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Though Robert Zemeckis has spent the last decade dabbling in motion-capture and animation, his skills as a live-action director have not diminished in the slightest. Returning to live-action for the first time since Cast Away, 2012's Flight is one of Zemeckis' most thematically heavy, dark and outright dramatic picture in years, dabbling in R-rated territory (an area very rarely explored by the filmmaker) as he deals with addiction and the grim side of humanity in an uncompromising fashion. Due to this, Flight is not an especially pleasurable viewing experience, and movie-goers expecting fluffy entertainment should look elsewhere. Nonetheless, this is a competently-produced and superbly acted motion picture which deserves to be seen by a wide audience.
Airline pilot Whip Whitaker (Denzel Washington) has unparalleled expertise when at the controls of a plane, but he's a compulsive alcoholic and cocaine user unable to control his addictions. On a routine trip one morning, Whip's plane begins to fall apart in the air, sending it into a dive. Whip manages to save the plane in a miraculous feat of skill, bringing the aircraft down onto an empty field, killing only six of the 104 people aboard the flight. Whip is immediately branded a hero due to the amount of lives he saved, but he seeks to elude the spotlight and battle his personal demons without consistent media exposure. When a blood test shows that Whip was high on cocaine and was over the legal alcohol limit on the day of the flight, corporate lawyer Hugh Lang (Don Cheadle) is brought in to keep Whip out of prison and prove that the airline manufacturer was at fault. As Whip begins to rehabilitate, he befriends a junkie named Nicole (Kelly Reilly) who similarly wants to clean up her act.
Your response to Flight depends on your expectations. Despite the initial crash being a focal point of the trailers and advertisements, it happens about half an hour into the picture, and what follows is not a typical survival or disaster movie. Rather, the rest of Flight's story concerns Whip as he attempts to stay sober, deals with the impending legal proceedings and nurses his relationship with Nicole. Whip is a fascinatingly complex creation, a mix of admirable and reprehensible traits, and it's possible to root for him to succeed even though he deserves his comeuppance and we know it. What makes Flight noteworthy is the grey moral area probed by John Gatins' screenplay. It carefully introduces the possibility that Whip's piloting abilities may be enhanced by drugs and alcohol, and the plane might not have been saved had he been sober. Whip leans on his colleagues to testify that he was sober and in control on the flight, even though they're conscious that he was intoxicated. Furthermore, Whip's lawyer goes to great lengths to eliminate the toxicology report that incriminates him despite Whip admitting he was under the influence of cocaine and booze. The ending, however, takes a refreshingly unexpected direction, though it spells out everything in a really pat and on-the-nose manner.
Zemeckis gets major plaudits for his handling of the opening half-hour. Everything is efficiently set up during this time, and it would be an understatement to say that the plane diving sequence is amazing. Flight was reportedly produced on a modest $31 million, yet the technical specs are spot-on. The crash scenario is riveting, sold with first-rate visual effects, an immediate sound design and taut editing, finding Zemeckis at the top of his game. The set-piece also develops Whip as a fearless character. Flight earns its R rating, as the drug material is graphic and there's a surprising amount of nudity in the picture's opening act. Indeed, in the first scene there's full-frontal female nudity, and the picture soon shifts to a porn film set. It's unbelievable to think that this was directed by the same guy responsible for Romancing the Stone, Back to the Future and Who Framed Roger Rabbit?.
Washington earned himself a well-deserved Oscar nomination for Best Actor for his work here. It's a transformative performance, the type which steals accolades and awards. Refusing to let his ego get in the way, he allows himself to look unflattering here; flabby, out of shape, arrogant, pathetic, and an addict. The actor embraced the chance to play Captain Whitaker, resulting in a portrayal that he'll be remembered for. Meanwhile, Goodman has a tiny but memorable supporting role as Whip's drug-dealing pal, inserting a degree of comedy into the proceedings that actually gels with the otherwise serious disposition of the picture. A lot of the heavy acting lifting, though, is done by Bruce Greenwood and Cheadle as Whip's well-meaning friend and his attack-dog lawyer, respectively. The politics surrounding their motivations to try and get Whip off the hook are understandable, giving us something to mentally chew on after the end credits expire. James Badge Dale also makes an absorbing cameo playing a cancer patient who meets Whip in the hospital. Then there's Reilly, who's superb as heroin addict Nicole. Whip's relationship with Nicole feels underdone, however, and it feels as if more could've been done.
Flight at times feels too much like a manufactured movie, and perhaps it is overlong at around 140 minutes. Nevertheless, Washington's performance is a true tour de force, and the film is guided by Zemeckis' exceptionally sure directorial hand. Flight is a high quality drama and a compelling look at the grim aspects of addiction. It's well worth checking out, but only if you can stomach the exceedingly adult content.
7.9/10
