Sully

Many of Clint Eastwood’s directorial efforts focus on the story of an everyman - someone thrown into a situation where their actions will ultimately define them - and those same themes are very much evident in his latest film Sully, which follows Captain Chesley Sullenberger in the events following his successful water-landing which came to be known as the ‘Miracle on the Hudson’.

It’s January 15th, 2009, and veteran US Airways pilot Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger (Tom Hanks) is flying US Airways Flight 1549 out of New York’s LaGuardia Airport alongside First Officer Jeffrey Skiles (Aaron Eckhart). Three minutes after take-off, a flock of birds strike the plane, disabling both the engines. With no airports in safe gliding distance, Sully performs a risky water-landing on the frigid surface of the Hudson River. All 155 on board survive and the event is heralded as “the most successful ditching in aviation history”. But despite the success and Sully’s new Hero label, an investigation into the flight begins to question if the ditching was necessary and if Captain Sullenberger put the lives of those on board at undue risk.

Eastwood’s past three films (J. Edgar, Jersey Boys and American Sniper) were all biopics and surprisingly underwhelming ones at that. Many would argue that his last truly great film was Gran Torino eight years ago, and Sully unfortunately looks to continue that streak. Where American Sniper ruffled many feathers for it’s uber-conservative, hefty dose of pure patriotism, the problem with Sully lies more with its construction, and how it attempts to turn this amazing but very brief 6 minute flight into a feature. The film excels when we go back in time to the crash-landing sequence, and when we reach the climax of the investigation in the final act of the film, but much of the rest of the run-time consists of Sully engaging in snooze-fest conversations on the phone with his wife (Laura Linney is not given a lot to work with and as such doesn’t give much of a performance), Sully taking runs, Sully having nightmares about the crash, the NTSB holding evil board meetings, and some (not-so) thinly-veiled references to 9/11.

Sully falls into the same trap that Flight did - albeit less so - with just too much of that Hollywood veneer to tell a thrilling story. I kept thinking throughout that if Eastwood adopted more of a documentary style like Paul Greengrass did with the excellent United 93, perhaps the human story would have felt less in your face, and there would have been less padding. If you focus on the 20-30 minutes that covers the accident and the final NTSB hearing, you could probably cut Sully into a really well-constructed 60 minute film, but nobody would be brave enough to produce/distribute it and I doubt many patrons would be willing to pay full price for it.

It won’t surprise anybody to know that Tom Hanks is able to transform himself into Sully with ease - he’s become accustomed to playing an everyman over the years - so let’s just say he’s as fantastic as you would expect and leave it at that. You don’t often see Aaron Eckhart in these more subtle films and he too is excellent. Although I mentioned before that Linney doesn’t have much to work with, and really there’s a surprising amount of dodgy performances and even some overacting in parts of this film. You could chalk this down to Eastwood’s one-take-then-lunch style but I think Todd Komarnicki’s dialogue is probably more to blame. There’s also the NTSB characters who are really just doing their job but seem to be tailored to look unreasonable and arrogant to the audience, then they turn around in a final dislocated moment of nostalgia-overstretch and say “Hey, we’ve always claimed that you're an American Hero”, which takes away some of the film’s credibility.

Sully is an ambitious film that just doesn’t really have enough content to stretch to feature length and remain engaging. The flight sequences are extremely well executed and the Hanks/Eckhart duo bring subtle charisma to the screen, but the padding and less competent supporting performances keep Sully grounded in average territory.

London Has Fallen

Remember how great it was when everyone made fun of Hollywood for bring out the same movie twice in 2013 (although it's far from the first time they've done it). The White House fell down twice in one summer and everyone had a chuckle. Now think about this, the one that gets a sequel was the one where the president isn't black. That's something we should all think about. But don't worry people, the Vice President is Morgan Freeman in this one, we can all breathe a collective sigh of relief.

