Movie Review: "Flight"

"Flight": B+.  We are introduced to Whip Whitaker (Denzel Washington) by watching him guzzling room temperature beer and snorting coke in his hotel room within minutes of being awakened by an early morning phone call from his ex-wife.  They are arguing over their teenage son, with whom Whip has had little contact since the divorce.  The timing is particularly bad for Whip, as his much younger girl friend Katerina (Nadine Velazquez) is putting on her clothes, not bothering to seek the privacy of the bathroom.  We think to ourselves, "This guy is a swinger who walks on the wild side."  That first impression is quickly adjusted when, moments later, Whip exits his room and swaggers down the hall.  He is wearing the uniform of an airplane pilot, and he's got a flight to catch at the Orlando airport.  He is Captain Whip Whitaker.  When he boards the flight on the way to the cockpit he is greeted by a sharply dressed flight attendant, none other than Katerina.

We know from the coming attractions and TV promos that this short Orlando to Atlanta flight is doomed, and that were it not for the skill and courage of Captain Whit, all of those aboard the flight would perish.  Knowing this ahead of time does not in any way diminish for us the nail-biting tension and thrill of watching what transpires on board.  Director Robert Zemeckis makes us feel like we are on board too.  We also realize, if we are capable of thinking about anything else in the heat of the moment, that the star of this movie is Washington.  Zemeckis is not going to bump him off in the first twenty minutes of the story.  However, the ensuing crash is not without fatalities.  The NTSB is going to investigate, and that spells trouble for Whit, who wakes up in a hospital wearing bandages over his face and IV hook-ups to his arm.  He finds out later that his blood has been drawn and tested while he lay unconscious in the hospital.

While the plane is in mid-air, but before the crash, the camera switches briefly to the poor side of Atlanta, where another druggie, Nicole (Kelly Reilly), desperately needs money to pay her rent and to satisfy her narcotic craving.  She'll take her money any way she can get it, but draws the line when a porn producer offers her a gig.  When she ODs after injecting herself, she ends up in the same hospital as Whit.  They meet each other in a stairwell, where they have gone to momentarily escape detection while they have a cigarette or two.

Back to Whit's situation.  He soon realizes that not only is his flying career in jeopardy, but he faces criminal prosecution, with life jail term possibilities, for flying the plane while under the influence of alcohol and drugs.  The pilots' union has a representative (Bruce Greenwood) to help him, and a lawyer (Don Cheadle) to find legal loopholes to make things as tough as possible for the NTSB investigation.  Their strategy is to blame the airplane manufacturer for the crash.  "The plane quit working in mid-air."  The union rep and the lawyer are needed, but a third aid is the only one Whip totally trusts, Harling Mays (John Goodman), who is a combination wing man, drug supplier, body guard and hippie mystic.  Once again - - and this is about the third or fourth time I've written this in 2012 - - Goodman steals every scene he's in.

What the union rep and the lawyer don't know initially is that Whip is an alcoholic.  What happens when they, or the NTSB, find out?  Will Whip lose his wings?  Will he do hard time?  Can he stay sober long enough to get through the NTSB investigation?  Can Nicole help him, or are her own problems insurmountable?

Most movies featuring an alcoholic as the protagonist have a fine line to tread.  The alcohol abuse needs to rear its ugly head enough times for the viewer to appreciate the sadness and severity of the problem.  Yet, once that realization is instilled in the collective awareness of the audience, the point does not need to be further hammered home.  We almost get to that point in Flight, and indeed, maybe Zemeckis is guilty of crossing it.  Nevertheless, I found enough other aspects of the movie laudable so that, in my view, the movie succeeds.  Foremost among them is the stellar acting performance by Denzel Washington.  As a pilot, a playboy, a liar or a lush, Washington becomes his character. The supporting cast delivers too.  Reilly's role calls for her to be pretty enough to be tempting, but sometimes gaunt and disheveled when she is high.  Cheadle nails it as the union attorney. He is not afraid to tackle the NTSB, and gives advise to his client, Whip, which is practical and legally sound.  He has to be careful not to violate the lawyer's Professional Code of Ethics, providing Whip an aggressive defense without literally telling Whip to lie. There is one scene where the attorney witnesses an illegal operation (payment to a drug dealer), but manages to keep his involvement indirect.

Flight raises serious questions involving morality and ethics.  The question that keeps coming up, and which Whip himself asks, is this: If anyone else had been in the pilot's chair for that fateful flight, would there be any survivors?  If the answer is "unlikely," does that excuse him from driving drunk?  You will have to see this movie to find out how the obvious answer is determined.  Don't count on seeing it as part of the on-board entertainment on your next Delta flight.