Air Marshal

I briefly looked at the other user comments for this movie before posting my own. Yes, this is too close to EXECUTIVE DECISION for its own good. Yes, there are laughable bits like how they misspell a certain country's name in the first few minutes. And there are other things, like how the terrorist's activities are a bit too uncomfortably close to what has happened in real life. Plus there's the fact that much of the movie is shot with a jiggly camera to simulate turbulence I guess, but is VERY distracting. The movie is full of flaws, yes. But at the same time, I can't say I was BORED with this movie. The bad parts of the movie are often entertaining in their own right. And there are some action sequences (like hand-to-hand combat) that aren't that badly done. This movie is probably too flawed to actively seek out, but if you come across it on a slow day, it just may make 90 or so minutes pass by.

Okay now, I've read all the other commentaries here on IMDb, and I can conclude that all positive reviews come from people in the US (who appear to think that ANY movie concerning killing Arab-types can't be a bad movie) and/or women that squirm by the sight of this joke of a lead, this Prescott-figure.

People, this movie sucks. I hope they stored it in a safe place, because of you'd leave this movie uncovered in an open field, it would create a black hole. Honestly.

The acting... WHAT acting? The special effects... Did they use MS-PAINT to make that "plane"? - The inaccuracy where it comes to armed forces, procedures, flying an airplane... The crew on this movie could not even portray someone blinking, even if they tried hard.

Too bad you can't vote for NO stars whatsoever.

Others have already pointed to the stereotypes in connection with 9/11. I will focus on tech details of the aircraft. An American crew that operates a simulated (Russian) Tupolev 134 with a Bulgarian registration! They even had an elevator in the plane to make the audience believe this was a 747. The designer of the cockpit must have been either delirious or suffer from another major psychiatric disorder. That also goes for the special effects people. The airplane movements were totally unrealistic and probably the result of a doped flight simulator sequence. The film was aired by a commercial TV-station. It was enough to switch off after 10 minutes. It couldn't be more incredible.

AIR MARSHAL is one of those movies that not only insults your intelligence, but it dares you to care. Not only does the screenplay play on 9/11, even having a character use the line "Let's roll", but I have not seen this much plot contrivances in a long, long time. Truly an awful movie, only saved (if you can call it that) by its audacity to be exploitative, stupid, and at the same time, convoluted up to a point where you just have to shake your head in dismay.

And would someone please tell B-movie filmmakers to stop using cheap-looking CGI models? If they can't afford actual props, shouldn't they steer their screenplays AWAY from films that requires them?

There are bad movies and then there are bad movies. AIR MARSHAL is just...bad.

2 out of 10

(go to www.nixflix.com for a more detailed review of this film)

Pretty lame excuse for a thriller. This is one of those films where you spot fake accents, spot continuity gaffes and watch bad acting and corny lines. Working like Bruckheimer with no money, Air Marshal struggles to do too much with too little. The real question is, why do low-budget filmmakers try to make huge action pictures that they can't possibly afford the effects and actors for? Why not make a talking heads movie with ideas and art involved? I guess that would be asking too much.

This will never open in theaters, so go to a video store and dig around in a few years, you'll find it there.