The set up for this movie is either one big joke or whoever wrote this movie must be highly uneducated. The Prime Minister of England dies of a heart attack and all the major leaders of the western world attend the state funeral. Ok let's start, yes, if the sitting Prime Minister of England died, there would be state funeral. Would all the world leaders attend? Probably not, they have countries to run. If leaders did come, they wouldn't be from Italy, Germany and Japan, but New Zealand, Australia and Canada (don't worry Canada, you get repped in this movie). President Benjamin Asher (Aaron Eckhart) does attend, but can't help but feel like something will go wrong (because when all the world leaders get together something is bound to go wrong, just like in real life). The head of his Secret Service detail Mike Banning (Gerard Butler) feels the same. And just like the end of Ghostbusters or people who still believe in The Secret, they will the bad stuff to happen. Terrorists, led by weapons dealer Amir Barkawi (Alon Moni Aboutboul), end up hijacking London and killing all the leaders apart from the faithful President, who survives thanks to his one man army.

This may be an unpopular opinion, but I found myself siding with the terrorists on this one. I mean the Americans did approve a drone strike on a wedding where they knew more civilians were than terrorists were present. We live in a world where there's a movie about the decision to commit to a drone strike because there's a single child in the neighbourhood (see Eye in the Sky), so a mass murder like this seems very extreme. I'm surprised they waited two years to retaliate. An even more bizarre thing about this movie is that director Babak Najafi is Iranian and although the bad guys in this movie are Pakastani, it is still a very anti-Muslim, pro-Western democracy movie. The bad guys are treated like characters in a video game and the movie does have the sensibilities of one. The action sequences toward the end even feel like you're playing a level of Call of Duty, complete with a hard to beat villain at the end.

The casting seems very off for this movie. I understand bringing back the three main leads, Butler, Eckhart and Freeman, and tossing in a new villain, but did they really have to use Melissa Leo and Robert Forster again. They play bigwigs in the US Defence Force and you barely see them at all. Both are veteran actors whose talents could be put to better use elsewhere. Same could be said of Jackie Earle Haley who is introduced only to say a couple of lines in the background. Gerard Butler really needs to stick to roles where he can use his natural Scottish accent because he has a horrible American one. British actress Charlotte Riley could have used more screen time because she was fantastic as MI6 agent Jax. The same could be said of Patrick Kennedy who was a minor villain. Both Waleed Zuaiter and Alon Moni Aboutboul were fantastically underused.

Despite the video game aesthetics there really isn't anything remotely enjoyable about London Has Fallen except maybe the caricatures of current world leaders.

Classic Movie Review: Thursday (1998)

Thursday came in a post-Pulp Fiction era. What may seem like a movie that is just a Tarantino rip-off is actually a lot more ambitious.

Save for an opening scene, the entire film does indeed take place on a Thursday. Drug dealer-turned-architect Casey (Thomas Jane) is trying to adjust to suburban life, when Nick (Aaron Eckhart), Casey's old partner, shows up on his doorstep. Throughout the course of the day, we find out that Nick has stolen a large amount of money and drugs from various people and is tying up loose ends. Meanwhile, Casey is in his house trying to deal with all the people who are after Nick.

The idea of having this film be set during one-day is a really cool idea for a low-budget crime drama. It adds a tension to the film because you can tell that the day is drawing to a close toward the end of the film.

Thomas Jane has always been an enigma to me. He is a critically-acclaimed actor, known for his dramatic roles, yet he is never afraid to poke fun at himself or bow down to fans, as we saw with his short film Dirty Laundry (where he reprised the role of the Punisher). He is really believable as a guy who left his old life behind him and just doesn't want to get dragged back into that world.

I've only ever been a fan of Aaron Eckhart when he's been in lower budget or independent films (Meet Bill, Thank You for Smoking), so he didn't disappoint me in this film. You don't see much of his character, but when you do, you want to know more about this homicidal maniac.

Verdict: A really cool crime movie, where it is more about the consequences of living a life of crime and how you can never really leave. A must watch for anyone who is starting of in the industry and wants to see how a good story can be told with not that much.