Have you ever been watching a movie and about halfway through you realize that, while you are not hating the film, this will probably be the only time you ever watch it? You're glad that you're sitting down to watch it, but there's just something about it that says 'yeah, once is enough'? That's how I felt about Sully mid-way through the movie. I wasn't having a bad time or not enjoying the movie, but it became clear that there would never be another instance in my life where I desired to watch it again. And Tom Hanks usually never has the effect on me. He's generally a very watchable actor who makes movies you want to watch more than once (forgetting, of course, all about the existence of Larry Crowne). Sully does a serviceable job of honoring it's title hero, but leaves the viewer with just enough satisfaction of getting his or her money's worth without ever needing a second viewing.
For those who don't know, New York hero Captain Chesley 'Sully' Sullenberger departed from La Guardia airport on January 15th, 2009 with 155 souls on board the aircraft. Minutes after departure, the plane struck a flock of birds that flew into both engines rendering them both dead. Quick to act, Captain Sully made an emergency water landing in the Hudson River just miles from the airport, unable to safely fly the plane back. All 155 passengers (pilots and flight attendants included) survived with only minor injuries sustained to those that didn't escape "without a scratch". It is one of the most heroic moments in commercial aviation history and deserves to be remembered and honored. But the question that lingered in my mind, both when I saw the trailer, and now having just seen the film... did it need to be a movie?
Two-hundred and eight seconds the turmoil lasted. Once the plane hit the water the flight attendants and pilots helped passengers safely off the plane and onto rafts in the Hudson. The Coast Guard and the NYPD took twenty-four minutes to respond, successfully rescuing every passenger aboard the aircraft. This is nothing short of amazing. But did it need to be a movie? Looking at it from Hollywood standpoint, of course it did. Any remotely interesting story that's put into print should 100% be made into a movie if it can make money. But from an audience perspective, I'm not sure it passed muster. The film seemed to strain to put together a solid 96 minute run time. It lingers heavily on Sully's dreams after the crash. He constantly sees himself unsuccessfully landing the plane and crashing into buildings and killing everyone on board. It's a stretch to imagine the actual Sully having gone through this, but who knows? We get very unimportant flashbacks of Sully's flying experience both as a youngster with a crop duster and in the armed forces. Neither scene add greatly to the overall story. Sully reminds us twice that he's been flying for over forty years. This information seemed, to me, to be sufficient enough to give the man his credibility.
The moments that make the movie worthwhile, however, are very well done and intriguing, even to the point of thrilling (even though the audience knows exactly what's going to happen each time). We get pieces of the crash throughout the movie from differing perspectives-- from the air traffic controllers attempting to guide Sully in making his way safely back to the airport, to the flight crew, to the passengers, to finally Sully and his co-pilot Jeff Skiles (Aaron Eckhart). This is the heart of the movie where we are able to experience every aspect of the crash and how it really never should've gone as successfully as it did. Yet, there is all this filler and fluff in-between of Sully trying to prove that his actions were the only ones that allowed everyone to walk away with their lives. The board trying to show that he could've made it back to the airport and Sully questioning whether or not he made the right decision. And while I don't exactly know the entire story surrounding the aftermath of the crash... it seems most of this was created to add to the drama of the film... and not what actually happened to the real hero. Then, there's this strange tension played up between Sully and his wife (Laura Linney) who we only get to see on the other side of phone calls. There are moments when it seems his marriage is either on the verge of ending or has already ended or is in a bit of a limbo. But it only comes from him. It's never truly explained and it's a sore thumb in a movie that carries with it other sore digits.
Call it old age, call it mind-slippage at its finest, but lately Clint Eastwood has been making very vanilla films. They're the perfect embodiment of the term 'meh'. In fact, aside from American Sniper, in the past eight years Eastwood has only made movies that are the film equivalent of plain toast. From Invictus to Hereafter to J. Edgar and Jersey Boys, his movies all have that strange, quiet vanilla feeling of emptiness and stale monotony. This is how the fluff of Sully feels. This is how everything outside the aircraft in the movie feels. Nevertheless, when we get the scenes of the two-hundred and eight second crash is where the movie truly feels alive. This is what genuinely honors its hero.
Tom Hanks is great in it, playing Sully with a quiet stoicism we're not all that used to seeing from Hanks. He is deeply troubled and concerned about the future of his career and thoughts on whether endangering so many people was the right decision. Even though personally I believe only about thirty minutes of the movie are worth watching, it's nice to have Tom Hanks leading the thirty minutes. Chances are, you're not going to see this movie in theaters. In fact, the theater I was in was only half-full and I was the only one in there under the age of 65. So, take your grandmother to see who he probably believes is the greatest hero of the twenty-first century, or wait until it's blasted on the 'Suggestions For You' section of your Netflix home screen. While, personally, I don't believe this movie needed to exist, it is nice to see effort made on behalf of Eastwood and the crew to give Sully the recognition of heroism he absolutely deserved.
C+
No comments:
Post a Comment