Flightplan

First off, I loved "Panic Room" and Jodie Foster's performance in it. When I first saw the looks of this film, I was very intrigued and thought it was going to be a "The Forgotten 2"....i was very wrong.

What starts off is with Jodie Foster playing a mourning mother after the death of her husband. Her and her daughter catch a flight to go stay with Foster's grandparents, however, after Jodie's character falls asleep, the daughter is gone....and to make matters worst, she is told that she never existed...

Sounds like a good premise eh? Well that's what infused me to go and see it. It starts off well but once the daughter goes missing, it went downhill. Jodie's performance throughout is good, not Oscar worthy but it is one of the highlights of the film (as well as the ever-cool Sean Bean.) Unfortunately I can't go into great depth of anything else of the story because of spoilers, but I will say that the ending plot is horrible, totally impossible and so therefore ruins the impact of the film and its good beginning.

There are also a lot of other things that annoy me about the film, to cut a long list short here are some examples: - a brilliant, new state of the art plane...and there's hardly anyone on board.

• Foster's character, although confused and frustrated does get annoying after a bit, and seeing as w're meant to identify and sympathise with her, is not a good thing.

• The overall twist / ending plot is ridiculous, as I stated before.

My vote is 6/10....go see the film for the enjoyment of Jodie Foster and some thrills. however, do not expect a masterpiece..because this is FAR from great.

You can't say there's a movie like it really. Had a bit more leg work been done at the start, I think it would have even been better too.

I'm trying to think if this required more suspension of disbelief than a normal movie in the genre, and I think it's probably on par; whereas other flight thriller type stuff depends on the viewer on suspending it in other areas, this is more wild, sure, but also far more interesting.

"Flightplan" seems to have affected IMDb contributors like no other film in recent memory. Mostly is bad. We didn't catch up with this picture until recently. Frankly, we are puzzled as to why the hatred. Granted, the film had the potential for being better, but it's not the total failure as some of the comments in this forum will make one believe. It appears there's an agenda to mark "Flightplan" comments as not useful.

Director Robert Schwentke working with Peter Dowling and Billy Ray's screen play, hasn't added much to the film in order to make it a thriller to be reckoned with, but, in general, the film is not a total waste, as seems to be the perception among contributors.

In a way, "Flightplan" plays with the viewer's perception as to who is behind the disappearance of Julia, the six year old girl traveling with her mother, Kyle, to New York. Kyle has suffered a great tragedy in her life when her husband was found dead in her building's courtyard. The fact that Kyle hasn't been able to accept the death is clear in the first sequence when we see her sitting inside the Alexanderplaz metro station in Berlin.

Kyle, an aircraft designing engineer, is a good mother. One can imagine her panic when she wakes up from a nap to find Julia's gone. No one seems to have noticed the little girl; there is no record of she ever been on board. Kyle meets resistance from the crew of the flight. Even the sky marshal, Carson, is no help at all. What's a mother to do? If one is in Kyle's shoes, one starts taking matter into her own hands.

Jodie Foster does a good job portraying Kyle. She is a mother who doesn't take no for an answer. In fact, she is the one that unravels the mystery surrounding her daughter's disappearance. The climax sequence is perfectly set, as one would expect it to be.

Peter Sarsgaard, is Carson, the sky marshal traveling in the economy section. He is in charge of the safety of the passengers on the flight. In an unusual role for him, Mr. Sarsgaard has some good chances in the movie. Sean Bean plays the pilot of the jumbo jet. Kate Beahan is seen as one of the flight attendants. Erika Christiensen is also part of the crew.

The best way to enjoy the film is not to compare it to anything else and just go for the entertaining value in it because we know this is not a ground breaking film, but thanks to Mr. Schwentke and his cast, it offers us a bumpy ride of a film.

Jodie Foster is terrific as usual playing recently-widowed aircraft engineer and mother of a solemn little girl who is faced with terror and dread while on a flight from Germany to New York: her daughter vanishes and no one on-board will admit to ever having seen her. Unintentionally or not, the film takes its cue from the cult classic "Bunny Lake is Missing", but then goes its own way for a compelling second-half. The script is carefully plotted, hedging no bets and leaving no stone unturned, and that may be its only fault: the plot is so smoothly planned and drawn out for us that it loses some intensity. Ironically, the opening (with Foster making burial arrangements in regards to her husband, and later feeling watched from her apartment window) are spookily dream-like, but the director becomes much more sober once the action moves to the plane, and yet his film could really use more of that surreal, what's-going-on ambiance he initially captured so succinctly. Still, a first-rate picture with excellent performances by everyone, down to the last two-line player. *** from ****

You ever have that film where you see it in the video store many years ago but have no idea what the film is? Then that very same film shows up in a bargain bin and you pick it up just based on the description on the back? Well, probably not, but that's my background of this film. To my surprise, this film is one great suspenseful ride. I love films that have you guessing right from the very beginning but never to the extent where you are disinterested. What helps with that is the unique premise and great cast. Jodie Foster brings her daughter on a plane from Berlin to New York and falls asleep, but as she wakes up, she discovers that her daughter is missing and may have never even gone on the plane. This film plays with the "unreliable narrator" technique, where you don't know if the story that is unfolding is based on the reality of the passengers or the reality inside Jodie Foster's. The answer may shock you. The best way to find that answer is to watch the film. It's a hidden gem.