Silent Service Gets Chance to Sound Off : Movies: ‘The Hunt for Red October’ gives submariners their turn at strutting in the rivalry with ‘Top Gun’ aviators.

Round 2. The Bubbleheads strike back.

When the movie “Top Gun” was released, San Diego buzzed with talk of the daredevil Navy fliers risking their lives for the nation. Fighter pilots puffed their chests and wore their leather flight jackets all over town. Tom Cruise look-alikes donning mirror glasses abounded.

In the longstanding rivalry between the naval aviators and submariners, the movie Top Gun boosted the Fighter Ace community. But when “The Hunt for Red October” opens today, the submariners, dubbed “bubbleheads,” hope to gain reknown as the Navy’s hottest, most elite force.

“We say there are more airplanes in the sea than submarines in the sky--so obviously submariners do their jobs better,” said Rear Adm. David R. Oliver Jr., commander of Submarine Group Five, during a recent interview.

Several hundred sailors in uniform filled the Grossmont Cinema Thursday during a special afternoon showing of Paramount Pictures’ $35-million movie. The screening began with the blast of a klaxon and the shout: “Dive, gentlemen, dive!”

In the movie, an adaptation of Tom Clancy’s bestseller about the Cold War, a highly respected captain of Soviet missile submarine Red October and his clique of officers decide to defect to the United States. The Americans, however, cannot be sure whether Soviet skipper Marko Ramius intends to attack or defect. From the beginning, one man--a CIA analyst named Jack Ryan--believes Ramius’ quest is peaceful.

“These are two men, searching for peace--a Russian and an American,” Neufeld said, “and they pull it off.”

Forget that, in the real world, the Cold War has thawed, cautioned producer Mace Neufeld. The movie is set in 1984, before glasnost kicked in.

In the movie, Ryan ponders what Ramius will do with the sub crew and asks aloud how he would get a crew to leave its vessel. At Grossmont Cinema, the sailors howled. As one later explained, a leak--either of water or radioactive materials--will make men abandon a submarine. Fast.

Submariners represent a community reknowned for secrecy and such close-knit camaraderie that it has been dubbed “the Silent Service” and a “Priesthood.” For this tightly guarded world, the fact that Navy officials cooperated and allowed the filming of the movie marks a dramatic departure.

In past decades, there have only been a few American submarine movies, including “Run Silent, Run Deep,” “The Bedford Incident,” “Ice Station Zebra,” and “Gray Lady Down.” Of all these movies, “Red October” is the most realistic, submariners say. But there were glaring errors, they say, that would be invisible to the average viewer.

The sonar and some of the computer technology don’t actually exist as depicted, said Charles Baker, a 25-year-old navigator, who has been in the Navy seven years. “But I can’t get into specifics because that’s classified.”

And there were, of course, scenes that made submariners cringe because they seemed so preposterous.

When the deep-submergence rescue vehicle reaches Red October, for instance, Ryan and his crew knock on the hatch of the submerged sub. A Soviet officer opens it, and the Americans board. No muss, no fuss.

“They can’t do that in two seconds--it’s impossible. That takes 45 minutes,” said Gordon Hemphill, a 32-year-old sonar technician who has been in the Navy almost 15 years.

With the exception of these details, many agreed that the movie comes achingly close to real. But several warned that it does not really penetrate the brotherhood claimed by submariners.

“Submarine force has an espirit de corps ; almost a subculture,” said Billy Ferguson, a 29-year-old Portland, Ore., native who has been in Navy seven years. “We are our own society, we have our own language, our own customs; it’s impossible for an actor to reproduce that.”

Ferguson played Lt. Hawkins, a fire control officer, in the movie. “You don’t see my face, but that was me,” he explained.

Tom Lewis, 28, machinist mate first class, worked with the actors, trying to help them understand the ways of submariners. “They were really stiff,” he said. “They didn’t know how to let the orders flow.”

In one scene, an actor had to be replaced with a real Navy crew member, Lewis recalled. “He was supposed to go get the captain a cup of coffee. He just couldn’t get it right.”

Lewis and others watched the film with pride.

“It shows we are professionals,” he said.

“It gave me the same thrill it would have given an airman going to see ‘Top Gun,’ ” said William Bright, a 25-year-old machinist mate.

The Navy’s intent was not to assist in a movie that would serve as a recruiting tool, Adm. Oliver said, “but if the American people get a better feel for what submarines do--that’s good for all of us.”

Shelia Benson’s review, F1