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THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
MQVIES
'Flight'sets a new tone
LANDON MCDONALD
/mcdonald@kansan.com
Robert Zemeckis makes his long-awaited return to live action with the release of "Flight," his first non-animated effort since being "Castaway" with Tom Hanks back in 2013. Viewers put off by the doll-eyed languor of his CGI "Polar Express" and "Beowulf" can rest easy knowing the "Back to the Future" director's abilities are largely undiminished, despite the uneven quality of his new work.
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"Flight" is a well-meaning melange, a drama that starts off as a powerful, fiercely acted character before study nosediving into a forced, arbitrary resolution that strains credulity and contradicts everything the audience has by then come to understand about Whip Whitaker, the alcoholic airline pilot played with imposive intensity by an Oscar-caliber Denzel Washington.
Denzel Washington and Don Cheadle star in "Flight" directed by Robert Zemeckis. It opened in theatres on Oct. 14.
When we first meet Whip, he's shacked up in a hotel room with nubile flight attendant Katerina (Nadine Velazquez), nullifying the previous night's hangover with a few liberal snacks of cocaine. It is made clear from the beginning that despite a surfeit of skill and a background in the Navy, Whip is a sad, arrogant waste of a man, one who certainly has no business working as a pilot.
Less than an hour later, this same man is flying a jetliner carrying 102 passengers in the midst of a raging thunderstorm, his nerves fixed somewhere between ice-veined assurance and reckless mania. Suddenly the controls fail and the aircraft enters free fall. Whip, calling on all his experience and a considerable amount of dumb luck, manages to set the plane down in a field outside of Atlanta, minimizing passenger casualties while executing a complete inversion, a process that requires flying upside down.
Zemeckis stages the crash with startling intimacy, immersing the
viewer in a fog of fear and panic. The lurching chaos on display is offset by Whip calmly comforting his flight crew, even when the plane glides close enough to a church that its wings cut through the steeple. This is the most effective scene of its kind since the ending of Paul Greengrass's "United 93."
The rest of the movie deals with the aftermath of the crash, including the investigation that kicks off when Whip's blood tests reveal the apparent hero was legally intoxicated at the time of the accident. This prompts Charlie (Bruce Greenwood), Whip's longtime friend and a pilot's union rep, to elicit help from a flashy Chicago lawyer (Don Cheadle) who brags that his clients never go to jail. Whip, wracked with guilt over the six deaths he may have caused, hooks up with a recovering junkie
named Nicole (Kelly Reilly, Dr. Watson's wife in the "Sherlock Holmes" series) and tries to sober up in time for a hearing with an investigative bigwig (Melissa Leo).
Aside from Washington, "Flight" also features several invaluable supporting performances. John Goodman elevates his every scene as Whip's jocular drug dealer Harling, whose arrival is usually heralded by the Rolling Stones' "Sympathy for the Devil" (just one of the gems on the film's oldies-laden soundtrack). Greenwood, an underrated performer if there ever was one, lets his character's brotherly concern for Whip shine through his low-key exterior in a way that's genuinely moving.
The trailer for "Flight" suggests a very different movie from the one you'll find here. This isn't a conspiracy thriller or an action film in the vein of Washington's runaway train hit "Unstoppable." This is a portrait of a self-destructive alcoholic, similar in spirit to something like "Leaving Las Vegas." Washington's character is not meant to be especially likeable, but his flaws never feel less than fully, tragically human.
The downfall of the film is its unabashed Hollywood end, which compels Whip to start behaving in ways that only serve to drive the plot, closing the story on a note of sour sentiment, roughly 15 minutes after a scene that would have made for an ideal farewell. It's as if Zemecik, after more than two hours of dutiful chronicling Whip's spiral of substance abuse, suddenly wanted to make an entirely different movie, adding a Lifetime-worthy conclusion that grounds the rest of "Flight" like ice on the wings of a plane.
FINAL RATING
Edited by Madison Schultz
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1 From one end to t'other
2 Egg
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12 Vast time period
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18 Diamond round-trippers
19 Stair part
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38 Lucky number
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52 Swindles
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54 Symbol of intrigue
55 Ardor
56 Despot
DOWN
1 Rotation gauge, for short
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2 Villain's adversary
3 Wander
4 Oust from office
5 Likelihood
6 See 38-Across
7 Guitar's cousin
8 Paris subway
9 Big success
10 Competent
11 Twosome
12 Store-front sign abbr.
20 "Monty Python" opener
22 Start
23 Laugh-a-minute
24 Deity
25 "Richard —"
26 Sudden assembly that some find enter-taining
27 Michigan, for one
29 Raw rock
30 Church seat
35 Writer Buscaglia
37 "Who cares?"
39 Fodder plant
40 Simpson's interjection
41 Dissolve
42 Assistant
43 "Hey, you!"
44 Congers
45 Sitarist's rendition
46 Mast
49 Fish eggs
50 Literary collection
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SUDOKU
Difficulty Level ★★★
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Difficulty Level ★★★★
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Difficulty Level ★★★★
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Written and directed by pro snowboarder Mike Basich and Hand Built Production's Dalton Paley, "Open Space" is Basich's autobiography, the "untold stories" of his personal journey through the sport of snowboarding.
Tonight at 7:30 p.m. at Liberty Hall, Hand Built Productions will present two snowboarding documentaries: Their Own "Open Space" and Absinthe Films" Resonance."
From the standpoint of an outsider, the life of a professional extreme sports athlete looks glamorous. Although the struggles on their turf are visible to their fans, what goes on behind the scenes can sometimes be just as stressful.
(CONCERT AND POETRY SLAM TOO!)
LAWRENCE
Snowboarding success
After he was diagnosed with epilepsy at age eight, he turned to snowboarding as a kind of medication. In the film, Basich claims he was "hooked for life" when he first started encountered the sport in 1985.
Almost miraculously, tests revealed two years later that he was free and
clear of the condition. By then, Basich had already been experiencing success as a contender in competitions, and there was no doubt he would continue to pursue his passion.
"I wasn't about to let go of what I had, and my heart was set on snowboarding," Basich said in the film.
Tickets to see both films are $5, and a portion of the proceeds will go to benefit the Humane Society.
Emma LeGault
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