Crimson Tide
Movie Quote Quiz

Capt. Ramsey: I expect and demand your very best. Anything less, you should have joined the Air Force.

Hunter: In my humble opinion, in the nuclear world, the true enemy is war itself.

Capt. Ramsey: All I ask is that you keep up with me. If you can't, then that strange sensation you'll be feeling in the seat of your pants will be my boot in your ass.

Zimmer: You don't put on a condom unless you're gonna fuck.

Hunter: Captain? I just wanted to say thank you.
Capt. Ramsey: You were right, and I was wrong! About the horses, the Lippizaners. They are from Spain, not Portugal.
Hunter: Yes, sir.

Capt. Ramsey: They're fueling their missiles, we don't have time to fuck around.

Capt. Ramsey: Short of the outbreak of World War Three, the ship sinking... being attacked by a giant octopus, I'd like to be undisturbed for the next thirty minutes.
Hunter: I'll see to it sir.

Capt. Ramsey: Rickover gave me my command, a checklist, a target, and a button to push. All I had to know was how to push it, and they'd tell me when. They seem to want you know why.
Hunter: I would hope they'd want us all to know why, sir.

Hunter: Look, it wasn't a mutiny, I did everything by the book.
Chief of the Boat: It's not about the book. If the Russians are gonna launch and we sit here and do nothing... who's gonna stop 'em? Half of me's glad the Captain came back.

Capt. Ramsey: This is the captain. Set condition 1SQ for strategic missile launch. Spin up missiles one through five, and 20 through 24. The release of nuclear weapons has been authorized. This is not a drill.

Zimmer: This is a mutiny, Peter. There's only two sides to a mutiny.

Hunter: Get the radio fixed Vossler. I could've built one by now.

Hunter: Chief of the Boat.
Chief of the Boat: Sir?
Hunter: Thank you, COB.
Chief of the Boat: Thank you? Fuck you! Get it straight Mr Hunter, I'm not on your side. Now you could be wrong! But wrong or right, the Captain can't just replace you at will. That was completely improper! And that's why I did what I did. By the book.
Hunter: I thank you anyway.

Peter "Weps" Ince: You're missin' your daughter's levitation.

More for Crimson Tide

Mistakes

Crimson Tide mistake picture

Continuity mistake: When the incomplete second EAM is shown in the movie for the first time, its subject line states "nuclear missile launc..." However, when this same message is finally received at the end of the movie the subject line states: "terminate launch all missiles". If the first one had been consistent with the second this would have made quite a difference. (00:55:45 - 01:45:25)

Paul Reinders

More mistakes in Crimson Tide

Trivia

Trivia: I just saw the movie Crash Dive 2 (which is also about submarines and also involves an enemy Akula-class sub) and it has many recycled scenes from Crimson Tide. To name a few: the scene where the sub does a "snap shot" of two torpedoes, the scene of the Akula being hit, and the scene where a torpedo barely misses the heroes' sub.

More trivia for Crimson Tide

Questions

Question: The disagreement between Hunter and Ramsey centers on the interpretation of the message that got cut off - Hunter says it might be a recall order so it has to be verified before they launch missiles; Ramsey says it is meaningless because it got cut off, so they should proceed with their original orders. I do understand that the captain was working within a scary time limit (one hour till the Russians could fire their missiles), but I don't understand how anyone could justify not spending part of that hour trying to confirm the cut-off message. Naval command would hardly have radioed them again to say "Yes, we really want you to fire your missiles, we're just telling you again for emphasis," so that means it was not just possible but extremely likely that the cut-off message was a recall order. Given that, how could anyone in their right mind want to cause a nuclear holocaust without first trying to find out what the cut-off message really said?

Answer: In a war situation, the Captain is absolutely NOT allowed to try and contact anyone, lest it gives their position away, which is why he was unable to question or confirm the order.

GalahadFairlight

All respect to GalahadFairlight, but Hunter was not asking the Captain to 'contact' anyone, but rather to use all possible measures to receive the EAM. Active contact was not required, and in fact, going shallow would have been 100% necessary just to launch the missiles, at which point VLF reception would have been easily possible. No nuclear submarine captain would ever have been so stubborn, nor so dismissive of his own XO. Both of these were pure Hollywood inventions.

More questions & answers from Crimson Tide
More movie quotes

Join the mailing list

Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.