Sean Connery spent time underway aboard the U.S.S. Puffer (SSN 652) preparing for his role. He was given Commander status, and allowed to give commands while underway (with the Captain beside him).

To help the audience quickly grasp which sub's interior they were seeing as the movie jumped from scene to scene and sub to sub, the filmmakers created a subtle lighting scheme: blue for Red October, green for the Alfa class "V.K. Konovalov" and red for Dallas.

When the movie was first released on VHS in 1991, the tapes were red.

The underwater model of the Red October has never been in the water. This effect was achieved using smoke on the "underwater" set and a few digital touch-ups. The sub was hung by twelve wires, from an overhead grid, which gave the ability to tilt and turn the model as needed.

The film starts out in Russian, then switches to English, in an early scene, as the political officer reads a passage from a book, which contains a quote from Robert Oppenheimer. The switch occurs on the word "Armageddon", which is the same in both languages, but pronounced differently.

After the release of Tom Clancy's novel "Red October", some members of Congress contacted the CIA, demanding to know why the Russians had invented a caterpillar drive before the U.S. Navy did. Although a result of good research, the caterpillar drive is pure fiction.

$20,000 was spent on Sean Connery's toupée.

During filming, several of the actors portraying U.S.S. Dallas crewmen took a cruise on a real submarine. To train for his role as the Dallas' commander, Scott Glenn was installed as a "co-commander" of the real sub. The real Commander ordered his crew to first give report to him, then give the same report to Glenn. Glenn was so impressed with the Commander, he basically played that man in the film. Always giving orders in a calm quiet voice, even in tense situations.

The fighter crashing into the flight deck was stock footage of a F9F Panther test flight in 1951. This particular aircraft was piloted by official test pilot George Chamberlain Duncan (1917-1995). Duncan survived the crash with minor burns, and after a few months, he was back flying again.

Navy recruiters set up booths in some theater lobbies for people to sign up to join the service, or to at least look into it. The Pentagon hoped that the film would do for the submarine service what Top Gun (1986) did for naval aviation.

After being faxed the script, Sir Sean Connery initially turned the role down on the basis of the plot being unrealistic for the post-Cold War era. Whoever sent the fax neglected to include the foreword, explaining the movie as historical; once he received the foreword, Connery accepted the role.

The scene where Jack Ryan is lowered onto the U.S.S. Dallas was filmed in the parking lot of the Mole Pier at Long Beach Naval Station on a beautiful sunny day. Editing made it look like it was the ocean.

Alec Baldwin accepted the role of Jack Ryan because Harrison Ford turned it down. Cast member Sam Neill also benefited from Ford's refusal three years later by being cast in the lead role of Jurassic Park (1993).

Two of the submarine captains in this film have actual Navy experience. Sir Sean Connery was in the Royal Navy before becoming an actor. Scott Glenn spent three years in the United States Marine Corps, which falls under the Department of the Navy.

After consulting with the wardrobe and make-up departments behind John McTiernan's back, Sir Sean Connery arrived on set for his first day of shoots with his hairpiece incorporating a ponytail. Many years later, once Connery's potential influence had greatly waned, McTiernan stated in an interview with Sight & Sound Magazine that he was "f---ing livid" with Connery, and that the Scottish actor tried to use his considerable heft with the studio, going over the director's head to pass the alteration with producers. It seemed as though Connery was to get his way until midway through the second day's shooting, when director of photography Jan De Bont started laughing while reviewing the dailies, remarking to Connery that his ponytail looked like "a limp, swinging d--k." This soon became a meme among the crew, and by the end of the second day, Connery was so upset at the mockery, he relented, having make-up remove the alteration and forcing the re-shoot of a key scene. McTiernan joked that the reported cost of the hairpiece, approximately $20,000, was mainly down to the cost of those subsequent re-shoots, and that the hair seen in the final movie was merely "a ten dollar bargain from a thrift shop."

According to Sir Sean Connery and Peter Firth, the scene where Putin is murdered was watched by high ranking Russian Government V.I.P.s who were visiting the set that day.

