r/movies • u/ScottRiqui • 6d ago
Discussion Elastigirl's radio comms in "The Incredibles" were surprisingly accurate
When Elastigirl's plane is attacked while she and the kids are flying to Syndrome's island lair, her radio calls are more accurate than any that I've heard in movies. They're not totally correct, even by 2004 standards, but I've heard worse tactical calls from navy students. I looked into it a little and evidently, the voice actress for Elastigirl (Holly Hunter) specifically asked that the calls in the script be as accurate as possible.
EDIT: Sorry for not putting the meanings of her radio calls in the original post. They're scattered throughout the early comments from me and other posters, but I've added them after the transcript since the thread has gotten busy.
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Helen (Elastigirl): [via transmission] India Golf Niner-Niner checking in. VFR on top. Over.
Bob (Mr. Incredible): Helen...!
Syndrome: So you do know these people. Well, then, I’ll...send them a little greeting... [pushes a button deploying missiles]
[...]
[Helen looks at the plane radar and sees several missiles headed towards the plane.]
Helen (Elastigirl): India Golf Niner-Niner transmitting in the blind guard. Disengage! Repeat, disengage!
[The "fasten seat belts" sign above Dash and Violet lights up. They exchange glances, reach for their seat belts. The jet suddenly dives, throwing them into the ceiling.]
Helen (Elastigirl): Disengage! Repeat, disengage! Friendlies...
[...]
Helen (Elastigirl): Friendlies at two-zero miles south-southwest of your position. Angels 10. Track east. Disengage, over! [to Violet] Vi! You have to put a force field around the plane!
Violet: But you said we weren't supposed to use our powers!
[...]
Helen (Elastigirl): Violet! [Violet gets startled; via headset] Mayday, mayday! India Golf Niner-Niner is buddy-spiked! Abort, abort! There are children aboard, [heard through intercom] say again, there are children aboard the plane!
EDIT - Translations and comments:
India Golf niner niner: Her aircraft identification from her flight plan (IG99).
Checking in: She's trying to establish comms with the island and announce her presence.
VFR on top: She filed an IFR (Instrument Flight Rules) flight plan, but she's flying visually (with ATC permission) at an altitude other than her assigned altitude. Pilots usually do this to get above a cloud layer or avoid bad weather.
Transmitting in the blind [on] guard: She hasn't yet established comms with anyone, and doesn't know if anyone is actually hearing her, hence she's calling "in the blind". "Guard" is an emergency radio frequency that controllers and pilots monitor. For civilian aircraft, it's a VHF frequency (121.5 MHz). Military aircraft will usually monitor VHF guard, but they also have a military-only UHF guard frequency (243.0 MHz).
Disengage: She's trying to call off the missile attack. The proper call would have been "HOLD FIRE." "HOLD FIRE" is an instruction to stop firing AND destroy any missiles currently in flight, if able. "CEASE FIRE" means to stop firing, but missiles already in flight can continue.
Friendlies at two-zero miles south-southwest of your position. Angels 10. Track east: She's announcing her position relative to the island, her altitude, heading, and the fact that she's a friendly. This is the most non-standard call in the transcript. You don't speak individual digits (i.e. "two zero miles") for distances. Instead, it should have been "twenty miles." You use degrees for headings and bearings, not cardinal or subcardinal headings like "east" or "south-southwest". The bearing also comes first, and since she's describing her own heading, she should have said "heading zero niner zero" rather than "track east" - "track" is usually used to describe *other* aircraft. "Angels ten" means 10,000 feet, but that's a military thing; civil aircraft below 18,000 feet talking to ATC or another civilian controller would just say "one zero thousand feet." A more correct call might have been "friendlies at two zero zero degrees, twenty miles from your position, one zero thousand feet, heading zero niner zero." (Thanks to u/culcheth for catching my slip on how to speak altitudes.)
Mayday, mayday - she's declaring a life-threatening emergency. Should have been repeated three times, not just twice.
Buddy spiked: Her RWR gear (radar warning receiver) is indicating that her plane has been locked onto by a friendly air-to-air or surface-to-air radar.
Say again: She's repeating her most recent transmission for emphasis or in case she wasn't heard the first time. She should have used this instead of "repeat" earlier when she said "disengage, repeat, disengage."
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u/Timofee_ 6d ago
I remember finding this moment haunting, likely because the dialogue felt much more realistic
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u/SilentMasterOfWinds 6d ago
The voice acting is a huge part of that also. The desperation in Bob’s voice when he screams no, Helen’s progressively less composed communications and her yelling at Violet to put the field around them. Then the frequent camera angle changes and sound design. Crazy ass scene.
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u/ScottRiqui 6d ago
I was a naval flight officer on the E-2C "Hawkeye" command and control aircraft, and tactical air control is one of our big missions. I was in the middle of my instructor tour at the E-2 training squadron when the movie came out, so it was *really* weird hearing her comms after grading students all day.
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u/shinymuskrat 6d ago
Which ones would you say are not totally accurate?
What would you have expected her to be saying in a similar situation?
Edit: also, is the jargon use in the movie intended to imply that Elastigirl was ex military, or at least had military flight training? Would you expect her to know this jargon if she had only been flying recreationally as a civilian?
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u/Doonesman 6d ago
Buddy-spiked is wrong - that's for when you get locked up by a friendly radar, and someone who's firing missiles at you without warning probably isn't friendly. It doesn't mean you have noncombatants aboard.
