(Photo Credit: Vertical Entertainment)
(“Fight or Flight” trailer courtesy of Vertical)
To paraphrase media mogul and Pro Football Hall of Famer Shannon Sharpe, Ghost from “Power.”
Ghost from “Takers.”
Casper the Friendly Ghost.
“Fight or Flight” gets two crowns.
In the James Madigan-directed movie “Fight or Flight,” a mythical terrorist nicknamed The Ghost is crippling nations and global industries.
The Ghost has single-handedly destroyed certain nations’ gross domestic product with their acts of terrorism.
If order is to be restored, special ops must eliminate the threat known as The Ghost.
But how does an agency do that if they do not even know what the terrorist looks like?
With The Ghost dismantling all opposition in “Fight or Flight,” a mercenary is needed to eliminate the threat once and for all.
But the one mercenary who can get the job done is an alcoholic and former CIA agent who has vowed to avoid his past life by any means necessary.
“Fight or Flight” begins, not surprisingly, aboard an airplane.
But this is not any ordinary flight.
This flight is complete with beatdowns and people falling from the sky.
It is complete mayhem.
The movie then rewinds to before the fateful flight when The Ghost’s operations become too big to ignore.
Although The Ghost has remained elusive, Katherine Brunt (Katee Sackhoff) knows whom she must persuade to return to work in order to finally bring down the international terrorist, whose name is Lucas Reyes (Josh Hartnett).
Persuading him might take a little creativity, though.
But she is determined to get her man, come hell or high water.
Katherine first tries to reach her favorite mercenary via his cell phone.
But when Reyes sees her number come up on his cell phone, saved under an expletive, he tries to ignore it.
When Katherine cannot have a decent conversation with Reyes via cell phone, she instead calls the landline of the bar that he is currently getting wasted in.
Still, Reyes is not interested in the mission.
As a result, Katherine sends some very nice gentlemen into the establishment to talk to him, physically.
However, for someone who makes a living by kicking tail and killing, a few nice gentlemen might still not persuade Reyes to take the job.
Tired of the shenanigans, Reyes finally listens to what Katherine has to offer.
Katherine tells Reyes about all the upheaval The Ghost is causing around the globe.
Intelligence shows that The Ghost will be on a flight from Bangkok to San Francisco that very day.
Katherine wants Reyes to board that flight and apprehend The Ghost before the criminal gets off the airplane in “The Golden State.”
There is only one major conundrum, however.
Back in the day, Katherine put Reyes on a no-fly list, meaning he cannot travel via airplane and cannot obtain a passport.
The good thing about being a major government official is that they can make sure a person can skip a line whenever they want and obtain any government document that they need.
Despite the hookup, Reyes still must rush to make his flight.
He must identify the faceless terrorist known as The Ghost.
And he must do so drunk as a skunk, as is his habit.
Hopefully, a lack of sobriety will not prevent the mission from becoming successful because Reyes has handled everything Katherine has thrown at him in the past, even though he was drunk.
But one curveball that comes Reyes’ way is the fact that the airplane is filled with cold, calculated and contract killers who also want to apprehend The Ghost.
Although Reyes should have had a fairly easy mission, when someone puts a $10 million bounty on The Ghost’s head, everyone and their Mama wants a piece of the invisible hell raiser.
What ensues is what one would think from an action film set 37,000 feet in the air.
Unfortunately, “Fight or Flight” is a little too cheesy.
Therefore, it does not make good on the twists and turns that the movie possesses, which are the positive attributes of “Fight or Flight.”
The movie “Fight or Flight” is suitable.
Unfortunately, it drops at a time when Hollywood is on a hot streak with “Sinners” and “Thunderbolts.”
As a result, other films might get lost in the shuffle.
“Fight or Flight” is fun enough to check out, though.
The characters are all bada$$es, especially Reyes and Isha (Charithra Chandran).
In “Fight or Flight,” Isha is thrust into the mayhem out of nowhere.
She is a flight attendant who might become the best “fight attendant.”
But the fighting scenes are entertaining even though they may be unrealistic, as are many action movies, because the hero hardly ever loses a fight or dies.
However, the lack of realism does not stop Hartnett from being totally understandable as Reyes.
The mercenary desperately wants to live a normal, stress-free life.
Unfortunately, to escape his past, Reyes must smother his sorrows in liquor.
If he does not conquer that vice, his health might make it impossible to live a normal life if given the chance.
But his talents and skillset refuse to give him that chance at normalcy.
He kills people and beats people up for a living.
That is what Reyes is good at.
The key to his dilemma is finding some good in what he is good at, even if it causes a little destruction in the process.
The dilemma for Madigan is finding a place for his Ghost when Hollywood has given us so many better Ghosts in recent years.
REGAL RATINGS
FOUR CROWNS=EXCELLENT
THREE CROWNS=GOOD
TWO CROWNS=AVERAGE
ONE CROWN=POOR
