By Jack Ransom - January 23, 2025
“Y’all need a pilot?”
The 6th directorial effort from controversial actor/director Mel Gibson. Flight Risk sees a pilot (Mark Wahlberg) transport an Air Marshal (Michelle Dockery) accompanying a fugitive (Topher Grace) to trial. As they cross the Alaskan wilderness, tensions soar and trust is tested, as not everyone on board is who they seem.
Now, that synopsis may spark a sense of intrigue, but anyone that has seen either of the trailers knows basically the entire plot. Whilst it is undeniably cackle worthy at time in its cheesy, mean spirited 90’s throwback nature and boasting an utterly unhinged Marky Mark performance, this honestly radiates ‘coming soon to Netflix’ energy and suffers from irritating humour, an abundance of cliches and shoddy green screen.
Even at 91 minutes this feels overstretched and the final act is hysterically haphazard and quickly wrapped up. Honestly, the supposed banter and jokes between Winston (Grace) and Madolyn (Dockery), immediately had me rolling eyes, however things did look up when Daryl (Wahlberg) arrives with his absurd southern tones, immediately suspicious demeanour, ridiculous over-chewing of nicotine gum and eventual stunning bald cap reveal. However, this occurs within 20 mins leaving an hour of mostly repetitive back and forth between Winston and Madolyn as they attempt to land the plane and work out who the mole in the organisation could be, all the while an incapacitated Daryl mouths off about how twisted, horny and psychotic he is (genuinely lost count of the times he says “I’m gonna enjoy this.”).
Production-wise this certainly shows its budgetary restraints: from the dodgy CGI moose at the start to the PS3 video game cutscene quality backdrops and the blurry distorted messy finale set piece. It still seems somewhat puzzling seeing Gibson’s name attached to this (considering the scale and calibre of his previous directing jobs), he does inject some scrappy intensity to the camerawork and the bursts of violence are suitably raw, it’s just a shame that there is very little flair or stylised distinction to the visuals overall.
Performance-wise everyone is undeniably locked into the tone and absurdity of the film. Wahlberg is having the time of his life. Completely off his nut, giggling, screaming, shouting lines about twinks and causing a “Jackson Pollock” in his trousers. Clearly the overly manic portrayal is there to do the heavy lifting for the ultimately generic and forgettable madman his character is. Michelle Dockery delivers a suitably straight-faced and badass portrayal as Marshall Madolyn, though again the role is one you have seen countless times before. Topher Grace’s motormouth can become incredibly grating, but he has a smattering of chuckle worthy lines.
Flight Risk had all the right ingredients to be a trashy throwback riot, instead it crash lands into a mountain of cliches and garish visual effects. The journey starts off with a novelty wacky Wahlberg and has spikes of tension and fittingly corny lines, but mostly it’s just going to be forgotten about.
Flight Risk releases in cinemas January 24
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