A Few Words About A few words about... Flightplan (1 Viewer)

[Robert Harris]

Jodie Foster is one of a handful of actors that I would watch reading the proverbial phone directory.

Now 43, she's been at the acting game for 35 years. That's the length of most careers, and she's just getting started.

Ms. Foster has the rare ability to act with her eyes, which is something that was handled with similar delicacy by Lillian Gish -- take a look at Broken Blossoms.

Robert Schwentke on the other hand is relatively new to the business, but has the sense to trust his actors and take advantage of their abilities.

Flightplan is a deceptively simple story about a young girl who apparently disappears while aboard a huge jumbo jet. Everything here is handled beautifully, and the viewer, along with Ms. Foster and the airliner's crew are never quite certain of the truth.

Add in superb performances from Peter Sarsgaard and Sean Bean.

This is a film that I feared might fall into the routine, and was pleasantly surprised that it went in totally the opposite direction.

While image and audio look to be superb, this DVD was viewed on one of my smaller systems, as my theater is currently undergoing an update. I'll leave it to this site's reviewers to comment further in that regard should there be any negatives. I saw and heard none.

Recommended.

 

[Stephen Orr]

Rented from Netflix and watching this tonight.

 

[Vegas 1]

I agree about Jodie Foster, my wife and I saw this in the theater good flick. I will add Flightplan to my collection.
Regards
Al

 

[Andrew Bunk]

You know, I had this in my hands this morning as a blind buy, but decided to wait.

I guess I'll be stopping at Target again on the way home.

 

[Mike Frezon]

Anybody want to go so far as to say Jodie Foster has the potential to build a truly great career as an actress?! It's already a very good career. If she keeps things up, I think she'll be looked upon as one of the great actors of this generation.

I think back to her stint as Addie Pray on the TV series Paper Moon in the mid-70s...and the many great roles before and since. Taxi Driver, Silence of the Lambs, and a personal favorite...Little Man Tate.

 

[Chad Ferguson]

I agree that Jodie Foster is a great actress cant agree with Flighplan being that great. Was good and then the 3rd act just took a turn for the plan and boring.

 

[Alistair_M]

Personally I thought the opposite about Jodie Foster and Flightplan.

I thought her performance was fairly routine, and I never felt emotionally connected to her loss of child.

The film, was pretty good for the first hour - but then degenerated into close to rubbish at the end. If I was eating popcorn, I would have been tempted to throw it at the screen!

The saving grace for me was Sean Bean. He's so often playing the villian but he was very pleasing as a thoughful, sensitive character. Hope he does more roles of this type.

But hey, thats film. One persons honey is another's poison.

 

[Chuck Mayer]

Not too interested in the film, but I think Jodie is long cemented as a great actor/actress/star, whatever you want to call her.

She is a star because she puts butts in seats. I think very few actors have that power, despite what (their) agents and studio heads think: Roberts, Washington, Hanks, Cruise, and Foster can open a film. That's it. She does it with a lower profile than the rest.

Two Oscars, a few notable snubs, and the incredible respect of her peers assure her of Hollywood immortality.

 

[Cees Alons]

Jodie Foster is one of the few who invariably make me look into a film when I see she's in it. Only a few of those I didn't decide to buy.
She's able to "carry" a film, in fact she often chooses parts that mainly comprise the whole movie.

Bottom line: I like her very much as an actress and I bought Flightplan.


Cees

 

[Mark Lucas]

Yeah. I also thought it was a good movie, when I saw it in the theater. Last year.

Looking forward to the Blu-ray release.

 

[DaveF]

I agree that Jodie Foster is a marvelous actress, but I wish that she could find better roles. The last two I saw, "Flight Plan" and "Panic Room" were better than mediocre, perhaps, but not great. Especially for her talents.

Flight Plan was entertaining, but I saw it start in an interesting way and then devolve to the routine silliness of an uninspired action/thriller.

The movie would have benefited had she really was a loon, and had no daughter
. The same mistake was made with Mel Gibson's "Conspiracy Theory", sacrificing an intriguing story for a cheap resolution.

 

[David James]

DaveF:

Regarding your spoiler. During the movie, I was hoping it wouldn't turn out that way -

 

[Paul Hillenbrand]

David James wrote:
I agree, and the great acting had me really believing the opposite.

Paul

 

[Robert Harris]

On occasion, during production, there have been instances where either cast members did not receive final pages until absolutely necessary, or alternates were shot.

While I'm not noting that this was the situation here, it has been used to keep an actors performance in neutral.

RAH

 

[Chad Ferguson]

This could just be me but that one flight attendant's eye liner was so heavily put on or something, it was freaking me out, anyone notice this?

 

[Bill Cowmeadow]

I think Ms. Foster has taken this type of acting cue from another brilliant actor, Michael Caine.

He, in my opinion, is one of very few actors who can relay emotion with almost no facial/body movements.

Bill

 

[Shane_M]

Mr. Harris: I wonder if you noticed during the sequence when Jodie's character is talking to the psychiatrist that there is some distortion in the dialog on the DTS track, mostly coming from the psych.

I'm yet to listen to the DD 5.1 track to see if it occurs there, but it only occurs during that scene. The rest of the movie the audio is perfect for the environment.

 

[Robert Harris]

Sorry, but I wasn't able to view this with the DTS track, as my system is down.

 

[Cees Alons]

And beautiful eyes, I must say.

The DVD just arrived at my home.


Cees