Final Descent

I like Robert Ulrich a lot so that may influence my opinion. I expected to be bored but was not. The acting was good. There's always a temptation to go over the top in these types of films but it didn't happen here. The snippets of the passengers were blessedly short and the emphasis stayed on trying to save the plane. The technical stuff was believable.

A brand new jumbo aircraft that fly its self is being piloted by a cowboy who hates computers. Keeping an eye on him is a rival for his girl (the other pilot). Sure as shoot'n second plain private and piloted by a 200hour pilot. Turns in to the jumbo jet disabling the ailerons in an upward position. This is just the beginning.

This movie is closer to the original Airplane movie with the exception that all the people just half expose their past a little at a time as the disaster proceeds. The ending is predictable and the constant problems are part of the formula. However tithe actors make a very good mix and do there jobs well enough to make you forget that it is a movie.

This is one of that strange breed of films - the cliche ridden, made for TV that also happens to be fantastically entertaining!

No scenes of tedious plot exposition and no dead-weight back story dragging it down, just a damn fine airplane disaster flick with genuine excitement and a likeable cast.

Good work fellas!

Now granted, if you are one of those types that complain because your ice water was served cold and wet you might not like this. But if you go into with the knowledge you are not in some USC film class, you can enjoy a lazy afternoon watching this.

Urich is his usual engaging self. This actor while in some pretty broad roles always managed to keep his performance low key.

He does so as the pilot of this doomed plane. There is a question of potentially sacrificing the lives of some to save the others, a nice little addition to your standard disaster movie.

This movie is not much realistic, sure. It is more realistic than airport 79 (that movie where a Concorde is far more manouverable than a military jetplane!), but it is obvious... Indeed, I have to say that this Tv-movie is full of nice ideas in the plot, movie ideas, OK, but also funny for this reason. So, if you like the catastrophic genre, take a look at this very economic movie. But don't expect a realistic movie: no one has realized, up today, a really realistic movie about the airplanes.