The Age of Aquarium

After the squealing car chase, the shoot-out in the abandoned warehouse, and the bombed building, the action-movie cliche making the biggest splash this summer is the detonated fish tank. Taking a cue, perhaps, from 1985's Year of the Dragon and 1989's Lethal Weapon 2 — both of which feature exploding water worlds — Tom Cruise shatters a wall-size aquarium in Mission: Impossible and Arnold Schwarzenegger similarly empties an alligator pen in Eraser. Though both scenes are making waves with audiences, Mission co-screenwriter Robert Towne brags that his version is the big kahuna. ''The difference is in quality,'' he sniffs, adding that this trend is ''just finding its fins.'' Sounds fishy.