Anyone over the age of 30 is probably familiar with the film “Top Gun,” which has contributed heavily to America’s pop culture lexicon. “Top Gun” was a box office smash in the late 1980s and has had impressive staying-power in the years since. It made Aviator sunglasses cool, turned the song “Danger Zone” into an anthem and inspired adolescent boys everywhere to think becoming a fighter pilot would get them into bed with Kelly McGillis.
One of the iconic moments from the film was an exchange between Tom Cruise’s character Maverick and his partner, Goose. When informed that their rival, Ice, played with sublime smugness by Val Kilmer, had won another battle in their group’s simulated war games, Maverick sneered, then delivered a line upon which a testosterone-laced bro-mance like “Top Gun” thrives:
“I feel the need… the need for speed.