Director James Madigan’s bone-crunching debut incorporates a full-throttle efficiency from the underrated Josh Hartnett and irresistibly embraces its B-movie-ness, encouraging audiences to hoot, holler, groan and chortle. Not as soon as throughout its 1-hour, 41-minute operating time does Madigan let issues run on autopilot. It satisfies any motion fan’s itch with gory kills, loopy stunts and humorous one-liners and facial expressions.
Sure, it does journey alongside on comparable plot tracks as, say, “Bullet Train” with Brad Pitt. However the place that 2022 confined-space little bit of mayhem obtained snarled up in its personal contortions and aesthetics, Brooks McLaren and D.J. Cotrona are content material to maintain their movie planted firmly in a B-movie panorama. There are not any high-falutin’ notions about what this film desires to perform, apart from giving us a bloody good time … emphasis on the bloody.
Hartnett reveals his pure reward for motion and comedy as oft-inebriated American agent-in-hiding Lucas Reyes. He receives a suggestion too good to refuse: An opportunity to get bounced off the no-fly record, earn again an American passport and obtain a one-way ticket from Bangkok to SFO. The demand is that he carry with him an elusive, most-wanted “terrorist” named The Ghost who’s on that airplane. The particular person providing the deal is the extreme and chilly Katherine Brunt (“Battlestar Galactica’s” Katee Sackhoff), a determine from his previous. However there’s a giant drawback with the task; the SFO-bound flight is filled with assassins equally able to bag “Ghost” for a profitable payday.
It’s a surefire, if not precisely authentic, setup that doesn’t overstrain your mind cells however affords the room for its actors and a crew of stunt performers to brawl, leap, slug, wield chainsaws, and throw lethal darts and cutlery objects at one another. And naturally somebody will get sucked out of stated airplane. Hartnett deserves a medal for doing a few of his acrobatic stunts (your again will ache watching him and stunt performers athletically bouncing about) as do the sound designers who make every smack, punch and crunch sound so actual. Along with the icy presence of Sackhoff so as to add an edge, Charithra Chandran peps it up as a resourceful flight attendant. She’s an excellent match to play off Hartnett and is greater than recreation for the fisticuffs and punchlines.
However the purpose this one flies excessive — within the nonstop “John Wick” vein — is due to Hartnett. Typically sneered at and dismissed early in his profession as a result of his attractiveness, Hartnett takes over this motion flight guide and, nicely, soars to new heights. Buckle up, youngsters, you’re in for one a helluva enjoyable flight.
‘FIGHT OR FLIGHT’
3 stars out of 4
Score: R (violence, language, some drug use)
Starring: John Hartnett, Katee Sackhoff, Charithra Chandran
Director: James Madigan
Working time: 1 hour, 37 minutes
When & the place: Opens Friday in theaters
Initially Revealed: Could 7, 2025 at 3:37 PM PDT
