Synopsis: A computer expert, Martin Bishop, heads a team of renegade hackers who test security systems. His past comes back to haunt him when government agents blackmail the "sneakers" into carrying out a covert operation: track down an elusive black box filled with national security secrets. But nothing, in this high-tech world, is as it seems.

Cast:
Robert Redford .... Martin Bishop/Martin Brice
Sidney Poitier .... Donald Crease
Dan Aykroyd .... Mother
David Strathairn .... Erwin "Whistler" Emory
River Phoenix .... Carl Arbogast
Mary McDonnell .... Liz
Timothy Busfield .... Dick Gordon
Ben Kingsley .... Cosmo
Bernard Abbott .... James Earl Jones

Favorite Quotes:
• Whistler: "Fellas, Janek's little black box is on his desk between the pencil jar and the lamp."
Mother: "Uh, Whistler, I hate to tell you this, but you're blind."

• "And give him head whenever he wants." - Whistler

• Bishop: "'Give him head'?"
Whistler: "'Be a beacon'?"

• "Very good, Bish. Remind me to make you an honorary blind person." - Whistler

• Bishop: "You gotta do it, Whistler."
Whistler: "...do-do what?"
Bishop: "You have to drive. I'll talk you through it. Now hurry!"
Whistler: "...dri-drive what?"

• "Oh, God! Oh, God! I'm driving. Oh! Don't do that, I'm driving!" - Whistler

• Whistler: "I want peace on earth and good will toward man."
Abbott: "Oh, this is ridiculous!"
Bishop: "He's serious."
Whistler: "I want peace on earth and goodwill towards men."
Abbott: "We're the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing!"
Bishop: "You're just gonna have to try."
Abbott: "All right, I'll see what I can do!"
Whistler: "Thank you very much. That's all I ask."

Notes:
• Sneakers reteamed David with Mary McDonnell. The two had previously worked together in John Sayles's Matewan, as well as James Earl Jones. They would reteam immediately after this film in John Sayles's Passion Fish and yet again in the TV films The American Clock and Evidence of Blood. McDonnell, as it turns out, has been David's most frequent leading lady.
• The late River Phoenix died soon after Sneakers was made. During the course of filming, the team of actors, David included, became good friends. Dan Aykroyd and River Phoenix maintained a particurarly close friendship until his death.
• In one scene, Whistler is eating a box of "Cap'n Crunch." In the 1970s, "Cap'n Crunch" came with a small whistle in the box. A "phone phreaker" called "Captain Crunch" (John Draper) discovered that this whistle could be used to get free phone calls (one of many components in the practice of "phone phreaking," which digital phone switching-systems have made almost obsolete). Whistler is patterned after Joe Engressia, a blind telephone expert born with perfect pitch who was one of the original phone phreakers.
• Mother wears a T-shirt bearing the name "Aleka's Attic," a band formed by co-star River Phoenix, and Robert Redford's jacket is the same one he wore in The Natural (1984).
• When Whistler is driving the van, one of the headlights gets smashed, yet, it is operational in a subsequent shot.
• Sneakers was nominated for Best Motion Picture (Phil Alden Robinson, Lawrence Lasker, & Walter F. Parkes) at the Edgar Allen Poe Awards.

Critical Praise & Commentary:
• "Strathairn shines as Erwin 'Whistler' Emory, a blind phone hacker who gets to do some van driving." -David Loftus, AllWatchers.com

• "Next we have 'Whistler', played perfectly by David Strathairn. Whister is has an acute sense of hearing due to his loss of sight. His ability, and more importantly his disability, offer one of the more entertaining scenes in the film involving their surveillance van." -Mike McGee, Digital Review

• "I especially enjoyed Strathairn's performance as the blind hacker; if I hadn't been aware of him as an actor, I likely would have thought they'd actually hired a sightless dude." -David Nusair, Reel Film Reviews

(David On His Role:)
• "Sneakers was one where, for the most part, I covered the bases that I had set out for myself." -David Strathairn, 2006

• "And being on the set with Sidney Poitier, Robert Redford, Dan Aykroyd, James Earl Jones, Mary McDonnell, River Phoenix and Ben Kingsley was pretty great in Sneakers." -David Strathairn, 2006

Related Links:
Rio's Attic - Sneakers Press Kit (off site)
Sneakers - Film Notes (off site)
Sneakers - Film and Technology (off site)