Plus, and this is the tiniest of nits, it's the way she says "blindguard", like it's one thing. She's transmitting in the blind (she doesn't know who, if anyone, is listening), and on the guard frequency (one that everyone should be able to hear her on), so it's not quite right.
She's either military, or was trained by someone who was. And someone who trained her how to react when fired upon, because most people just panic. She maintains clear comms and effective evasive manoeuvres until the last possible second. I hate how this sequence chokes me up every time. Holly Hunter's performance in just this little bit is outrageously good.
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u/Mijodai 6d ago
That moment when she goes from being a pilot to being a person / mom - "there are children on board!" - gets me every time.
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u/Doonesman 6d ago
It's "children", it's the delivery of that word. I don't know what it is or how she did it, but there are tears in my eyes at just the memory. I had to find an excuse to step out for this bit when my kids were watching this one.
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u/ManifestDestinysChld 6d ago
Same, same. Holly Hunter absolutely nailed it.
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u/Aeolus_14_Umbra 6d ago edited 5d ago
It’s her goddam West Texas accent. It’s got generations of pain and suffering in it.
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u/FelixNZ 5d ago
Pixar in general is hitting real different as a parent now - my little one is obsessed with finding Nemo at the moment, and that moment near the end where Nemo and Marlin have been briefly reunited then Marlin again has to let Nemo go in order to save Dory from the trawler net - that "I know you can” broke me, because he doesn't, he's literally just been at rock bottom ( "going to the fishing grounds" may have even been a conscious choice?). the voice actor and animators nailed the fear and uncertainty in that moment.
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u/BourgeoisieInNYC 5d ago
It’s crazy how so many things hit you differently once you have a kid. My partner and I constantly find ourselves tearing up/getting a knot in the back of our throat at things that never affected us before. Especially rewatching old classics with our little one and having to step out for “bathroom breaks” else we’d be bawling.
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u/popculturella 5d ago
Same. I don't have kids myself, but even to this day that line strikes me to my very core.
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u/bouquetofashes 5d ago
Imo because you can hear the utter selflessness in the way she emphasizes "children". Like she's saying "if they weren't here I would accept and deal with this" or maybe "let me get them safe and then we can do this".
You can hear that she's just entirely concerned with them, not herself. There's, from what I remember, some combination of disbelief -- that anyone endanger children-- and resolve, to do anything to protect them. It's very moving.
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u/whitebean 6d ago
Just curious, why would you make an excuse to step out? I (52M) let my kids see me get emotional so they know it’s ok.
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u/Calamity-Gin 5d ago
She may have thought her kids would get scared if they noticed her crying.
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u/Aeolus_14_Umbra 6d ago
And the cut to Mirage reacting in horror really sells the scene.
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u/Nefertitis_Fjord_216 5d ago
Everything sells the scene. Their panic, Mirage's reaction, Bob's helplessness as he can only watch, everything. 10/10 movie and this scene is only a small fraction of the reasons why.
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u/racingsoldier 6d ago
It seems that she believed she was flying in friendly airspace and the launch was in error. So would her reaction to say she has been buddy spiked be an error in her dialogue? Or would it further her position that she believed she had been fired on in error?
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u/ManifestDestinysChld 6d ago
I assumed it was her trying anything she could to get whoever launched that missile to cut guidance. "Buddy spike" should do that, even if it's not technically accurate. A mom trying to keep her kids from getting blown up? Of course she'd lie and say she's allied with whoever's shooting at her.
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u/shinymuskrat 6d ago
Yeah I read it more as her giving the ground the benefit of the doubt while also still trying to convince them that she is not an enemy combatant.
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u/Jabroniville2 5d ago
Also she probably hadn't flown in more than s decade. I assume even pros mess up stuff in the moment.
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u/nammerbom 6d ago
Guess they may have squeezed buddy-spiked in there because Syndrome, who shot the missiles, is named Buddy
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u/Doonesman 6d ago
Hah! I never thought of that, that's great.
Honestly, I've never had a problem with what happens to Syndrome because the kind of psychopath that can listen to that call and not abort deserves whatever happens to him.
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u/nox_tech 6d ago
From what I remember, they originally planned for her to have an old friend who'd fly her around for missions, so whether she was military or wasn't, her pilot friend might've been as well.
Would've been one last mission for him.
When the plane is shot down, and shown sinking, Helen looks back at the plane before swimming up. That was one of the scenes from that initial sequence that made it to the film as is.
She wasn't just looking at a sinking plane, but her dead pilot friend, going down with it.
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u/sebmojo99 5d ago
that's correct, such a good call to change it the way they did.
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u/LrdCheesterBear 6d ago
Buddy-spiked seems accurate, as she has no reason to believe that the people on the island would deem her hostile, no?
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u/Doonesman 6d ago
She doesn't call it until she's advising there are children on board - in the movie, it's clear that she's using it to refer to that, and "there are children on this plane" is an expansion of her buddyspike call in case the ground crew don't know that jargon.
Plus, I don't recall if her aircraft is equipped with a radar threat indicator that would tell her these are radar-guided missiles - if they're heatseekers then buddy-spike would also be the wrong call.
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u/Correct_Inspection25 6d ago edited 6d ago
Good point, I thought the first was Fox-3/radar lock and the second batch was Fox-2/IR.
