observation notes: Airline Disaster

So here's the lowdown on Airline Disaster, without ruining the end: it isn't a mockbuster, there's no specific film it's capitalizing on, it's just your basic terrorists-taking-over-a-super-plane-on-its-maiden
-voyage-in-exchange-for-the-release-of-their-terrorist-buddies movie, made atypical by a really neat end that'll get you smiling, guaranteed, and not because it's happy or anything, just when you figure out what they're doing, it makes you smile, slyly.

It's a good story overall, a nice balance of action and intrigue, well-paced and with a couple of hit points that make the plot more than one-note. Point: the super plane's pilot is the President's brother. Double Point: the President's a woman. Triple point: the President is played by Meredith Baxter-no-longer-Birney (the mom from "Family Ties") and the pilot is played by Scott Valentine (Mallory's boyfriend on "Family Ties," also, Carnosaur 3). Weird! Rounding out the cast are some Asylum regulars like Geoff Meed (6 Guns, I Am Omega), Londale Theus (Transmorphers: Fall of Man, 2012: Supernova) and the lovely, talented and ridiculously underused Lindsey McKeon.


Without spoiling anything about the end, I'll just wrap this up by saying all in all, Airline Disaster is a captivating action-thriller on par with any other big-plane-gone-amok film (see Air Force One, Turbulence, Executive Decision, Die Hard 2) and with an ending that might just make you stand up and cheer, depending on how drunk you are. I was pretty drunk. There were tears.

Plus, you get to hear Scott Valentine bellow this line, in reference to his super plane: "Come on, you big beautiful whale!"

Awesome.