Review: Plane. Does What Is Says On The Fuselage
If you took all of the major work by Gerard Butler, distilled it, filtered it and poured it into a film can, Plane (2023) would be the resulting solution.
It’s New Year's Day and Trailblazer Airlines pilot Brodie Torrance (Butler) saves a plane and its passengers from a lightning strike, performing an emergency landing on the remote island of Jolo in the Philippines. Thinking the worst is over, Brodie searches for help along with another passenger, who happens to be an extradited convict and former member Commando, Louis Gaspare (Mike Colter). They discover that the island is run by the ominously anonymously titled ‘separatists and militia’. Along with help from the airline’s hired guns, Butler, Louis and the crew must try to get the passengers off the island before it’s too late.
Butler is relaxedly himself in Plane. Using his own accent frees him up to the emotion and urgency of some scenes. It also garnered some knowing laughs from a cinema in Glasgow, particularly when his co-pilot Samuel Dele (Yoson An) asks him if he was English - Butler’s character quips ‘I wouldn’t lower myself’. We may have found the trick to making a brilliant, classic action film once more: let Gerard Butler be Scottish.
I found some of the aviation industry politics interesting. They are portrayed almost like villains in a secret lair; darkly lit rooms and big tables somewhere in New York. There’s talk of ‘containing the story’ and ‘writing up press releases’. There may be a gripping 90 minute film in the corporate intrigue of an airline dealing with a crash, but this isn’t it. I do however believe that a major airline would hire their own private army to extract stranded passengers in order to avoid bad PR.
Don’t expect to be surprised by the structure of this film; it doesn't fly off-course from titles of a similar style. You will however be surprised by how much you enjoy yourself. It manages to cram in enough wham-bam action and suspense to keep the audience engaged for no longer than the film deserves. Clocking in at 1 hour and 47 minutes, it makes for a perfect-length film to see on a damp February evening.