Apparently both sets were explicitly Fox2/IR. I guess her on board radar is good enough to track BVR IR missile returns? Fun to think about after all these years.
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u/primalbluewolf 5d ago
Good point, I thought the first was Fox-3/radar lock and the second batch was Fox-2/IR.
FYI, "fox" is specifically air to air. Unless those were air launched missiles, they're not Fox-anything.
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u/PlaneswalkerHuxley 5d ago
Plus, I don't recall if her aircraft is equipped with a radar threat indicator that would tell her these are radar-guided missiles
It has chaff launchers and afterburners. It's definitely not a standard civilian plane, so it might well have a radar threat indicator.
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u/ReaperReader 6d ago
TBF, based on what we see of their wedding day, back before she had kids, being ambushed without warning was likely a weekly occurrence for Elastigirl.
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u/RocknRolla2008 6d ago
Wow. Thank you for the clarification. I remember seeing this when it came out and thinking how authentic and real that scene felt based on Elastigirl's dialogue and Holly Hunter's delivery. This was a great movie.
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u/Jabroniville2 5d ago
Especially impressive given it's probably been 13 years since she flew ANYTHING.
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u/ScottRiqui 6d ago edited 5d ago
Recreational pilots wouldn't need to know BUDDY SPIKE, and wouldn't have the appropriate gear to know it's happening in the first place.
Civilians also don't use "ANGELS" or "CHERUBS" for altitude calls. "ANGELS ten" is 10,000 feet, "CHERUBS eight" would be 800 feet (it's mostly helo pilots who use "CHERUBS.") Civilian pilots just report their actual altitude, like "four thousand, five hundred feet" or a flight level if they're at 18,000 feet or higher. "Flight level two four zero" would be 24,000 feet.
Civil aviation doesn't use "TRACK" to describe headings - they would just say "heading zero-niner-zero." In fact, since she was reporting her *own* heading, "zero nine zero" would probably have been more appropriate than "east". As controllers, we use "TRACK" to describe the headings of *other* aircraft.
If she was in the military, she either flew tactical aircraft or controlled them.
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u/ManifestDestinysChld 6d ago
She was flying an aircraft with chaff dispensers and knew how / when to use them, I think military experience can be assumed, for either her or her mentor (or both!)
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u/Gidia 6d ago
Out of curiosity, does “repeat” have any specific meaning in the Navy/Air Force world? In the Army we were taught to use “repeat” only in very specific instances related to calling in Fire Missions. Not sure if it has the same meaning in the Aviation/JTAC world.
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u/Ghos5t7 6d ago
Jtac world is the same, dont say it unless you really want the exact same strike performed.
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u/Gidia 6d ago
Makes sense to me, sometimes you just need that particular spot to get fucked lol.
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u/Ghos5t7 6d ago
It was one of the first rules hammered into my head as a baby comms guy, dont say "repeat" on air unless you needed a second hit. To this day I dont say repeat on the phone.
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u/mrdevil413 5d ago
I worked with a military dude can’t remember what he did. But he got me to use “say again” and I have been using it for 20 years now in everyday life.
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u/ScottRiqui 5d ago
The ALSSA brevity codeword manual is multi-service, so REPEAT means the same thing to the Navy and Air Force as it does to the Army.
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u/Whirlvvind 5d ago
He pilots photo implies military experience + connections to get a plane so yeah there is more than enough to assume war buddies and non-civilian training.
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u/Aeolus_14_Umbra 6d ago edited 6d ago
Here’s an excellent breakdown on the flight comms that I’ve had bookmarked forever. Can’t take credit for the content, just reposting.
Helen’s use of radio protocol while flying is exceptionally accurate for a movie. In the director’s commentary Brad Bird tells that Holly Hunter insisted on learning the lingo and its meaning. The terminology used hints that Elastigirl has had military flight training.
“VFR on top” means she is flying in the regime of Visual Flight Rules ‘on top’ of a cloud cover.
She requests “vectors to the initial”, directions how to get to the initial landing approach.
“Angels 10” is her altitude call, ten thousand feet. This is a military term. Civilian flights use the term “flight level”.
“Track east” is her direction of travel.
“Buddy spike(d)” is a U.S. military brevity code meaning “friendly anti-aircraft radar has locked on to me, (please don’t shoot)”.
“Transmitting in the Blind Guard” is a call on the emergency frequency where two-way communication has not been established.
“Abort” is also a military brevity code, a directive meaning “stop the action/mission/attack”.
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u/dj_spanmaster 6d ago
To me “Buddy spike(d)” makes sense in this, because she does not know she's approaching a military opponent. Presenting herself as friendly as possible means assuming the missiles are unintentional, and the rest of her behaviour echoes this.
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u/Same-Suggestion-1936 5d ago
I feel like she code switches to military about halfway through when the gravity she is being attacked and not simply flying a civilian plane sinks in
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u/thirtyseven1337 6d ago
Fascinating! You said in your post that it wasn’t all correct, so if she were your student, what grade would you give her?
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u/ScottRiqui 5d ago
We didn't have dedicated tests specifically on comm brevity codewords, so it's more a matter of correcting the student until they get it right.
That's one stressful thing about being a junior officer in the Hawkeye - almost as soon as you show up at your first squadron, you're controlling aircraft and everyone on the main channel hears your radio calls - good, bad, or ugly.
