Free Fall

Freefall is a typical disaster movie, but it was nice to watch. The special effects were somewhat "cheesy" but worked. The best performance came from Scott Wentworth as the hard-working agent. He is also reunited here with former co-star Kate Trotter, as well as Michael Sloan.

Jaclyn Smith plays Renee Brennan with confidence and accuracy. We get to see a day in the life of a NTSB crash investigator. The conflict between Boxleitner and Smith does depict some realism with respect to the FAA-NTSB relationship. Although this film never reaches any emotional depths, people who investigate these types of airline disasters often have to put their emotions on the backburner anyway. Much of the plot of this movie was predictable, but all in all, I enjoyed watching it. Perhaps the most pleasant surprise was the superb acting of the young Hayden Christensen (Patrick). If you like airline disaster movies, this one is worth seeing.

This movie begs for a showing in the Satellite of Love. If I had a few clever, motivated friends nearby, and we wanted to spend a raucous evening playing Mike and the Bots, this is the movie I would pick, hands down, bar none. Liquid cheese oozes from every line of dialog, every absurd plot development, and especially from the "If Ed Wood had had CGI instead of models" special effects. This is literally one of those movies that's so bad, it's actually entertaining.

Free Fall details the story of a woman who becomes victim to a deranged psychopath intent on destroying the airline industry. It may sound a bit pessimistic, but the suspense and dialogue make it all work quite well.

It's a fast-paced tele-film that may have been done hundreds of times before, but the antics of the characters seem to heighten the tension involved and make the viewer actually want to stick with it and see what happens. Jaclyn Smith gives out a watchable and confident performance as Renee in a film that contains surprisingly taut action packed sequences in which fans of disaster movies and such should enjoy. 7/10

Disappointing terror-disaster flick, even for a TV movie. No real enthusiasm or effort from major or minor players--Smith is the NTSB investigator and Boxleitner her FAA inspector boyfriend but no sparks ever ignite.