While under attack from the other Russian sub, Ramius asks Ryan which books he has written. Ryan describes one book about Admiral Halsey, to which Ramius replies "I know this book. Your conclusions were all wrong, Ryan. Halsey acted stupidly." No further explanation is given, but they are referring to the Battle of Leyte Gulf in October 1944. The U.S. was about to invade the Phillipines and knew the Japanese Navy would counterattack, but didn't know where. Halsey's fleet was supposed to guard the northern approaches to the invasion beaches. The Japanese Navy sent a small fleet of their ships in one direction as a decoy. Halsey took the bait and sent his entire fleet after it, but without informing the rest of the U.S. Navy of what he was up to, leaving the north completely unguarded. (This action is what Ramius refers to when he says "Halsey acted stupidly.") The rest of the Japanese Navy was able to slip through unscathed and undetected. If not for the valiant action of destroyers and escort carriers, the Japanese fleet could have devastated the U.S. invasion fleet.

At the end of the film, Ramius quotes a poem that is attributed to Christopher Columbus. According to John McTiernan, the poem was actually written for the film by screenwriter Larry Ferguson.

The U.S. Naval Institute, a private nonprofit professional military association, located on the grounds of the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, has been publishing books and magazines related to naval strategy and maritime history since 1874. A copy of the Naval Institute's monthly magazine "Proceedings" is seen in Ryan's London apartment. In 1984, the U.S. Naval Institute published a work of fiction, for the first time in its history, Tom Clancy's novel "The Hunt for Red October".

Due to his obligation to this film, director John McTiernan had to pass up the opportunity to direct Die Hard 2 (1990).

Larry Ferguson, who wrote the film's screenplay, plays the role of C.O.B. (Chief (Petty Officer) of the Boat) on the U.S.S. Dallas.

Sir Sean Connery's conversation with Sam Neill in the Captain's quarters of the Red October has a similar feel as the conversation between Mr. Starbuck and Captain Ahab from Chapter 132 ("The Symphony") of Herman Melville's Moby Dick. Ahab and Ramius both spent forty years at sea, and share the line "I widowed her the day I married her", concerning their wives.

When Ryan asks if the doors visible on the Red October could be used to launch an ICBM horizontally, Skip Styler responds with "Sure. Why would you want to?" This is not as unfeasible as it sounds. The UUM-44 SUBROC (SUBmarine ROCket), was a ballistic missile operational with the U.S. Navy at the time, specifically designed to be launched from a torpedo tube in order for the submarine to stay undetected for longer. The SUBROC however was a kiloton range anti-nuclear submarine depth charge, rather than a city levelling megaton range ICBM. The size of the latter would bring with it significant additional technical challenges with limited gains, hence Skip's question.

Klaus Maria Brandauer was originally cast as Captain Marko Ramius, but broke his leg prior to filming. It was Brandauer who suggested his friend Sir Sean Connery for the role, having known him since they appeared together in Never Say Never Again (1983). The same year The Hunt for Red October (1990) was released they shared the screen in The Russia House (1990), another story set during the Cold War.

The dual-beeping sound effect of the Red October moving on the U.S.S. Dallas' sonar screen was also used in Patriot Games (1992) as the sound of Jack Ryan's e.k.g.

The crew of the U.S.S. Dallas adopted the tagline "The Hunt Is On" as an unofficial ship's motto.

For the purposes of filming the underwater model of the Red October, only the left side of the sub was detailed to appear as an authentic submarine. The effect of showing the right side of the boat was achieved by simply turning the frame and reversing the image.

During filming in 1989, the U.S.S. Houston, which doubled for the U.S.S. Dallas in the movie, snagged the tow cable between the commercial tugboat Barcona and a barge, sinking the tugboat ten miles off Long Beach, California. One crewman drowned, and two more were rescued.

Filming started in 1989, with the Cold War still in progress, but when it was released in 1990, the Soviet government announced that the Communist Party was no longer in charge of everything. Producers found this obstacle irrelevant, and went on with the release, but using a disclaimer, telling that the story takes place in 1984 (same year Tom Clancy's novel was published) during the Cold War.

Several employees that designed and built submarines from the Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Company (now known as Northrop/Grumman Newport News) were Set Design Advisors for the submarine interiors on the Dallas and Red October. Some of the interiors actually contain real submarine items - mostly things like hatches, lights, et cetera, to add realism.