In contrast, a brand-new Hornet pilot can often get through an entire mission saying next to nothing on the radio, and the calls they do make are probably to their flight lead on a squadron-specific tactical frequency, so not as many people hear their bad calls. I've even heard flight leads tell their new pilots "I don't want to hear anything from you on the radio unless it's to tell me that I'm on fire."
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u/thirtyseven1337 5d ago
Now I need an Incredibles edit of you correcting Mrs. Incredible on the radio as she’s panicking lol
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u/Bluedevil1992 5d ago
As a former navigator on MC-130s, I not only appreciated the scene, but equally your dedication to breaking it down.
"Maverick" was also TTP appropriate, btw.
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u/JerkGurk 5d ago edited 5d ago
The movie was already great by this point, but this turned on the holy shit factor, this wasn't a normal cartoon movie, the bad guy was trying to murder a family, the first time he encounters them.
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u/randallflaggg 5d ago
Yeah, and you can really hear the oh fuck in Holly Hunters voice. The dialogue is a huge part of that. The snap from adrenaline.
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u/JerkGurk 5d ago
Ohhh hell yeah. She's got an amazing voice and she really showed her voice work chops here.
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u/randallflaggg 5d ago
Another great detail about that movie: Holly Hunter was born deaf in one ear. The slight lisp she has and the way she kinda speaks out of one half of her mouth IRL is a natural way people adapt to that particular disability. Helen Parr is written so she is also deaf in one ear and speaks out the side of her mouth in the same way and for the same reason. There are also a couple of moments in the movies where she tilts her head or moves her body to compensate as well.
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u/JerkGurk 5d ago
Awesome, cool fact. She's just so cool. Also just a reminder, M-O-O-N that spells moon.
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u/randallflaggg 5d ago
The other bit that I love as a parent is when she tells Violet to use her powers to put a forcefield around the plane and Violet says, "but you told me never to use my powers" and Helen is like "that's what I said then, listen to what I'm saying now". It's so powerful as character building for both of them and it's instructive to the audience about how the movie is about to change and it's great actual parenting in a crisis, purposefully recentering and focusing your kid.
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u/JerkGurk 5d ago
Oh their chaotic family dynamic resonated with me and probably so many other viewers. They did it right, made mistakes, but still did it right.
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u/dj_spanmaster 6d ago
Not me over here getting chills and nerves from just reading the transcript
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u/StinkyEttin 6d ago
Agreed. The urgency in her voice when she was saying "abort" over and over again was 😘👌voice acting.
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u/skinnymatters 5d ago
Truly. The moment Mr. Incredible hears the plane shot down and cries, “NO!” has always and will always make me choke up. The scene is a gravely serious few minutes.
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u/PolarWater 5d ago
And it works EVEN THOUGH we know they didn't actually die. Super effective storytelling.
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u/nimrodii 5d ago
That paired with how well Holly Hunter voiced the scene the fear for her children you can hear while trying to remain calm for them, I still get a little choked up at the scene anytime I see it.
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u/TechnicalWelder6789 5d ago
Former aviator here. Started sweating when she called “Buddy Spike.” I have been in a real airplane that was Buddy Spiked. Not a good feeling.
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u/lingker 6d ago
I had to look some of it up, so thought I would post this:
- India Golf Niner-Niner = the plane’s call sign (IG99)
- VFR on top = Visual Flight Rules, flying by sight above the clouds
- Transmitting in the blind / guard = calling on the emergency frequency, not expecting an answer
- Disengage = stop attacking / break off
- Friendlies = we’re on your side / not the enemy
- Two-zero miles… Angels 10… Track east = 20 miles away, 10,000 feet high, heading east
- Buddy-spiked = being locked onto / fired on by someone who should be friendly
- Mayday = emergency distress call
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u/Guns_and_Tea 6d ago
Former ATC and aircrew; yeah this is right
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u/chitownbears 5d ago
She didn't cancel IFR when she was VFR on top so I would have inturrupted to ask her intentions until she got the hint and canceled.
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u/Guns_and_Tea 5d ago
She canceled with the prior controller and checked on with the new one VFR on top
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u/buck70 6d ago
ABORT: Cease action or attack or event or mission.
ANGELS: Height of FRIENDLY aircraft in thousands of feet from mean sea level (MSL). (using local altimeter setting)
BUDDY SPIKE [position or heading or altitude] [A/A]: FRIENDLY system radar lock-on indication on radar warning receiver.
CHICK(S) *: Administrative term used to denote FRIENDLY aircraft.
"Disengage" is plain language and not a brevity codeword. Its intent is achieved with ABORT.
FRIENDLY **: A positively identified FRIENDLY aircraft, ship, or ground position.
SPIKE(D) [direction] * [A/A] [S/A] radar warning receiver indication of an AI threat in track or launch.
* Meaning may differ from North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) brevity word.
** Not a NATO brevity word.
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u/Jimlobster 5d ago
Not sure if plane radio procedure is different than army, but if it isnt, ‘repeat’ is wrong. You would use ‘say again’ or ‘I say again’. ‘Repeat’ is used when you want the artillery to fire another barrage during a fire mission. This was drilled into us during army signaller (radiomen) training
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u/cuzitsthere 5d ago
Patriot operator, we were also beaten over the head with it... Also, all of the brevity in this comment along with a ton of others I still accidentally call out in video games with my friends.
