MovieChat Forums > The Right Stuff (1984) Discussion > Jack Ridley is a jerk!

Jack Ridley is a jerk!

posted 14 years ago by zerodegreesk
6 replies | jump to latest

Now, I love this scene, but I just noticed something funny about it. When Check Yeager confides in Jack Ridley the situation with his broken ribs, the shot cuts to Ridley walking into a room. In this scene, he walks past at least two brooms or mops standing in the corner. You get a good, solid shot of these handles leaning against the wall. But, the whole entertaining point of the scene is Jack Ridley walking right past these to commandeer a portion of a janitor's mop, for the handle, thus giving the janitor a major pain in his ass.

Jack Ridley could have made the same handle from one of the mops or brooms that were just leaning against that wall. Like I said, I love this scene... I think it's a bit of a goof.

[–] rwsmith29456 14 years ago

Is it more important that a landmark flight be made or that the janitor has to requisition a new broom? One thing that I find so great about this time and place was that people were free to come up with any solution that worked. When they decided to attempt a ground take off in the X-1, which it wasn't designed at all for, Ridley figured where the point of balance would be with just enough fuel to perform the flight profile so they propped up the plane on a couple of boards, and when it balanced, it had enough fuel and off they went. It's a shame he got killed so young.

[–] hideg-3 14 years ago

I like how Levon Helm twirled the broomstick portion after he cut it off, working a bit of his drummer skills into the part.

[–] CDN_Dragon 14 years ago

I like how Levon Helm twirled the broomstick portion after he cut it off, working a bit of his drummer skills into the part.

It was a great touch....

Ignorance and prejudice...
And fear walk hand in hand...

[–] captchas-1 14 years ago

This is a very funny movie. That's a very funny scene.

--- CHAS

[–] rizdek 12 years ago

It's probably a slight goof that they had him pass those other cleaning devices. I thought they wanted to show how innovative he was in an interesting scene. Maybe it also was to show how everyone did their part...an attempt at inclusiveness rather than exclusiveness. Maybe the janitor would feel proud...have a story to tell the kids, so to speak, to imagine he had a part in such a momentous flight. IOW, maybe it wasn't a pain in the ass, but a plume in his chapeau.

my god its full of stars

[–] MannLaw 9 years ago

I think he was trying to figure out a way to fix Yeager's problem. When he saw the custodian using the mob, he knew he had found the tool he needed and that is why he - politely - asked for it. He might have even saluted the custodian after he took the mop and may have also said "thank you," but I may be wrong about that as my memory has faded some.