I hate to give Mel Gibson any praise or a compliment of any kind these days, but the guy knows how to direct a movie. As displayed in the trailer for this movie, he’s given us such classics as “Braveheart,” “Apocalypto” and “Hacksaw Ridge” — all historical epics with huge casts, complex action scenes and singular protagonists on personal quests.
So why is he directing “Flight Risk,” a 90-minute movie almost entirely set on a small plane with a cast of three? Those parameters don’t play into any of his strengths behind the camera, which leads me to think he didn’t have another choice but to direct whatever the studio gave him. Given that his name is all but box office poison in Hollywood, it’s no wonder they kept his name off all the marketing, replacing it with the aforementioned, “From the director of…”
Nevertheless, this film mostly succeeds in what it sets out to do. Unfortunately, the bar is set embarrassingly low, feeling more like a way for everyone involved to pay off a car loan, keep their union benefits or settle a debt with a producer. I hate to say it, but without Gibson at the helm, it could have crashed and burned a lot sooner.
U.S. Marshal Madelyn Harris (Michelle Dockery) has arrested accountant Winston (Topher Grace), who was hiding out in a remote part of Alaska after turning informant against his mob boss employer. With Winston ready to cooperate, the two need to get back to the lower 48 states so he can testify in court.
Chartering a small private plane to take them to Anchorage, Madelyn and Winston are being transported by Daryl Booth (Mark Wahlberg), a Texan living in Alaska. With their 90-minute flight mostly over the Alaskan wilderness, it is soon revealed that Daryl is a hitman Winston’s former employer hired to take out the accountant before the plane returns to civilization.
If that initial premise sounds good to you, you’re in for a promising opening half hour that makes the most of it. Because of course Madelyn and Winston don’t know that Daryl is actually there to do more than fly the plane, and he seems pretty normal at first. But as the flight continues and the cop and accountant start to figure it out, the tension is genuinely great.
That’s mostly due to the main trio all show up and do the best they can with a lacking script. The first person we’re introduced to is Winston, and Grace is nearly non-stop with the quips and sarcasm, something he’s always excelled in. When faced with only three possibilities — death by Wahlberg, death by plane crash or life in prison — he’s got nothing left to lose and lets the sassy remarks roll.
And then we meet Madeyln, the straight man to Winston’s comic relief. And while she is mostly all business, her backstory is slowly revealed throughout the flight, demonstrating the why and the how of the whole situation. True, it’s all clichés we’ve heard and seen a hundred times before, but it also allows Dockery to do some pretty awesome and heroic stuff.
Meanwhile, Wahlberg, who rarely plays an unredeemable villain, is having the most fun of the three. Putting on a fake Texan accent that his native Boston accent can barely handle and actually shaving part of his head are the most obvious ways he gets into character, but there are plenty of uncomfortable lines and physical acting moments that he pulls off throughout.
And that’s where the goodwill ends because even at 90 minutes the premise feels stretched. Thanks to a couple of ex machina solutions, the story continues with situations and conversations between the three passengers repeated again and again, and the characters are two-dimensional at best.
The action is predictable and the special effects work is shockingly cheap. Whether a moose who looks more like Bullwinkle than a live animal or shots of scenic Alaska that the local tourism board would turn down, it isn’t pretty. Stuck in a plane cabin 20 feet long and six feet wide, there’s only so much you can do, and Gibson finds it all shortly after takeoff. Buckle in.