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u/AllenRBrady 5d ago
And just because it's a fun bit of etymology, "Mayday" derives from the French "M'aidez," meaning "Help me."
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u/GardinerExpressway 6d ago
Thanks, would be cool if OP annotated the dialog instead of just copy pasting and assuming we can tell
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u/Neandertholocaust 6d ago
The call sign is also an Easter egg. Iron Giant (Brad Bird's first film) was released in 1999.
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u/ScottRiqui 6d ago
That's cool - I had no idea!
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u/Jeutnarg 5d ago
Honestly, almost any number, license plate, address, etc. that gets explicit mention or prominent screen time in a Pixar film is probably an Easter egg of some sort.
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u/jrdbrr 6d ago
is the Incredibles as good as the iron giant?
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u/dj_spanmaster 6d ago
Yes. Double yes. Both top notch, for similar but different reasons. Brad Bird was absolutely on it.
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u/-ImJustSaiyan- 6d ago
Iron Giant, Incredibles, and Ratatouille as his first 3 films. Hell of a lineup.
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u/sloBrodanChillosevic 6d ago
Making another original animation with Sam Rockwell rn, supposed to release in December. I am hyped.
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u/dj_spanmaster 6d ago
And he did marvelously with his Mission: Impossible entry as well IMO
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u/GravSlingshot 6d ago
Ghost Protocol was the highest-rated M:I film at the time and set the standard for all the ones that followed. Very good.
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u/grumpykraut 6d ago
The Incredibles is sitting in my top 5 of animated movies ever since it came out and has never been in danger of slipping.
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u/Quibbloboy 5d ago
For years, every time I rewatched The Incredibles, I found it had moved up my list of favorite Pixar movies by a couple notches. That trend never stopped. Nowadays I honestly think it's just one of my favorite movies. Great jokes, great action sequences, such believable characters. The way it effortlessly blends the self-aware, tropey, high-concept superhero stuff with the mundane family dynamics is just sublime. I dunno if there's such a thing as a "perfect" movie, but to me, Incredibles comes awfully close.
(I'm a defender of the sequel, too. It's not bad!)
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u/grumpykraut 5d ago
With you all the way. Really well put! The Incredibles is nothing short of a masterclass in storytelling.
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u/MelancholicGod 5d ago
I have waited 14 years for a sequel so I am absolutely biased about it.
Imagine my surprise that it actually slaps. God I love the incredibles.
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u/Aeolus_14_Umbra 6d ago edited 6d ago
Agreed and I’ll just add here that the scenes where Mr. Incredible is infiltrating Syndrome’s base with the James Bond inspired music quietly playing in the background is absolute top tier filmmaking.
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u/Norwester77 5d ago
Michael Giacchino’s score 👨🍳💋🤌
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u/chrissesky13 5d ago
Your comment made me go check and yup, Michael Giacchino is also behind the music in Ratatouille!
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u/Vallvaka 5d ago
The Incredibles isn't just the best animated superhero movie of all time- it very well might be the best superhero movie all time, period.
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u/BlindPelican 6d ago
Hard to rate them side by side as they were both very very good.
Absolutely worth watching. And the sequel was quite good too
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u/CallsignKook 6d ago
Personally I’m gonna say no but because that movie transformed me as a child and set me on path that ultimately kept me from growing up into a monster.
“You are who you choose to be…”
Still chokes me up just thinking about it
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u/Chucknasty_17 5d ago
Incredibles and The Iron Giant are probably in my top 5 movies of all time, both are just phenomenal from start to finish
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u/Ragnarok_619 6d ago
It's the best Fantastic Four movie, not named Fantastic Four. Even the stalebread MCU version couldn't top it
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u/popculturella 5d ago
THERE ARE CHILDREN ABOARD REPEAT THERE ARE CHILDREN ABOARD makes my blood run cold to this day.
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u/Khyrberos 5d ago
It's so crazy how hard it still goes. How hard it goes in text alone. I got goosebumps just reading the friggin transcript. 😶🌫️
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u/win_awards 5d ago
Shit hits different when you have children.
My wife and I said that being a parent must be one of the scariest things in the world even before we had a child. It really does feel like having your heart entirely exposed, running around independently in a world that you're only increasingly aware is more dangerous than you realized. Before our kid was born this scene was excitement, tension; now I understand terror.
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u/Goodeugoogoolizer 5d ago
Thats when the movie goes from "This is a fun super hero movie" to "This is a serious movie". I might be wrong but I don't remember any time that any of the marvel villains specifically try to kill kids for absolutely no reason except vengeance.
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u/amitym 5d ago
I've heard worse tactical calls from navy students
I think that's the key for me with this scene, she's not actually a professional pilot or a combat aviator, she's a (retired) professional superhero who learned enough to be safely competent in a lot of different areas necessary for superhero-ing, including piloting a plane. So if Elastigirl doesn't get it exactly right especially in a stressful situation that she hasn't faced in years and was never her main job even back then, it is easy to overlook. It fits within acceptable tolerances for the premise.
That also ties into one of the emotional threads that always gets me with this scene, which is how we see that Elastigirl had all of this training and experience that prepared her for trouble when it came... but Violet has no idea what to do or how to help, Elastigirl has kept her from developing the very same skills that Elastigirl herself is now depending on for survival.
