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FLIGHT OF THE PHOENIX Send This Review to a Friend
There’s no point at all to remaking the 1965 film directed by Robert Aldrich. The new version is a dud, from the time the plane crashes to its being reconditioned for a flight to survival for those still alive. “The Flight of the Phoenix,” this time directed by John Moore and written by Scott Frank and Edward Burns based on Lukas Heller’s screenplay and Elleston Trevor’s novel, is grounded by clichés.
The cast is headed by Dennis Quaid as Frank Towns, the pilot, who is sent to Mongolia to pick up personnel connected with a failed oil exploration. Cockily ignoring a storm, Towns subjects everyone to danger and the plane crashes in the Gobi Desert. (The earlier film had the plane going down in the Sahara).
From then on the quest is for survival, with personality clashes, water shortage, food shortage, but most of all, credibility shortage. Miranda Otto plays Kelly, the woman who resisted shutting down the oil rig and starts off clashing with Towns. It’s a very boring performance involving a boring character.
Giovanni Ribisi plays Elliott, who boasts of his aircraft knowledge and takes over in the effort to fashion a plane out of what’s left after the crash. Will it take off? Will the hostile tribe closing in on the survivors reach them first? Will anybody care? A 20th Century Fox release.
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