★★★★
Director Jean-François Richet (The Emperor of Paris) brings a script by Charles Cumming and J. P. Davis to flight in Aircraft. In so doing, he additionally brings a strong and generally stunning story to the viewers that considerably breaks the mould of the usual motion/thriller.
Pilot Brodie Torrance (Gerard Butler) has a full load of passengers, together with Louis Gaspare (Mike Colter), an accused assassin that the FBI is extraditing for trial. However lightning forces Brodie to land the disabled airplane to save lots of his passengers. He does so efficiently on a distant island, however they aren’t the one individuals there. Earlier than assist can discover them, a lot of the passengers and crew are taken hostage by armed rebels. Brodie feels it’s his responsibility to try to rescue them, with the reluctant assist of Louis – the one different particular person the rebels don’t have.
The script by Cumming and Davis looks like it ought to be an ordinary thriller with predictable development and end result, however there’s far more to it than that. As a substitute of a overwhelmed however in any other case invulnerable protagonist, no one pretends to be a hero; they do what they really feel is greatest in each nail-biting state of affairs. Whereas Butler is the lead, it’s extra from a storytelling standpoint than the rest. The largely faceless passengers have an individuality of character and response, reasonably than being a herd of frightened nobodies. The movie additionally stands out from others due to its realism. Places all through appear and feel proper, as do the characters. In combat scenes, they take greater than superficial harm. Individuals trudging by means of a Southeast Asian jungle panorama acknowledge the presence of mosquitoes as a substitute of being impervious to them too. The actors portraying the armed insurgent thugs carry a terrifying and genuine presence and stress to a number of scenes.
Richet’s directorial selections relating to digicam work are a superb addition to the stress within the movie. The cinematographer understands his imaginative and prescient, making a lot of the movie a shaky point-of-view film. Often, this method doesn’t work and comes throughout as amateurish, however for the conditions right here, it matches completely. When the airplane hits turbulence, the viewers can nearly really feel it from their seats. The rating, appropriately devoid of songs, provides to the anxious momentum that permeates the movie from the primary turbulence to the ultimate scene.
Aircraft is a strong motion movie, pairing a believable state of affairs with a few plausible characters appearing extra realistically than in most different motion pictures. In a style saturated with seemingly inhuman heroes, the story is a well timed departure.
