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Flightplan
(Touchstone Pictures: 2005)
As a thriller, Flightplan satisfies many of the requirements of its genre. The movie is fast-paced and exciting.
It contains a handful of surprises and a light sprinkle of suspense. Unfortunately, Flightplan also misses out on some of
the basic requirements of a movie, such as a respectable main character and an ending that resolves the movie in a
satisfying manner.
The primary character in this movie is Kyle Pratt (Jodie Foster), a widow whose husband has been killed by falling off of
a building. Kyle and her daughter, Julia (Marlene Lawston), have packed his body into a coffin to be flown from Germany to
the United States for burial. This traumatic and unexpected incident has left the two surviving family members with deep
emotional scars and extreme paranoia as the two cling to each other for safety and nearly bawl each other out for wandering
too far away from one another in a public place.
Kyle and Julia board a gigantic airplane and try to steady their nerves by relaxing on an empty row of seats in the back of
the plane. It isn't long before Kyle falls asleep and enjoys a three-hour nap into the night. But when she wakes up to check
on Julia, her daughter is mysteriously missing.
Kyle soon becomes frantic in the search for her daughter. She upsets the passengers, annoys the stewardesses, screams at
the pilots. No demand or action is beneath finding her daughter, even if it means defying the flight's security officer and
placing the entire airline in jeopardy.
At this point, the movie produces many questions for its audience to ponder. For instance, where is Julia? How far will Kyle
go to find her daughter? Did the daughter really board the flight? Is the daughter even alive? Has Kyle imagined everything,
or is she still sane?
With questions like these, Flightplan builds up a great amount of mystery and suspense that can be easily defined as the
movie’s strongest feature; but unfortunately, when all of the questions are finally resolved, their answers are far from
satisfying. The clever development of the first two-thirds of the movie quickly degrades into an ending that’s too absurd
for its own good. An issue as simple as the disappearance of a child turns into a huge, complex plot that is ripe with the
same kind of clichés and plot holes that you’ll see in any other typical thriller. The movie is, essentially, all build-up
and no resolution.
If there’s one thing that does hold this movie together, aside from the suspense, it’s the set of performances, especially
that of Jodie Foster, who delivers a convincing portrayal as Kyle, in spite of the over-the-top expectations of her role.
Also included in the ensemble is a notable performance by Sean Bean as Captain Rich and a decent performance by Peter
Sarsgaard as Carson, the security officer. Even the performances of lesser characters, such as those of the stewardesses,
are quite exceptional.
Unfortunately, a good performance can’t save a badly-written character. There’s one other thing that strikes me about
Flightplan, and that is Kyle’s inability to apologize to anyone for her irresponsible actions. Regardless of who is
ultimately right, who is ultimately wrong, and who is misjudging whom, Kyle does cause a lot of trouble for a lot of
innocent people, and many of these innocent people have clearly been terrorized by her rash conduct. Yet, throughout
the entire film, not a single apologetic word escapes from her mouth. Is this really the kind of person that I’m expected
to root for?
I appreciate the entertaining action and suspense that Flightplan has to offer, but I also have higher expectations for the
movies that I see. I expect sympathetic main characters to be honorable, and I expect endings to be worth the time that it
takes to arrive at a resolution. Is that too much to ask?
Score:
(3 1/2 passports out of 5)
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Release Date: 09/23/05
Profanity: Mild-to-Moderate
