown into the sea by the blast before Mason rescues him.

Goodspeed fakes Mason's death by informing Womack that he was killed in the bomb explosion. Before both men part ways Mason gives Goodspeed the location of the microfilm. Sometime later Goodspeed and Carla steal the microfilm and Goodspeed learns who truly killed John F. Kennedy.