Backdraft

One of the Baldwins wants to be a fireman. His brother Kurt Russell is cross with him for wanting to be a fireman. Something about him not being very firemany when he was young or something? I don’t know. Anyway, Baldwin does sex with Jennifer Jason Donovan on the back of a fire engine, then Robert De Niro turns up as a burny Hannibal Lector and it’s a race to stop fire and put it in prison.

Trivia

William Baldwin insisted on understanding the life of a firefighter and so spent six months living in apartment that was on fire.

The film was originally named ‘Blow-off’ after the traditional name for an explosion caused by oxygen rushing to meet fire, but was changed to Backdraft after producers discovered its British meaning.

Scott Glenn did many of his own stunts, and was so impressive he was invited to become a New York firefighter, and is now New York’s fire commissioner

The project was intensely personal for star Kurt Russell whose father was a fire.

Bloopers

In an early scene in which Kurt Russell’s Stephen rescues a puppy from a fire, for several seconds the fire is actually water. This is a scene from an early draft of the script set in a deep-sea diving rescue team. After filming had begun, producers changed the script to set the story in a fire house instead, but this scene somehow made it into the finished film.