The real deal

The movie’s long-awaited sequel Top Gun: Maverick opened in theaters May 27. The original movie was as important to the U.S. pilot population as the end of World War II and the Vietnam era. Top Gun’s portrayal of the exciting life of naval aviators in the Navy Strike Fighter Tactics Instructor program reignited the nation’s fascination with flying. The U.S. Navy saw an increase of 500 percent in applicants for its aviation program and throughout the summer of 1986 capitalized on it by putting recruiting booths outside of theaters. Top Gun grossed $357 million worldwide, it made Tom Cruise an international star (who also became a pilot), saw Ray-Ban sunglasses sales increase 40 percent, and collectively took our breath away.

Cruise—in one of his typical grandiose statements—promised all the flying in the new movie would be “real” and it comes close. Pilot Kevin LaRosa II filmed many of the flying sequences with his company Helinet Aviation.

LaRosa is known for his work on Iron Man (2005), The Avengers (2012), and Transformers: The Last Knight (2017), and he has worked on more than 100 motion picture and commercial productions. He is an ATP, has type ratings in several Learjet models, and has a Part 107 UAS rating.

LaRosa hopes movie goers leave the theater wondering if scenes were an actual flight or computer-generated imaging (CGI). LaRosa said he will not be offended if filmgoers presume it was done on a computer: “That’s actually the biggest compliment we could ever receive,” he said.

The new movie made $156 million over the 2022 Memorial Day weekend.

The next level

LaRosa designed CineJet, an Aero L–39 Albatros jet that features a customized gyro-stabilized camera system designed for high-speed aerial cinematography. Shotover, a New Zealand company that creates camera gimbals for the motion picture industry, developed the camera system. The L–39 has a top speed of more than 450 miles per hour, four times faster than the helicopters commonly used in aerial cinematography, and it can loop and roll. The Shotover camera system hangs off the nose of the jet from a specially designed mount. The lens sits just below the belly of the airplane, allowing an unobstructed, 360-degree view of the airplane’s surroundings. “I wanted to build something that we could go out and do aerobatics with—including a camera system that could push the edge of aerial photography like no one has done yet,” said LaRosa.

See how the aerial sequences in Top Gun: Maverick were filmed: aopa.org/ft/topgun