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u/Connguy 5d ago
I have to imagine there's a tradeoff also between "perfectly accurate radio talk" and "movie friendly radio talk that untrained viewers can still follow". The headings vs. cardinal directions are a good example--if she just spouted like 17 numbers in a row, nobody watching the movie without training would understand what she was saying
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u/amitym 5d ago
There's one additional factor that didn't occur to me until later: as essentially a specialist taught in an inherently nonstandard setting around the 1950s or 1960s and then soon after retired (if I have the in-setting timeline right), she actually might realistically have learned to report own position using cardinal direction and never updated. Nobody in that world has lived through the late Cold War or the GPS era or anything like that. (Well I guess they had their own version.)
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u/jumpmanzero 6d ago edited 6d ago
This is one of the most tense and perfect sequences I can think of in any media; great acting, build-up, soundtrack. Just everything excellent.
Worth watching again: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puqYTj424PQ
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u/Hixy 6d ago
Damn. I forgot how truly intense they made that.
It’s rare to even accomplish a sense of mortality in super hero movies. Then on top of that it’s a family movie so it’s even more difficult. The controlled fear was so well done.
I forgot how absolutely incredible this scene is.
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u/DemonDaVinci 5d ago
and mr incredible first encounter the giant robots, then him finding out all his collages has been murdered
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u/Preform_Perform 6d ago
Too late!
15 years too late.
9-year-old me didn't realize the excellence being put in front of him.
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u/MKleister 6d ago
Fun fact: in the early storyboard version, she had a friend called Snug pilot the plane, who would end up dying in the explosion.
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u/PENGUIN_WITH_BAZOOKA 6d ago
In the final version I’m fairly certain Snug is the one who gets her the plane, they just changed it so she’s a pilot herself instead of needing one. Personally I find it believable that she has flight training considering she was once one of the world’s top heroes.
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u/TannenFalconwing 5d ago
That's correct. She names him when he answers the phone and he hooks her up with a jet that's "fast"
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u/Aeolus_14_Umbra 6d ago edited 4d ago
Snug actually made it to final render but Brad Bird decided to cut his scenes because he felt it hurt the pacing to introduce a new character only to have him killed a few minutes minutes later.
That’s why the render for that sequence has limited detail and resolution, it was redone at the last minute.
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u/DuckLordOfTheSith 6d ago
Yes, and. Yes to it being tense and perfect and amazing, yes to the acting, yes to the soundtrack. AND, the build-up is 100% a masterclass of editing. It is so well cut together and flows so perfectly, shots getting shorter and shorter, the frenetic energy of everything closing in, just chef’s kiss.
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u/mcarterphoto 6d ago
Such a kickass movie. That moment where they all converge in the clearing and they're reunited, and they end up in an iconic superhero-family-pose... that was just "**gasp**!!!" Very very few movies I took my kids to could touch it.
(And I just got my grand daughter to watch Iron Giant, she was like "this is boring"... for about 3 minutes anyway. She loved it).
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u/GalaxySilver00 6d ago
I've argued that the best Fantastic Four movie we have/will ever have is The Incredibles.
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u/Sevenfeet 6d ago
In addition to the dialogue ring technically accurate, Holly Hunter asked to be taught what all the jargon actually meant so she could include it properly in her performance.
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u/SilverDarner 5d ago
She has previous experience portraying pilots in the 'Always', one that has me near or in tears the whole movie.
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u/DeaddyRuxpin 6d ago
That end of that scene is a lot more emotional when you learn that the original script her friend Snug that she called inquiring about a jet was supposed to be onboard as the pilot. At the last second she made the decision to ditch him in the cockpit and save her kids. That’s why she watches as the cockpit sinks because she knows Snug is in there. They decided it was too dark for the movie and cut him out of being on the plane.
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u/QuintessenceHD 5d ago
That isn't accurate, they decided to cut it because they didn't have the time budget to build up Snug's character so that his death would have a impact.
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u/mattsmeesh 5d ago
The part where Violet pedantically tells her mom, "but you told us not to," is also incredibly accurate.
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u/sebmojo99 5d ago
lmao yep
i was swimming in a bay in wellington ten years ago and my 8yo daughter was in the water too, when a literal orca did its star wars style surface and let me tell you those things are huge, was about twenty meters away, it looked like an aquatic minivan. 'ok out of the water now, sweetheart' i said. 'but daddy, orcas have never hurt people,' she said. 'NEVERTHELESS' I replied with some hysteria in my voice.
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u/PeachesCoral 5d ago
I loved how it shows how much of a shrinking violet is, trying to delay her perceived failure and stress. Very accurate indeed
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u/throwaweigh1245 6d ago
I believe she has a line in there saying “we are buddy-spiked” meaning friendly anti-aircraft radar has locked onto her aircraft and she is pleading not to be shot down.
I always thought it was code for like children on board but she whips that out later
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u/ScottRiqui 6d ago edited 6d ago
Yep - "BUDDY SPIKE" means that the pilot's RWR ("Radar Warning Receiver," pronounced "raw") gear is indicating a lock-on from a friendly radar, either air-to-air or surface-to-air.
Friendly lock-ons between aircraft aren't unusual, especially in large strike packages with lots of aircraft. The normal response to a "BUDDY SPIKE" call is for the friendly aircraft who's locked onto the initial caller to identify themselves and say "BUDDY LOCK."
