Turbulência 3

I have to admit that I only caught the last half of this movie on cable, but I liked what I saw. John Mann is a capable stand-in (at least visually) for the Alice Cooper-wannabe set, plus (with the aid of stand-ins, no doubt) he gets to kick the bejeezus out of his "evil twin" terrorist enemy and save the day. Say what you will about the "evil influence" of rock 'n' roll music-- this time the rock star is a good guy, and John Mann does the role proud.

This movie is a truckload of great ideas bogged down in a morass of hokey execution. Production values are ok, the film quality is _great_, but the dialogue is stilted and camera work mundane. There is also very little plot. It also seems to be a showcase of actors who's careers have been or could have been. Rutger Hauer, Gabrielle Anwar, Joe Mantegna, Craig Sheffer, the little baldish tv director who used to play hitmen (including on the episode "Bushido" of Miami Vice).

PROS:

Concept: a Marilyn Manson type gothic (-ish) rocker has organized a concert in the sky, complete with mock executions and The Hitcher is your co-pilot. (But wait, a gang of _real_ satanists want to hijack the plane and crash it into an unknown town in Kansas... )

Monika Schnarre, who must be one of the most beautiful women on earth. I'd never heard of her, and she's already 30? Maybe it's just the razor sharp cheek bones, strong chin, the red hair and the fact that she's covered head to toe in black leather...

Gabrielle Anwar, who is hot although not quite up to her more youthful standard of Body Snatchers (1993 - what happened to _her_ career?).

Rutger Hauer seems to be having a good time reliving his Hitcher days.

CONS:

Hokey

Poor dialogue

No plot to really speak of

The actors start losing the spirit halfway through this unlikely mess, specially Gabrielle Anwar and Joe Mantegna.

Church of the Stull?

The movie has a distinctively Canadian feel to it.

The bizarre pitch for this airborne thriller is Passenger 57 (1992) starring Marilyn Manson. It involves a controversial heavy metal group performing an internet-streamed gig aboard a jumbo jet, co-piloted by Rutger Hauer, that's hijacked by Satanists.

Screenwriter Wade Ferley clearly had no shortage of ideas, the problem is he didn't know how to develop them and so the film skitters between several characters involved with or observing the unfolding mayhem.

Despite all the onboard chaos, much of the time is spent with additional characters on the ground. A pointless sub-plot involves a Clarice Starling-style FBI agent tracking down a notorious computer hacker and other scenes involve Joe Mantegna.

Director Jorge Montesi has an extensive history in television and a handful of features under his belt. Unfortunately his experience fails to give the film anything more than a cheap TV movie feel. Locations are suspiciously absent of extras and very bland to look at, while the principle cast members spend the majority of the time in separate locations from which the fail to venture far from.

An early indication of budgetary limitations is the opening sequence. Craven is identified as this fictional world's Marilyn Manson, a character whose popularity is equalled only by his controversial status. Greeting him at the airport are his legion of dedicated fans and protesters clearly representing the religious right. But either side's numbers are so few it's difficult to suspend disbelief and enter into the story.

However, once you accept its limitations of budget and scale, Turbulence 3 becomes a fun thrill ride surpassing the majority of Airport (1969) clones. While its use of air disaster clichés, such as the on-board threat, communications with the tower/ground authorities and the final landing sequence (followed by the shot of emergency vehicles and survivors exiting the plane), place it within a specific genre, it's cultural themes to mark is very much as a film of it's time. It has a unique identity and it's trying to capture the zeitgeist; it just does it badly.

This is one of those movies in which there are plenty of familiar faces and names, but none of these are the main characters. Many in Turbulence 3's supporting cast have a history in the air disaster genre. Craig Sheffer returns from Turbulence 2: Fear of Flying (1999) but portrays a different character, unconvincingly cast as a hippie hacker. Sheffer and co-star Gabrielle Anwar and Rutger Hauer were also together in Flying Virus (also made in 2001) and he completed a quadrilogy of air disasters with TV movie Cabin Pressure (2002). Co-star Joe Mantegna had earlier appeared in Airspeed (1998).

The most complex sequences take place aboard the plane and feature none of the headlined stars. Unknown John Mann got a chance to shine in the dual role of Slade Craven and his psychotic doppelgänger. Craven is not as embarrassingly cartoonish as he could have been and Mann makes the role his own, exploring not only the public and private dimension of the rock star, but also his truly deranged double - enhanced with a vocal dub.

Mann, who performs 2 mediocre tracks as Craven, does a good job in stripping away the theatrical aspect of his character without ever removing his make-up. Unfortunately the impact is undermined by a late moment where our mock-satanic hero takes a moment to pray, as if to confirm he is indeed a good man.

The starring role in Turbulence 3 didn't do much for Mann's career. He eventually made it to the higher profile films in roles such as as "bouncer" in Catwoman (2004), "convict" in The Chronicles of Riddick (2004) and "Viking doctor" in Pathfinder (2007).

I suppose the main question is why Rutger Hauer's even in this film, playing a role that could have been played by literally anyone and only interacting with about two other cast members throughout the entire running time. But never mind.

Yes. Turbulence 3, then. Here's the story: a Goth rocker holds a live Internet-broadcast concert on a plane, but gets himself knocked out and replaced by a conveniently identical Satanic terrorist who wants to crash the plane into Kansas, leaving him to struggle free, fight his way through the other terrorists, clear his name and save everyone on board. Yes, the hero of this film is a skinny death rocker in full Goth make-up, whose only allies are a hacker and Gabrielle Anwar as the world's least convincing FBI agent several hundred miles away.

Sound good? Go ahead, watch it - it's appalling, and tries to serve up all the very worst Hollywood cliches as if they were ingredients in a full gourmet meal. Where's Ray Liotta when you need him?

Of the less-than-constructive criticism out there, it seems wholly ignored that the premise of the film is Aircraft + Hijack as in the other turbulence films. The concert aboard the plane definitely isn't a cliché and can not be detrimental to the plot even in theory. Speaking of which, the plot has lovely twists and turns even though people that decide to dislike the film before it even begins may be forgiven for ignoring the finer details.

Personally I like the film more for its style rather than grue value, if such a thing applies.

Regards, Slade