PLANE is a great date movie option that you should absolutely consider if you’re weighing your options. In the white-knuckle action movie PLANE, pilot Brodie Torrance (Gerard Butler) saves his passengers from a lightning strike by making a risky landing on a war-torn island – only to find that surviving the landing was just the beginning. When most of the passengers are taken hostage by dangerous rebels, the only person Torrance can count on for help is Louis Gaspare (Mike Colter), an accused murderer who was being transported by the FBI. In order to rescue the passengers, Torrance will need Gaspare’s help, and will learn there’s more to Gaspare than meets the eye.
THE GOOD
I think this movie seems perfect for streaming. Plane is a film with a simple title and premise that would seem at home as a Netflix original. The movie is getting its chance to shine in theaters in a typically quiet January season. Plane is a movie that thrusts you into a story with our heroes flying into an increasingly dangerous situation. The stakes increase quickly as the movie races back and forth between suspenseful circumstances and heart-pumping action. Gerard Butler calmly navigates us through a crash landing that seems way too scarily plausible.
I felt Twighlight Zone vibes watching the inevitability of the situation as Brodie calmly navigated the plane through a crash landing. Gerard Butler isn’t presented as Rambo and he’s not plowing over these dudes in this jungle. this is someone trying their best to fake it til they make it and live. He then leads us to the highlight of the action which is a decent fight in the jungle halfway through the movie proving Gerard Butler still is still a natural when it’s time to do an action scene.
Plane is breathtaking with the movie moving at a fast pace quickly diving into danger. Gerard Butler and Mike Colter are an odd couple that works around each better than they do alone. The movie quickly shows us each of their strengths and wisely moves the movie quickly for them to showcase what they can do. Mike Colter’s Louis Gaspare is fun, charismatic, and can speak french! Gerard’s character Brodie Torrance is quiet, cautious, and calculating. They complement each other well for this movie so I really like their casting for this fun movie.
THE BAD
I can’t tell you who the bad guy is in this movie. Actually, I can, it’s this guy who plays Junmar. I can’t tell you much about his character or his motive resulting in his character feeling like pure plot convenience. He is a pirate in need of hostages and hostages conveniently crash land in his backyard. Junmar is evidence that Plane is not clear on what kind of story it wants to tell. Plane flirts with being both an action movie and a suspense movie without fully committing to either and it shows. There are a lot of plot conveniences that save our heroes at the last minute that remove the sense of danger. The plane landing is miraculous enough but it’s surreal when the crash survivors are able to find food and construct shelter for themselves with relative ease.
I think Mike Colter’s Louis Gaspare deserves more character expansion and development. Louis periodically shares a sentence here and there about himself but we’re not shown very much at all. I think Mike Colter performs well. My issue is that the writing does his character a disservice. Louis Gaspare has a severe lack of character development and we don’t learn his true motivation. Louis is mostly presented as a weapon that Brodie uses to kill soldiers that he is unwilling to kill himself.
Overall
PLANE may look like it’s made for streaming but it’s a fun movie to watch in a big loud theater. The action and performances are all great even though the plot and writing leave much to be desired. PLANE may not be an award contender but is entertaining enough to make it a worthy option for a date night at the theater.
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