Plane

Gerard Butler seems to have found himself a comfortable spot as the leading man in Amazon Prime's selection of mid-budget action flicks and, in 2023, one came along that attracted a little more praise than usual which was the simply titled, Plane. I haven't made a point of seeing many of his recent films as they tend to be average but Butler has always given a fully committed performance and news has it that he's a delight to work so it felt like it was time again to give this film a shot and see if it was a step above the rest.

Butler stars as a down-on-his-luck pilot who has been demoted a budget airline after a fiery outburst with another passenger on a previous flight, and finds himself forced to land a passenger flight due a storm and comes down in dangerous, militia controlled territory. With a race against time and a dangerous criminal among his list of passengers, he must do all he can to get his plane repaired and back up in the air before they are all killed.

The film is something of a high concept thriller and director Jean-François Richet keeps the tension up across a tight 90 minutes through some entertaining action and a few cracks in the story. I went into this probably with expectations a little too high and came away having enjoyed a few laughs at some of the more bombastic elements but really is a simple watch and forget action flick from beginning to end.

Butler and Mike Colter do make for a great duo though but are cut short by a weak screenplay which could have made better use of its stars. There are a couple of fun moments dotted throughout Plane and I think this will satisfy anyone looking for an entertaining slice of action but it just doesn't quite hit the mark to leave an impression in the memory much past the closing credits.