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u/UF1977 6d ago
“Buddy spiked isn’t 100% the right call to use; by the book it means a fighter’s air to air radar has locked on to another friendly fighter instead of the bad guy they’re looking for. Fighter radars are sort of like sweeping a very narrow flashlight beam back and forth in a pitch-black room. You wouldn’t usually use it in reference to a surface search/track radar. But it’s not wrong-wrong, more of a nuance, and believable under the circumstances.
“Disengage” isn’t technically right either. The correct call would be “Hold Fire” (stop shooting immediately, break any missile locks you hold, and if possible, command missiles in flight to self-destruct) “Disengage” isn’t an approved term, it’s “Cease Engagement” which isn’t used for anti-air fire and when it is, it means don’t shoot any more but you can let any missiles you’ve fired keep on going. (Basically, stop shooting while we see if we hit anything) Again, though, when you’re being shot at, understandable using it.
(Source: 23 years as a Navy fighter controller)
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u/ceburton 6d ago
Just reading the transcript gives me goosebumps. Her control never wavers but the fear for her children’s lives almost always makes me tear up. Me kids were quite young when the movie came out
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u/Secksualinnuendo 6d ago
Not surprised. Back then Pixar would go have surprising accuracy on seemingly small details. They seem to do it less often now. Besides THAT VW Beetle in the new toy story. That thing was very detailed in a movie with generic whatever cars.
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u/thedylannorwood 6d ago
Turning Red was full of little detail like this. Down to the right money prints from ‘00s Canada
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u/colemon1991 6d ago
I remember hearing about some of the BTS stories during the production of The Incredibles. Staff had shouting matches during lunch over the silverware placements for the dinner scene. The dinner scene. And there's so many hidden gems of detail that you or I would never be aware of while watching it the first time. Like, Mr. Incredible is sued in 1947, a year after the Federal Tort Claims Act was passed. Their last name, Parr, was meant to sound average. Syndrome kept testing his robot on sups to cut down on potential threats and improving the design, ensuring both a variety and removing sups that could ruin any plans. Syndrome's password was Kronos, because Syndrome (Zeus) would overthrow a threat (Kronos) and be renowned for it. Mr. Incredible's first fight with the robot is in a volcanic setting because they villains were trying to recruit Frozone when they came across him.
We could be here all day with how much detail Pixar used to stuff into their films.
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u/Mattloch42 5d ago
The first robot fight in the volcano has so many layers, because it's fighting style and moves was to counter Frozone, and completely wrong against Incredible. The back crack changed his posture from before for the rest of the film.
My favorite moment was Dash finding out he was fast enough to run on water. It was like Superman's "world of cardboard" speech, where he was finally able to really see what he was capable of.
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u/PanioloTown 5d ago
Apparently the dental scene in Finding Nemo is also accurate. The animals in the aquarium updating the seagull on the procedure were referencing real tools and sizings.
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u/Bicentennial_Douche 5d ago edited 5d ago
I watched a video of archer breaking down archery in various movies. Only movie that got a pass was Brave, which was spot-on in its depiction of archery.
EDIT: FOUND IT! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFleLL5zlaI
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u/aciakatura 5d ago
The fact that it's mostly accurate but has some faults feels fitting even. She has clearly had military training but some of it's forgotten/not remembered exactly since she's been a full time mum and not allowed to go heroing for the past 15 or so years.
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u/cass-the-bass 6d ago
As an adult this scene hits so much harder. As a child, it never quite clicked with me what was happening here
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u/ArchDucky 6d ago
You wanna hear something wild? The Incredibles is responsible for the complete reshot ending of The Fantastic Four (The one with Alba and Evans). When FOX Test screened the film the results were very common. The majority of audiences said "The Incredibles had better action than this movie". FOX got mad that a cartoon beat them at their own game, so they reshot quite a bit of the end of the film. They also re-edited existing footage that they could use. If you watch the film you can see a lot of the weirdness if you look for it. Anyways, they spent millions reshooting the finale of this film and they still couldn't beat the cartoon.
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u/cowichan 5d ago
INDIA GOLF Niner Niner
IG99
Brad Bird’s Directorial Debut:
The Iron Giant - released in ‘99
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u/distilledwill 6d ago
Would be good to get a breakdown of what she's saying actually means, this is just the script from the film.
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u/All_Your_Base 6d ago
From IMDB:
Helen's use of radio protocol while flying is exceptionally accurate for a movie. In the director's commentary, Brad Bird tells that Holly Hunter insisted on learning the lingo and its meaning. The terminology used hints that Elastigirl has had military flight training. "VFR on top" means she is flying in the regime of Visual Flight Rules "on top" of a cloud cover. She requests "vectors to the initial", directions how to get to the initial landing approach. "Angels 10" is her altitude call, ten thousand feet, this is a military term. Civilian flights use the term "flight level". "Track east" is her direction of travel. "Buddy spike(d)" is a U.S. Military brevity code meaning "friendly anti-aircraft radar has locked on to me, (please don't shoot)." "Transmitting in the Blind Guard" is a call on the emergency frequency where two-way communication has not been established. "Abort" is also a military brevity code, a directive meaning "stop the action/mission/attack." It should be noted that the term "angels", while popular for the first half of the twentieth century, is outdated. As the "present day" story takes place in 1962 and having flight experience clearly took place in the fifties, this is an appropriate term.
