Never trust trailers - they lie. Take the trailer for Flight which paints a picture of a brave pilot who had a couple of drinks, saved the majority of his passengers in a daring move when his plane fails and then had to fight to clear his name. Yes, these elements are present in the film but Flight is really a detailed character study of an alcoholic - he just happens to fly a plane. Robert Zemeckis marks his return to live action (after his forays into Motion Capture) with a surprisingly adult and thoughtful film which, while not perfect, is well written and has a mesmerising performance from Denzel Washington.
Washington plays Whip Whitaker and we meet him waking up hungover in a hotel with a naked beauty. He then downs some more booze and adds some cocaine. If anyone came to movie not knowing it would be a fantastic moment as he walks out in his Captain's uniform revealing himself to be the pilot of a plane and the beauty a stewardess. The flight starts off with some bad turbulence but Whip boldly steers through a storm front. However, there is then a catastrophic systems failure and the airplane plummets towards the ground in a nosedive. Whip performs a crazy but successful manoeuvre to halt the dive and manages to crash land the plane in a field. He is hailed as a hero but his toxicology report states otherwise. Soon the Head of his Union (Bruce Greenwood) and a wily lawyer (Don Cheadle) are trying their best to keep him out of prison.
Meanwhile in hospital Whip has befriended recovering junkie Nicole (Kelly Reilly) and allows her to move into his grandfather's farmhouse (where he is hiding out from the press). A relationship develops but one that is under constant strain from Whip's alcoholism. While Nicole has started going to meetings about her issues Whip cannot face up to his addition, saying he can stop whenever he likes. As his binges continue, threatening not just his relationship with Nicole but also with his ex-wife and his 15 year old son, Whip has to decide whether to keep lying or to face up to the truth of what he is. With a hearing to decide where the guilt for the crash lies, can Whip keep it together?
The main draw of Flight, apart from Washington, is the crash and it is a stomach churning, totally involving 15 odd minutes of harrowing magic. The special effects are great, especially the decision to use a cabin set that can be rotated, showing items flying around and people ending up on the ceiling. What really sells the moment however are the performances in the cockpit (a cleverly claustrophobic set), especially Washington who keeps calm while all about are losing their cool. But Flight has to carry on for over an hour and a half more after this scene and, as far as excitement goes, what follows is much more sombre and static - a problem if you where expecting a movie with more movement. Luckily the human drama that follows is, in my opinion, equally as involving and that's down to the simple reason that Washington is one of the best actors ever to grace a film.
Washington is incapable of a bad performance but Flight is the best I've seen him in years and will rank as one of his signature turns. What Washington brings to a role is a total sense of honesty. He doesn't go for sympathy, showing us a man who is vain and deluded and occasional nasty as well as brave and heroic. His ability to play these contradictions in a way that rings true, means that better than liking or hating Whip, we feel we know him and believe in him as a person. We feel it as he tries to give up alcohol, pouring all his bottles down the sink, only to give in, buy more booze and end up slumped in a heap on the floor mumbling to himself. Daniel Day-Lewis will probably walk away with the Oscar but Denzel deserves it. He is breathtakingly good in this.
With Denzel on fire the other cast members can't really compete and this isn't helped by many of them being a rather underwritten. Reilly tries hard as the recovering drug addict but the friendship that grows between her and Whip feels both rushed and a little forced, as if Nicole's put there merely to witness Whip's descent and to take him to an AA meeting. Cheadle and Greenwood put in good work but they don't have that much to do other than tut a lot when Whip inevitably keeps getting drunk. John Goodman as Whip's drug supplying friend overplays terribly, going for comedy but coming over as grotesque and bringing a sour note to proceedings, espeically in the misjudged 'sobering up' scene towards the end.
In the end however, the script by John Gatins is engaging enough and its message - that freedom comes from acceptance and not flight - is cleverly conveyed, giving us an ending that is truthful yet affirming. The direction by Zemeckis, bar the showy crash, is restrained and sophisticated and he teases out some great performances. Let's hope he decides to stay in the live action arena from now on. This remains Washington's film though and it's an honour and a treat to see one of the world's finest actors producing one of his finest ever performances. It's more than worth watching for that alone.
GK Rating: **** The Blog of Delights
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