Turbulences 2

The first Turbulence movie really reeked (ie. it stunk out the whole cabin), mostly because there were large portions of the movie where nothing much exciting happened. They fixed this problem for Turbulence 2 with wall-to-wall non-stop heart-pounding action. OK, the action isn't heart-pounding but it's certainly wall-to-wall. There's always somebody fighting, running away, chasing, blowing something up, shooting, dying, trying to escape or, of course, flying the plane in turbulent conditions. Oh yeah, and falling...

The wall-to-wall action is flanked closely on both sides with wall-to-wall stupidity, but to its credit the movie does not take itself too seriously. How could it? A fear of flying group takes a ride in a plane with a bunch of terrorists with a bomb on board which then heads towards a storm. Ha ha, yeah right. Now, it's up to the fear of flying passengers & crew to save the day which they do with varying degrees of success. When ANOTHER crew member gets shot attempting to overthrow the bad guy the bad guy says something along the lines of "Aargh! what's wrong with you people?". It's delivered beautifully.

Actually, the acting in general is really very, err, well capable. I was going to say good, but in the context of this movie it wouldn't quite fit. I'm only giving this movie 4/10, but it's a fun 4/10. Chill that beer, microwave that popcorn, hand over your $2 to the video shop, switch off brain, press play, enjoy.

The plot of this film is just so preposterous it makes "Airplane!" look like a slice of gritty realism. Nervous flyers on a plane in a terrible storm with evil European terrorists (no clue as to what their cause was, other than "being evil"), deadly nerve gases, dead cabin crew, drugged ice cubes, gun fights, a missile attack, and an ordinary Joe who has to land the plane (he has a dead wife, and an impossibly cute little son, of course).

As the action lurched from this implausible random plot twist to that piece of clunky, cliche-ridden dialogue, I found myself being charmed by the sheer awfulness of it all.

My favourite part is when a terrorist starts babbling in Czech, and Jennifer Beals offers to try and interpret since she learned a few words of Polish from her Grandmother as a child. Seconds later she is in full swing: "He says that there is a deadly nerve gas in the hold, and he will press the detonator killing everyone within a 5 mile radius"....Whatever did her grandmother talk about all the time that she picked up that vocabulary?

"Fear of Flying: Turbulence II" does not pretend to be anything it is not. It is simply a formula airline-that-must-be-brought-down-by-passenger-taking-direction-from-the-ground-whilst-sitting-in-pilots-seat-where-said-pilot-is (insert one):dead/predisposed/poisoned etc.

This runs along the lines of the great 70's era tragedy films like Airport '77, Towering Inferno and the like. "Fear" has plotted this along that very formula, so much so that the inevitable hero of the movies son races out onto the tarmac as the inevitable plane is safely guided to the ground at the climactic ending with music crescendoing and you knew this would happen all along. So what? I cannot deny I was truly entertained. The dialogue was humorous-intentional at times- and I did find myself and colleagues arguing about who the actual terrorists were on the flight through out the film-is it him? No, it's gotta be him! Of all the critically acclaimed movies I have seen, this one is not by far, but it is fondly remembered. Kill an hour and a half or so with this.

Actually this movie is a bit better than the ridiculous first part, which was nothing less than shameful. But when I saw this I actually had a good time. Now I thinking seriously about renting part 3, but who knows...

"Turbulence II: Fear Of Flying"

Released by: Trimark Pictures. Release date: August 2nd, 2000 (VENEZUELA; theatrical release), Fall 2000 (USA; video premiere).

I saw the movie in theaters here in Venezuela and i thought that the movie was pretty good. The movie has a pretty bad plotting and Bad/Good acting. This movie was the first Trimark movie to be released in theaters in Venezuela. Although that the film's ending was pretty bad, they're making "Turbulence III" which has a bad plot and will be released on video and (internationally) in theaters.

I rate "Turbulence II": *** out *****