There used to be a time when Jodie Foster movies were must-see affairs for me. I’d make a point to catch them in the theater rather than wait for the DVDs to come out. But I was disappointed in Panic Room and I was turned off by the bad reviews that Flight Plan got, so I took my sweet time getting around to see it. I finally finished watching it tonight.
Well, I don’t even know where to begin with this movie. I’m not going to bother trying to give a detailed synopsis because the plot was far more complicated than it needed to be and just didn’t make sense any way I looked at it. Jodie Foster plays an engineer named Kyle Pratt (I’ve never heard of a woman named Kyle before, and this little detail bugged me throughout the movie) whose husband was recently murdered. They had been living in Germany where Kyle worked for an airplane manufacturer. After her husband’s death, Kyle decides to take her daughter back to the U.S. with the husband’s body. They fly on a plane that Kyle designed.
The conflict comes in when someone kidnaps Kyle’s daughter. The way things play out, Kyle’s sanity comes into question because none of the other passengers remember seeing the little girl. Was the kid killed with the husband? Is Foster delusional? Or was the daughter kidnapped as part of an elaborate plot to hijack the plane and steal millions of dollars? Um, yeah, unfortunately the answer is the last choice there.
Anyway, there are so many holes in the plot that you’ll be asking yourself “Why would he…?” or “Why didn’t she just…?” one hundred times during the course of the film. If that’s your idea of an entertaining movie, then you’ll love this one. Otherwise, you’re not missing anything!