It is a manly film: Gates McFadden with Louise Borras (as Jack Ryan's wife and daughter) and Denise E. James as a flight attendant have the only credited female speaking roles, and all of their dialogue scenes are over before the end of the opening credits. There is an uncredited female engineer speaking in the background at Skip Tyler's dry-dock, and another (non-speaking) flight attendant appears at the end, but apart from that, there are no other women in the film.

The name of the frigate that rescues the Red October's crew, the Reuben James, is from another of Tom Clancy's novels, "Red Storm Rising".

The bible verses that Putin reads at the beginning of his conversation with Ramius, come from Revelation 16:15-17.

Harrison Ford turned down the role of Jack Ryan, as he felt the script focused too heavily on Captain Ramius, played by Sir Sean Connery. Ford had previously played Henry "Indiana" Jones, Jr. in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989). His father, Henry Jones, Sr. was played by Connery.

Two torpedoes are dropped from the air at the Red October. One from a Bear-Foxtrot bomber, and the other from a Seahawk helicopter. There was only one actual torpedo drop which was incorrectly reported here as: "filmed from two different angles for the attacks". By watching carefully, the two sequences, played at the same time, it can be easily seen that the splash pattern around the torpedo of the second sequence is just the mirror image of the first sequence.

Director John Mctiernan previously used the same teddy bear in Die Hard (1988).

James Earl Jones (Admiral James Greer) was the only actor to reprise his role in Patriot Games (1992) and Clear and Present Danger (1994).

Kevin Costner turned down the role of Jack Ryan in order to make Dances with Wolves (1990). He played Thomas Harper in Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit (2014).

In the opening credits, Red October is escorted by two tugboats and a U.S. Coast Guard buoy tender, clearly seen off its starboard quarter.

The Hunt for Red October (1990) was released in March 1990, just as Major League Baseball was entering spring training. Lou Piniella and the rest of the Cincinnati Reds used this movie all season for motivation and swept the Oakland As in the World Series that October.

John McTiernan replaced his original editor, Peter Zinner, because Zinner found McTiernan's shooting approach difficult with which to work, given his classical, more traditional film background. However, Zinner has a bit part in the film as a Soviet Admiral.

Despite of the intense overtone of the movie, this is John McTiernan's only PG rated movie. Most of his films are mainly rated R or PG-13.

Jack Ryan mentions that he wrote a book about Admiral William F. Halsey. This is appropriate, as Ryan is also a Professor of Military History at the U.S. Naval Academy, as shown in Patriot Games (1992).

Gates McFadden filmed her role during the year she had been dismissed from Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987). Afterward, she rejoined the show and had to be replaced by Anne Archer in Patriot Games (1992) and Clear and Present Danger (1994).

A U.S. Navy yard oiler was used to escort the sub at the beginning of the movie. It was in Long Beach, California, and the Red October was built to look like it submerged by using two articulated barges and flooding the front one while being towed.

Coincidentally, while the real U.S. Warship Reuben James participated in the movie, it also plays a pivotal role as an escort vessel in the Tom Clancy novel "Red Storm Rising".

John McTiernan was unable to direct Die Hard 2 (1990), due to schedule conflicts with filming this movie, but returned to the franchise to direct Die Hard: With a Vengeance (1995). The motto of the U.S.S. Reuben James (FFG-57) which appears and is mentioned by name is "Back With A Vengeance".

There was actually a fire aboard the flight deck of the real U.S.S. Enterprise. It occurred on January 14, 1969. The Enterprise was undergoing ORI (Operational Readiness Inspections), prior to going to Vietnam. The fire took the lives of twenty-three men.

The novel contains much more involvement and cooperation with the British Navy, while the movie contains very little, if any, British involvement.

Most of Gates McFadden's role as Cathy Ryan was deleted from the final print.

Scott Glenn and Alec Baldwin took an overnight trip aboard the U.S.S. Salt Lake City, commanded by Commander (later Admiral) Thomas B. Fargo. Glenn based his portrayal of Bart Mancuso on Fargo.

