The Miracle on the Hudson

Rating: 7/10 (9 October 2016)

Given where I live I have a vague memory about the Miracle on the Hudson. That is to say I remember it happening and being on all of the news channels, but I never really cared to follow up on the events past those first few days after it happened. What the movie Sully brings is at best an exhilarating account of bravery displayed by Capitan Sully and at worst a little bit of feel good drama where the drama feels inflated.
Lets start off with Tom Hanks as the titular Captain Sully. Hanks is not only the perfect choice for this role, he is the only choice for this role. No actor working today brings as much trust and inherent compassion better than Hanks can. From the first moment that the NTSB starts questioning him about the events during the emergency water landing I immediately believe Sully. I trust that he did the right thing and that is because of Tom Hanks. He has made a career of being the good guy and this role demands that he be the best good guy he has ever been, and he nails it. Aaron Eckhart is solid in his supporting role because he is able to play off of Sully's personality. He allows the viewer to step into his shoes and play co pilot in our heads. In those 208 seconds he has to trust Sully like we trust Hanks and you feel that in his performance.
Even though I was not really sold on the CGI in Sully, the "water landing" scenes were the highlight of the movie. Even though they showed the same sequence of events more than a couple of times, each time it felt different. Eastwood lets you view it through the different lenses of the people involved, the passengers, the crew and even the people on the ground viewing it from office buildings and homes. While the CGI sometimes broke my immersion when they put you in the plane is when it really shines. I could almost feel the bottom of my seat drop out as if the theater had lost both engines.
Most of the issues I have with Sully are nit picking. The direction by Clint Eastwood is unimaginative, the writing is average but the biggest problem is one that Eastwood suffered from in his last movie American Sniper and that is an unrealistic villain. This time around Eastwood decided that the real opposition to our hero is over zealous government officials and white people problems. For me the real problem for Sully should have been the constant terror of what if. What if he had done something differently that day or what if he had put those people in danger? They allude to this a bit but I think this really should have been the emotional focus. At least thats what gave me the willies the most. Although i did say the writing was average, Sully actually as what most movies miss and that is an earned third act. The writers saved all their really good stuff for that second to third act transition. They even have a few twists for you at the end there which I did not expect at all.
Sully can sometimes be dragged down by the low points and dialogue heavy scenes but when it has to the movie really turns it on. at an hour and 37 minutes the length is just about right, there were a few scenes that kind of felt added in to pad the run time but it was a decently paced movie with as I said before a great third act. I did not expect much from Sully but I am here to say I have been proved wrong. This is a story about a true American hero, but more than that Sully is just a flat out amazing person who deserves for people to really know how great he is.