Director – Roger Spottiswoode – 1990 – US – Cert. 15 – 113m
*
Reviewed in What’s On in London, January 1991.
Released on 4K UHD, Blu-ray and DVD in the UK on Monday, 7th October, 2024.
One of the most accurate ways to judge whether or not a movie is worth seeing is to look at the credits. Air America‘s director is Roger Spottiswoode, whose career has spanned such diverse movies as the gripping political thriller Under Fire (1983) and the tedious Tom Hanks and dog cop buddy movie for children Turner & Hooch (1989).
Spottiswoode has Mel Gibson heading his cast, but it isn’t a great help with a script as dire as this. Worse, Gibson these days is getting more comedy roles, and he simply isn’t as good in these as he was in more serious parts earlier in his career. Here, he plays a pilot of Air America, the secret, CIA-owned airline network which flies covert missions and goods around the Far East.
This might well have been another Under Fire, but as it stands, I’m afraid, the resemblance to Turner & Hooch is more evident. Like that film, this bores rather than entertains, lumbering along without any overall sense of structure or direction.
Worse, since this is meant to be based on a real, historical organisation, events have been reduced to fun-loving Mel and eye-in-the-sky Downey having fun with aircraft under fire over Laos.
A pity this, because the original source material, which takes the form of two books by British journalist Christopher Robbins, Air America and its predecessor The Ravens, is compelling, intelligent and well researched material.
Little details have made the transition, like the old air hands who let new blood fly the plane single-handed while they indulge with wax crayons and children’s colouring books in the back seat. On the other hand, the quantities of drug freights are blown up out of all proportion.
The one great – and genuinely impressive – stunt involves a giant aircraft having both wings stripped as it lands in a disused hangar. But that’s about it on the plus side. My advice: forget the film, read the books instead – they’re not only more relevant, they’re also a lot more entertaining!
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2024 retrospective note: High points of Spottiswoode’s subsequent and extremely varied career include Bond movie Tomorrow Never Dies (1997) and A Street Cat Named Bob (2016).
Coming soon: my 1990 interview with Robbins about his two books on the subject.
Trailer (4K Restoration):