Buckle up and enjoy the show cos it's a helluva of a ride!

Rating: 10/10 (23 March 2020)

Greetings from the outer space! A long time without writing here so I'm back to give it a try with a movie that never failed to get my love, attention and
never lost its fun and charm all over the years. "Con Air" was one of those big ass blockbusters produced by Jerry Bruckheimer back in a time when "bigger, better,
faster and more" were the ultimate goal for him to generate budget and conquer audiences. I'm not saying that he doesn't do that anymore, but there's a certain
distance from the times he delivered the likes of "Crimson Tide", "The Rock" and "Bad Boys" where the sense of adventure, real danger, spectacular sequences and
stellar casts were the main attraction even if the story didn't deliver much, lacked of bigger brains and as usual, countless jump cuts and plot holes - he's still
delivering more of the same but the quality of the material, the charm and innocence of the 1990's flicks (the lack of political correctness was a major turn on too)
were all gone; the team he has now, the directors and actors on his productions are too softened in those days where he basically lives of "Pirates of the Caribbean",
some other franchises and super heroes who are the name of the game now. Action films were made with more humans beings than CGI. And that's why "Con Air", despite its numerous flaws,
still stands out as a supreme moment in terms of entertainment, quality and memorable moments.
The basics: Golf War veteran Cameron Poe (Nicolas Cage) spends some time in jail after accidentally killing a man who was messing around with him and his wife
(Monica Potter). When jail time's over, free is at the door when he takes a ride on a plane filled with the most horrendous and dangerous criminals, and their plan,
meticulously conceived by Cyrus "the Virus" Grissom (a hilarious yet menacing John Malkovich) is to take over the airplane and escape from authorities. After all, the
majority of the group have long sentences to complete while Cameron is going on parole and his greatest wish is to return home to wife and the daughter he never met.
The hijack works and suddenly our hero Poe is destined to alert the good guys down there about what is going on. One of the guys is Vince Larkin (John Cusack), supervisor
of the flight and a good man who has the thankless job of dealing with the unpleasant presence of a careless Narcotics chief (Colm Meaney, also hilarious) who put an
inside man on the plane to track down the schemes of a powerful drug dealer. It's total chaos but for us in the audience is an endless thrills to joy the ride, how
Cameron is gonna make his good plan to work; how Cyrus' dangerous plan is going to work; and how Larkin is gonna manage to do his job without being bossed around by
clueless bureatric people.
Gotta put into account that "Con Air" was a baby created to be pleasant to its creators (obviously) and to ourselves as long we don't get too demanding on
what the film brings to us. One action sequence tops the other, it's extremely fast paced yet perfectly edited, a insanely sense of humor with one countless cheesy lines
and dialogues (never cringeworthy), and to the ones expecting some message behind all those rushes, changes and gunshots there's a positive message behind it all:
there's always someone with good intentions trying to make the best of nightmarish situations. Poe is not the selfish hero who just wants to leave the plan and go
back home; he's the one who always finds means to spread the message of a taken flight to the police and also save his sick friend (Mykelti Williamson) and the female
guard (Rachel Ticotin), hostage of the bad guys. And the Cusack character comes in a high and might intellectual way, though always knowing best but when it's time to
act he becomes a man of action. As for the humor relief - though "Con Air" is not as heavy as one may think - Malkovich delivers all the goods, along with the ad-libs
from Dave Chappelle and the frightening Hannibal Lecter-traits coming from scene stealer Steve Buscemi. I grew up watching this and the forementioned films to the point
where I can watch repeatedly and the pleasure it's always the same. I might discover one or two new things, overlooked points, lots of errors obviously but I never get
tired of it. It reached to a point that few current films hardly ever get, which is to make you revisit the film time and again, absorb everything and that enjoyable
thing where you can repeat the most memorable lines every time you watch it. Not saying it's the greatest script ever written, but there's excellent quality stuff
that never gets out of your head ("Put the bunny in the box" or Buscemi's definition of irony when people are having fun while listening to Lynyrd Skynyrd).
The core of this review goes to show how nostalgic one can be with a movie. I guess the majority of current viewers are only accostumed to see Nicolas Cage
wasting his talent with "only in it for the movie" flicks and forget that for some decades he was a truly great actor, not just in action movies as this one and
"Face/Off" but also a heavyweight actor for all seasons in "Leaving Las Vegas", "Moonstruck" and "Adaptation.". I must say "Con Air" joins the list of his best movies;
along with John Cusack who also was at one time a talented fella but his current wave of dark characters simply don't appeal to me. His heroic character is smart,
likeable and it's worth the adrenaline he goes through while following the plane's movements. I mean, let us be honest: how many times in recent you looked back at
a highly charged action flick that had all those best elements combined that made the profit this one had? The difference is that audiences don't care much about
getting lost in the enthusiam and the fun filmmakers are delivering to us, now we all follow only intelligent action films that lose in appeal or quality here and
elsewhere (sometimes they're not even all that good). And a pity that director Simon West (unknown at the time) never repeated a similar feat with his next films, they
were all dull and empty - but made money, possibly launched some careers.
In all honesty, heart of hearts, "Con Air" is one of the most exciting, humorous and heart-pounding action/adventure films of all time in my book. It brings the best of me in so many ways, I get the laughs, the suspense and I can even enjoy all the unbelievable goofs and silliness of it all - the descent in Las Vegas tops everything - and admire how bald West/Bruckheimer et all brought to the screen. Fasten your seatbelts, enjoy the flight and apllaud at the end. You probably haven't feel this good in ages with a movie in the past decade. Just maybe. 10/10