The frigate shown when the Red October surfaces is not the real U.S.S. Reuben James, an Oliver Hazard Perry class frigate with hull number 57. U.S.S. Gary, hull number 51, portrayed Reuben James and also provided some of the engine room shots of Red October. The crew also participated on some scenes.

The ship escorting the Red October out of port is the U.S.C.G.C. Blackhaw (WLB-390), a buoy tender stationed in San Francisco, California at that time.

Alec Baldwin was succeeded in his role by Harrison Ford, with whom he appeared in Working Girl (1988); Ben Affleck, with whom he appeared in Pearl Harbor (2001); Chris Pine, with whom he appeared in Rise of the Guardians (2012); and John Krasinski, with whom he appeared in State and Main (2000), It's Complicated (2009), and Aloha (2015).

Robert Garland, John Milius, and David Shaber all did uncredited work on the script.

This is the cinematic debut of Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan character.

John McTiernan was unable to direct the sequel, Patriot Games (1992), because he was filming Medicine Man (1992), with Sir Sean Connery.

Factual errors: The Typhoon is a NATO designated name, so the Russians are unlikely to use it. The Russian name for the class is "Akula class". This is not to be confused with name "Akula class" that the NATO used to designate the Russian Project 971 Shchuka-B class attack submarine.

When the U.S.S. Dallas first detects the Red October, sonar man Jones reports: "I'd say we had a boomer coming out of the barn. Could be a missile boat out of Polyarny." Both sentences are equivalent. The second sentence sounds different, obviously added later in case the audience did not understand the references to "boomer" and "barn".

Gates McFadden, who is American, plays Cathy Ryan with an English accent. The role was subsequently played by Keira Knightley, who is English, with an American accent.

A brief, lightly digitally altered shot from it was used as a sight gag in an episode of the sitcom 30 Rock (2006), in which Alec Baldwin had a starring role. The premise of the joke was that Baldwin's character, Jack Donaghy, is trying to quell Tina Fey's character Liz Lemon's anxiety about hosting her own talk show for the first time. They perform a test with a high definition camera, which is unflattering or comical for most of the people who step in front of it: Lemon's minor facial flaws are severely exaggerated on the high-def monitor; downtrodden producer Pete appears to the camera as a naked man decades older than his actual age; and happy-go-lucky page Kenneth appears on the monitor as a Muppet. But Jack appears in high-def as a twenty-years-younger Alec Baldwin, thanks to several seconds of footage from The Hunt for Red October being broadcast on the monitor.

The Helicopter seen taking off from the Flight Deck of the USS Reuben James is a Sikorsky SH-60B Seahawk assigned to Helicopter Anti-Submarine Squadron (Light) 43 (HSL-43) "Battlecats" Homeported at Naval Air Station North Island, San Diego California. For filming of the movie, a Detachment was sent to and operated out of Naval Air Station Whidbey Island, Oak Harbor Washington.

Sir Sean Connery joined the cast after turning down the role of The Player in Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead (1990).

U.S.S. Reuben James (FFG-57) was commissioned on March 22, 1986, and decommissioned on July 18, 2013.

Average Shot Length = ~7.2 seconds. Median Shot Length = ~6.9 seconds.

In the scene with the frigate "Ruben James", a second frigate was used during the filming. The U.S.S. Wadsworth FFG-9 was also used to depict the Ruben James. The Wadsworth's hull number 9 is clearly visible in a couple of scenes.

Mel Gibson, Michael Keaton, Kurt Russell, Bruce Willis, Sylvester Stallone, John Travolta, Val Kilmer, Bill Paxton, Patrick Swayze, Stephen lang, jeff bridges, Ron Perlman, Richard Gere, Michael Nouri, and Christopher Lambert were considered to play Jack Ryan.

Natalia Ramius died on November 23, 1983.

The only non-Best Picture Oscar nominee that year to be nominated for Best Editing.

The film cast includes one Oscar winner, Sir Sean Connery, and three Oscar nominees, Alec Baldwin, Peter Firth, and James Earl Jones.

Richard Jordan was second choice for Dr. Jeffery Pelt, the National Security Adviser. The role was first offered to an Irish actor.

During the scene where Admiral Padorin receives the letter from Captain Ramius, he uses a cut-down sword as a letter opener. In the novel, it was stated to be his service knife, damaged while defending himself from a Nazi soldier after his gunboat sank.

