This is one heaps good movie

Rating: 8/10 (18 November 2011)

This movie is just absolutely brilliant. It is one of the best action movies that I have seen in a long time. There are numerous Hollywood clichés in it but they do not spoil what is an absolutely brilliant movie.
The story is simple (as it is with most action movies). Cameron Poe (Nicolas Cage) is a US Ranger that has just retired. He returns to Mobile Alabama to see his wife and is dragged into a fight with the local rough necks. In the fight he accidentally kills one of them. As he is a trained killing machine the Judge sentences him to eight years for involuntary manslaughter. He spends his eight years in jail and writes to a daughter that he has never seen. He is released after eight years and put onto a plane to be flown back home.
Seems simple but there is an added twist. There is a new Maximum security prison opening in Alabama for hardened criminals. The worst criminals in the United States of America are being moved to this prison and they are being taken by plane – the same plane which Cameron Poe is on. Almost immediately, these highly intelligent and extremely dangerous criminals break out of their cells and capture the plane. There is a simple solution to the problem, shoot the plane down, and a DEA agent, played by Colm Meanly (he who is Miles O'Brian in Deep Space Nine) wants to do just that. Federal Marshal Vince Larkin (John Cusak) wants his plan back in one piece and works to hinder the DEA agent at every turn. Thus the movie takes off.
And take off it does, not just in the literal sense. The movie is full of action; and when action is not the center of the scene then the brilliant cinematography will dazzle you. There was hardly every a dull moment in this movie. Things were happening thick and fast. The lead up was very short – throwing the audience into the thick of the action immediately. The criminals were hyper intelligent – yet their plans were very fallible: relying on other criminals who turn around and betray them as soon as their path is clear.
The movie has many tense moments – putting the audience into the position of a possible horror and then revealing that they horror that its mind had conceived was not as they expected. There are many twists and turns, and unlike most action movies, there is a real danger to the hero Cameron Poe.
Not only are the criminals, lead by Cyrus the Virus (John Malcovich) – who I might say played his role brilliantly – the bad guys but Colm's DEA agent also turns out to be quite an antagonist. Where the criminals are being actively resisted, the movie passively hinders Colm's character.
Colm's character is worth a mention for many of us who watch Deep Space Nine are very familiar with the kind and shy technician Miles O'Brian. Though Miles is known to have a bit of a temper, in general he is a nice guy. The DEA agent that Colm plays in Con-Air is a complete turn around. Simply put, he is a swearing, arrogant, prick of a DEA agent. His character is a character that the audience is to hate – and to mock when things do not go his way. As with most Hollywood movies, Colm's character reconciles with the rest of the cast.
As with Hollywood Clichés', there is a bit that I must mention. The bad guy, Cyrus the Virus, dies a spectacular death. There is no back to prison for him. His death was original and spectacular, but in the end unbelievable. Still, Jerry Buckenheimer (the director) retains the all important suspension of disbelief and one feels good that the bad guy has finally met his match.
The money shower is another cliché that has worked its way into the movie. That is where a truck full of money is hit and money goes flying into the air and lands everywhere. People then come piling in from all over to grab as much money as possible.
Other than that, the movie is great and it ends well. Buckenheimer creates much anticipation at the end of the movie and the tense moment remains as Cameron Poe lays eyes on his daughter for the first time ever. There is another interesting twist but I will let you see that for yourself.
In my opinion, this movie is what Speed was supposed to be.
Favourite Quote: Insanity, I'll tell you what insanity is: spending sixty years working in an office only to end up in an old folks home to die an undignified death while trying to get to the toilet – that is insanity.