Hijacked: Flight 285

I originally watched this movie because I'm a HUGE Breakfast club fan and I wanted to see Anthony Michael Hall and Ally Sheedy work together. I'm very glad I watched, it is a great tv movie and Anthony and Ally did wonderful. Anthony in my opinion did a good job as a bad guy and you could tell he had fun doing it, although at first all I seen him as is Sweet Brian from Breakfast club so at times it was hard seeing him be mean to others and to Ally's character. So if this movie is ever on I recommend watching.

Slick, well paced and sharply played, H:F285 is a competent and satisfying romp. Yes, it's just a re-hash of the Airport genre, but it manages to look and feel fresh thanks to a cast of actual actors (remember them?) and restrained direction that never attempts to overstep the modest budget.

The vast majority of the action takes place in the "forty feet long, thirty feet wide" cinema variety plane interior, but this isn't necessarily a bad thing as it induces mild viewer cabin fever after an hour or so.

If you enjoy watching sweaty balding A list actors stripping down to their vests and and blowing up, well, everything, then this isn't for you. However, if you enjoy character interplay, building tension that actually gets you involved in the story, and restrained - by Hollywood standards - resolution, give it a spin.

When I initially sat down to watch Hijacked: Flight 285, I figured it would be just another boring Hijack movie with the usual predictable ending. Instead I found myself completely enthralled with both the story and the characters.

Hall is a prisoner being transported by the FBI on a passenger airline much to the dissatisfaction of pilot, Brolin. Of course, Hall breaks free of his restraints with the help of two of his cronies and manages to hijack the plane. Ally Sheedy is the detective familiar with Hall and his activities, from the ground she attempts to reason with Hall to free the passengers.

What I adored most about this film is the characters, the good and especially the bad. Anthony Michael Hall offers a multi-layered bad guy whose struggle with his inner principles presents itself when he is forced to kill one of the passengers. It is a powerful moment that I have never forgotten nor probably ever will.

The other actors are also good including a wheelchair bound, Michael Gross, James Brolin in a bit part, Ally Sheedy, as the cop and Casey Sander (Grace Under Fire) as the hero. David Graf, who made a career out of playing the tough-guy, Tackleberry, in the Police Academy movies does an excellent job playing the coward who puts himself and the other passengers at risk.

Captivating performances that won't let you down. A must see!

First of all, completely ignore the other comments here. This film is BAD. Trust me. The direction is limp, the script embarrassing, the sets flimsy, and I haven't even got to the actors yet. Anthony Michael Hall will always be remembered for The Breakfast Club and Weird Science - he's OK at being a geeky teen, but a menacing hijacker? He's about as intimidating as my pants. And then there's Ally Sheedy. Perhaps she's had more of a career than Anthony, but that doesn't mean she's a good actor. To be fair though, its not like she has much to work with here.

OK, the film. Its like Turbulence v Passenger 57, except made for £2.50. If you want to watch a cheesy Hollywood airplane film that actually creates some tension, go and watch Executive Decision. At least you get to see Steven Seagal get creamed.

Do keep in mind that this isn't a big budget Hollywood production. It was a made for TV movie intended to give a couple of hours of entertainment while you sit on the couch watching the tube in the days before Netflix and Amazon, etc. It needs to be judged by that standard. And looked at it in that way, it's passable. It's reasonably suspenseful, although not especially original. It's another hijack movie that depends on all sorts of things: somehow the prisoner being escorted on a commercial flight managed to get word out to his accomplices of exactly which flight he was going to be on. And it depends on the FBI agents guarding him being complete dunces who seem far too easily overcome. But you have to accept all that or you won't have a movie. Somehow the hijackers have to take over the plane, after all. So - OK. I thought the performances here were just a little bit bland - there seemed to be surprisingly little emotion from those portraying the passengers, who you'd think would be a little more panicky at the presence of three hijackers, all of whom have guns and one of whom has a bomb? But there's intrigue in how this is all going to play out that was sufficiently interesting to keep me watching.

Now, I've found that every TV movie of this type has some sort of sub-theme going on. Here, there were a whole lot of variations on what you might call the complexities of male-female relationships. One of the passengers has a tense relationship with his wife. The head FBI agent on the ground has a complicated relationship with the female hostage negotiator. The leader of the hijackers has his lover among his accomplices, and she's a little too kind for his tastes every now and then. The female pilot and male co-pilot of the plane are former lovers who find sharing the cockpit a bit awkward. There was just a lot of this - and it was very noticeable and even a little bit funny.

I didn't find this to be a bad movie; I didn't feel at all as if I had wasted my time by watching it. (6/10)