BBFC advice: Contains infrequent strong language

My dear old dad has always loved an action movie but benignly accepts playing second fiddle to my mum's movie choices during my weekly visit.

However, having harrumphed a bit at the end of the latest Downton Abbey saga, he revealed he would love to see Tom Cruise's much anticipated Top Gun revival.

Cruise hit the headlines last year after his helicopter landed in a family's back garden a few miles from my parents' home because Coventry Airport was out of commission.

Fortunately, Joseph Kosinski's Top Gun: Maverick is a shade more intense than a breezy disturbance of that summer barbecue.

In the film, Cruise reprises his role as Maverick - a pilot with a reputation for his skill and notoriety for his inability to obey orders.

It seems astonishing that he has neither been fired nor killed since we last encountered him in 1986.

Anyway, we find him being given yet another last chance by a navy admiral (Ed Harris), frustrated at his behaviour. 

He insists Maverick will be teaching crews how to execute and survive an acutely dangerous mission off but will not be taking part.

At the same time he will be revisiting his past. The appointment has been ordered by his ailing old pal, Iceman (Val Kilmer). Meanwhile, the son (Miles Teller) of his tragically killed wingman Goose is among those up for education and selection.

And, of course, there is romance. Not Kelly McGillis this time - neither she nor Meg Ryan received the call - but Jennifer Connolly apparently had the requisite glamour.

However, Maverick's heart beats faster for his job and flying super-fast jets for the US Navy. The action sequences of him and his charges doing just that is where this movie stands above others.

The airborne sequences are remarkable and rousing - there are many bells and whistles on top of what we might expect.

Yes, the conclusion can be predicted a mile away but the public gets exactly what the public wants when they buy a ticket to Top Gun: Maverick.

It is a hark back to the 80s, has a belting soundtrack, a slither of romance and a feast of death-defying action and they are given all of the above.

Mr W. senior said it was "brilliant". I was tad more tempered but I could see what he and other beguiled watchers meant.