The film takes place in November 1984.

In the movie, the time the U.S. spent tracking down and "grabbing" the Red October is just a few days. In the Tom Clancy novel, the story unfolds over several more days.

Arnold Schwarzenegger was considered to play Marko Ramius since he worked with John McTiernan before on Predator (1987). He later worked with Mctiernan again on Last Action Hero (1993).

Gates McFadden played a doctor with a husband named Jack in this film and Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987).

Alec Baldwin and Jeffrey Jones appeared in Beetlejuice (1988).

Sam Neill's acting mentor was James Mason, who also played a renegade submarine commander in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954).

Rip Torn was announced for this film.

Gates McFadden is best known for her Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987) role as a doctor aboard the fictional starship U.S.S. Enterprise. In this movie, she plays a doctor, whose husband is sent to the real U.S. Navy aircraft carrier, U.S.S. Enterprise. The captain of the Enterprise is played by Daniel Davis, who also appeared in two episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Trailer narrated by Don LaFontaine.

Carl Schenkel was the original choice as a director, but he refused because he didn't want to direct a movie with an all-male cast.

Sally Ryan was born in 1979.

Scott Glenn appeared with William Baldwin, (Alec Baldwin's younger brother), in Backdraft (1991).

Sir Sean Connery and Alec Baldwin have both played the love interest of Kim Basinger in separate films: Connery in Never Say Never Again (1983), and Baldwin in The Marrying Man (1991) and The Getaway (1994).

Alec Baldwin has stated that it was this role that effectively launched his big-time career. Although he had prior film successes, most were in smaller roles or cult films, and he was therefore was a considerably lesser known actor before landing the role of Jack Ryan.

If Kevin Costner had not turned down the role of Jack Ryan, he would have reunited with his The Untouchables (1987) costar Sean Connery on this film as well as The Presidio (1988) in which he was considered for Mark Harmon's role. But he worked with Connery again on Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991) in which Connery had a cameo as King Richard. Costner would have also reunited with producer Mace Neufeld again after No Way Out (1987) which was also a Cold War thriller like this film.

Alec Baldwin appeared in "Working Girl" (1988) with Harrison Ford, who would later succeed him in the role of Jack Ryan.

Tim Curry, who plays Dr Petrov, also played the iconic evil clown 'Pennywise' in Stephen King's IT. Coincidentally, Bill Skarsgard, the son of actor Stellan Skarsgard (who plays Captain Tupolev) would reprise the role of Pennywise in the 2017 adaption.

As Jack Ryan's car arrives at Heathrow Airport, you can see a billboard for Evita, in which Joss Ackland played Juan Perón in the West End production.

Sean Connery previously appeared in Marnie (1964) with Tippi Hedren, Bruce Dern, and Diane Baker. Alec Baldwin appeared with Hedren's daughter, Melanie Griffith, in Working Girl (1988). Sam Neill appeared in Jurassic Park (1993) with Laura Dern. Scott Glenn and Baker appeared in The Silence of the Lambs (1991).

In the novel, Borodin survives; in fact, he wasn't shot at all. Conversely, Kamarov dies in the novel but lives in the film.

"Lieutenant Commander Mike Hewitt" is the torpedo operator on the surface ship, who calls out the range of the torpedo fired on the Red October, only for it to be remotely detonated by James Greer (James Earl Jones) just prior to impact. He is not referred to by name in the movie, but his character and the actor's name is listed in the credits. "Mike Hewitt" is a real person, although at the time of filming, he was Captain (now retired - he was Captain of the U.S.S. Fulton, a "sub-tender" ship stationed at the Naval Base in Groton, Connecticut). He was a technical advisor on the film, and they gave his name to the character, as thank you.

Before dying, Borodin (Sam Neill) says "I would have liked to have seen Montana..." In Jurassic Park (1993), Neill's character Dr. Grant is introduced while leading a dinosaur dig in Montana.

Jack Ryan (Alec Baldwin) and Captain Marko Ramius (Sir Sean Connery), despite being the protagonist and antagonist respectively, do not come face-to-face until over one hour and fifty minutes into the film.