Flight Risk Review

Flight Risk is Mel Gibson’s sixth film as director and his first contemporary set film with this airborne thriller.

Madolyn Harris (Michelle Dockery) is a U.S. Marshal who arrests Winston (Topher Grace), an accountant for the mob. Winston agrees to testify against a notorious mob boss in exchange for immunity. The pair must travel from the wilderness of Alaska to New York City, but their travels become complicated when they find out their pilot (Mark Wahlberg) is a hitman.

Gibson has a great reputation as a director. The trailers and posters have highlighted his previous successes (Braveheart, Apocalypto, and Hacksaw Ridge) and this thriller was based on a screenplay that was on the 2020 Black List. However, Gibson has a lot of baggage and is regarded as persona non grata in Hollywood. He’s no longer attracting the big roles he used to and some film critics like Mathew Buck have said they will boycott Flight Risk. Mark Kermode’s review was more focused on the controversies and personalities of Gibson and Wahlberg.

Most of Gibson’s films have been big epics with lavish production values. He won an Academy Award for Best Director for his work on Braveheart and he took big risks with The Passion of the Christ and Apocalypto since he filmed them in ancient languages. Flight Risk was a different film for Gibson because of the genre, short run time, and restrictive setting.

Flight Risk was a mix of a survival thriller and a crime thriller. The plot of the film was essentially Horizon Line with a psychopathic hitman. Or to put it another way, it was Horizon Line with films like Phonebooth and Buried. This mash-up of thriller presented double the life-threatening danger since a novice had to have a crash course in flying a plane, and the potential protagonists could be killed by someone who didn’t care if they lived or died. Added to the film was the time crunch to get Winston to New York and the conspiracy about a mole working in the U.S. Marshall’s office.

Gibson and screenwriter Jared Rosenberg made sure there were a lot of plates spinning. A lot was going on with the different connecting parts and within the plane, the film highlights the different objects. There were a lot of Chekov’s Guns in Flight Risk. This was a film that showed the characters survive many incidents that should have killed them.

While there were plenty of story elements going on, Flight Risk was a standard thriller. It’s the type of film Liam Neeson would have done in the 2010s or gone straight to Netflix or Amazon Prime. It’s not a film that needed to be made for the big screen. It was perfectly functional and Gibson was able to fill the film with plenty of tension. Flight Risk didn’t deserve the low Rotten Tomatoes Score it received.

Flight Risk cast was the strongest part of the film. Mark Wahlberg was the biggest name in the film and he was having fun as a deranged, over-the-top villain. He had a ridiculous look and accent. Wahlberg’s character made the film memorable because of his sadism. Michelle Dockery was the main star in the film and it offered her a different role. Dockery is best known for her role in Downton Abbey and she went from playing an English aristocrat to a no-nonsense federal agent. It was fun to see her be a tough chick and she performed the role well. The thrust of her character development was needed to let her hard surface crack.

Topher Grace and Maaz Ali’s roles were levity-filled. Grace’s Winston offered quips and comical observations, while Ali played a pilot who used the crisis to flirt and charm his way to a date with Madolyn.

Flight Risk was a perfectly serviceable if unremarkable thriller. Some have overly hated it because of its controversial filmmakers.