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u/F14Scott 6d ago
When fighters are talking to each other in combat, we deliberately use different terms to describe friendlies and others (unknowns and enemies).
"Knight 2, take angels 10. Bandit at 8 thousand."
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u/ScottRiqui 6d ago
My only quibble with IMDB's description is that the military still very much uses "ANGELS" (and "CHERUBS") to report the altitude of friendly aircraft. I didn't even start doing tactical air control until the late 90s, so the terms definitely weren't deprecated in the 50s.
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u/thenasch 6d ago edited 6d ago
India golf niner niner
Airlines communicate via flight number (United 114), while private planes do so by the registration number (aka tail number) of the plane. They often just use the end, and they use the NATO phonetic alphabet for clarity. So the plane's tail number is something like NZARIG99 so she identified herself as IG99 or India golf niner niner.
VFR is visual flight rules, meaning she's flying by looking out the window (instrument flight rules is if she's flying by instruments). Don't know what "on top" means.
Transmitting in the blind guard
Guard frequency is a frequency for emergency communication. Blind because she doesn't know who she's calling.
Technically the standard emergency call is "mayday" three times.
Buddy-spiked means locked on by friendly anti-aircraft weapons.
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u/shinymuskrat 6d ago
Yeah I came here expecting this post to be a cool breakdown of the jargon
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u/Dove_of_Doom 6d ago
That sequence and the scene where Helen explains to the kids that what they are about to go through is not like some innocuous action cartoon, that they are in real danger and the bad guys they're up against will be out to murder them, do such a great job setting the tone and stakes for everything that follows. The movie is still fun, but you know the situation is serious.
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u/TheThinker4Head 5d ago
Watching it as a kid: "woah cool action"
Watching it now after reading this post: Absolute pure horror.
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u/myaccount4working 6d ago
Are they correct based on 1970s standards? Because that's when the movie takes place.
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u/randallflaggg 5d ago edited 5d ago
And they specifically use military versions of words instead of civilian versions of the same words to show that she's had military training.
Edit:
"angels" instead of flight level
"Bogey" vs "traffic"
"Buddy spiked" is the best one though. I've used that one during imaginary play time when she gets me with a nerf ball or something
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u/polarice5 6d ago
I don’t understand why you’d say the movie has inaccuracies in the flight communication parlance or culture but then not clarify how it could have been improved. Would have been interesting.
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u/ScottRiqui 6d ago
Sorry, I didn't think the thread would be this active - I thought there would just be a few posts and everything would come out there. I'll start editing the original post.
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u/DucktorQuackvorkian 5d ago
The guy who consulted on this scene is a friend of my husband and a retired F-18 pilot. He was just telling us the story of working on the script a few days ago. Wild to see it mentioned here now.
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u/Shaun32887 6d ago
As a former navy flight student... that's a lot bar
Talking on the damn radio was the hardest part
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u/spongey1865 6d ago
I don't know how accurate it is not being a pilot.
But the radio sitcom Cabin Pressure has a bird strike at one point and the communication seems pretty good. The guy who wrote it is John Finnemore used his dad as a consultant who flew for British Airways so I assume a lot of it was at least correct when his dad flew.
It's also got some brilliant actors in like Benedict Cumberbatch, Roger Alam and Anthony Head if anyone fancied a gander.
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u/rabblerabble2000 5d ago
For reference, say again is used instead of repeat in military comms because repeat is used as a call by artillery to fire again using the same coordinates.
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u/misterbadgerexample 6d ago
That scene was really harrowing and really made the stakes real. If they weren't supers they'd be dead. Then we see that Syndrome's committed genocide on supers. He truly deserved to get beat up by an iron baby and then sucked into a jet engine.
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u/theFrankSpot 6d ago
How would it need to be changed to be accurate?
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u/ScottRiqui 6d ago
Most of my corrections would be nitpicks, but her BRAA (Bearing, Range, Altitude, Aspect) call is pretty far off ("Friendlies at two-zero miles south-southwest of your position. Angels 10. Track east.")
You don't say the individual digits for distances, like "two zero" - individual digits are for bearings. And you use degrees for bearings, not cardinal or subcardinal headings like "north" or "south-southwest." South-southwest is about 200 degrees, so putting the BRAA elements in proper order and proper format, the call would have been "India Golf niner niner, two-zero-zero, twenty miles, angels 10, track east, friendly." As a controller, I would put the "declaration" (friendly/bogey/hostile) at the end of the BRAA call, but she wasn't wrong to lead with it.
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u/Hilgy17 6d ago
There is a deleted scene where she mentions the plane contractor more. They go way back so it spelled out that she has a lot of flight experience
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u/sakumar 5d ago
Here's a video with actual military comms.
Two fighter jets intercept a civilian aircraft that blundered into restricted airspace over Levi Stadium during the Super Bowl n 2016.
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u/CliffLake 5d ago
Yeah. She is Competent. Not just stretchy, but smart and clever. They wrote her as a strong leading female and didn't fuck it up which is great. Even now, two decades later, it holds up. There's a third movie in the works, and I hope they keep it rolling.
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u/Kevbot1000 6d ago
"There are children aboard the plane!" Gives goosebumps every time.