Over the past few years, there has been one surprisingly great January action-thriller that breaks through the standard January doldrums. Films such as 2023’s Plane and last year’s The Beekeeper embraced the inherent ridiculousness of their premises and went above and beyond in their execution. On paper, Flight Risk should be the next addition to that list. Unfortunately, the only memorable thing about Flight Risk is the studio’s attempt to hide Mel Gibson’s name in the marketing.
The premise is simple: In the middle of the Alaskan wilderness, U.S. Marshal Madolyn Harris (Michelle Dockery) has captured Winston (Topher Grace), a former accountant for a major New York crime family. The duo must make it to Anchorage in time for the trial, so they board a charter flight piloted by a Southern pilot, Daryl Booth (Mark Wahlberg). Taking a flight in a rickety plane is nerve-wracking enough, but the tension peaks when the pair discovers that “Daryl” is, in fact, a hitman tasked with killing Winston.
There are flashes of the schlocky tone the film should achieve, and that is mainly thanks to Mark Wahlberg. In the first act, he adopts a ridiculous Southern accent. When the disguise (in this case, a cap and wig) is removed, Wahlberg drops the accent and shifts into pure, psychotic villainy. The reveal of his bald cap is genuinely hilarious, and even when subdued and cuffed to the back of the plane, he still uses the Southern accent. The enjoyment of his performance fades quickly as he mainly threatens to sexually assault the other two passengers throughout the film.
“The only memorable thing about Flight Risk is the studio’s attempt to hide Mel Gibson’s name in the marketing.”
Speaking of which, the writing and direction are as flat as they come. Despite Gibson’s litany of reprehensible actions, he has typically been known as a solid director in the past. Perhaps it is because he cannot rely on his trademark ultra-violence this time around, but his direction is so flat that you would not realize he directed the film until his name appears in the credits. The same goes for Jared Rosenberg’s script, which suffers from severely two-dimensional characterization.
When it comes to Winston, Topher Grace portrays him as the same anxious-yet-sarcastic motormouth he’s been known for since That 70’s Show. As for Madolyn, she spends most of the film contacting her superiors or getting help navigating the plane courtesy of flirty flight controller Hasan (Maaz Ali). Michelle Dockery isn’t a bad actress either, but there is very little of her character to give anything beyond being the protagonist. Worst of all, Flight Risk takes very little advantage of its aerial setting. After they incapacitate “Daryl” the first time, the film could just be the trio riding around on autopilot, and then it ends calmly.
It forces tension by having Madolyn try to determine who informed the mob about the charter flight or by having “Daryl” repeatedly escape in contrived ways. I’m one to let my suspension of disbelief go rampant, but the amount of times he would pick the lock for an extended period of time and neither of them looked back the entire time to see what he was doing drove me up the wall.
Typically, I’m a sucker for a high concept, single-location thriller. Flight Risk is an example of the most boring way to do it. With a movie like Flight Risk, it either has to go all the way into either relentless tension or B-movie schlock. By doing neither, it’s destined to be forgotten faster than you can say the word “lift off”. In other words, it’s the January movie I expected, not the one I wanted.
