Having just seen the move Flight recently, I can say that I was truly immersed in this movie all the way throughout the film. The way that the film took an unexpected turn, surprised its captive audience. Denzel Washington was brilliant throughout the film – whether he was portraying a self-confident pilot or else a down fallen has-been.
The movie did a lot to contribute to the emotions belonging to the script. Songs such as “Alcohol” and “Going down” made the audience fully aware of the state of mind of the main actor, Denzel Washington, the pilot. From the beginning of the movie we are aware that the pilot has a problem, perhaps more than one. The main source of his problems is his abuse of alcohol apart from his casual relationships and laissez –faire attitude. The music seems to go along with the film’s emotions which vary from time to time but you can sense that something terrible is about to happen very soon.
We see him consuming bottles of alcohol and later getting ready for work where he seems to be in a sober state. However, all is not as it seems. Although he seems to be sober, underneath his exterior of bravado he is stilled pissed out of his mind and he cannot function properly. We see him as a callous person who is very selfish and who only cares about his own affairs and his career. He seems to be a rising star and a person to be looked up to.
However, after the plane he is piloting makes a crash landing with dire consequences, his life takes a different turning. His lawyers insist that he did all he could to save the passengers and the plane and considering the circumstances, he did the very best he could have done. Had it not been for his instructions and commands, there would have been a much bigger disaster. And again the mystical nature of the music almost seems like a leitmotif as Denzek seems to begin realizing that he is going to get into trouble.
When all is said and done and it seems that Denzel is off the hook, he decides to confess and inform us and the court that he was drunk while piloting the flight that crash landed. He also informs us that this is not the first time that this has happened and that although, he seemed capable of taking charge, he was nonetheless drunk and passengers were putting their lives at risk every time that they flew on his plane.
Chaos reigns and everything is now turned topsy turvy because instead of being exonerated, he is now being punished and sent to jail. The hero has now become a criminal. He sees this as his just sentence for his crimes which he committed over and over again while endangering thousands of passengers’ lives every day. We go from admiring this person, to scorning him but this scorn is very short-lived and leads quickly on to pity when we realize that he has a serious problem which we see when he is left alone in his hotel room with a mini-bar. He drinks everything in the mini-bra, and when it is time for him to go to court, he is comatose with alcohol. The sensual nature of the music makes us empathies with the situation Washington faces as he descends into the maelstrom of drink and the emotion created is one of extreme sadness and empathy.
All though the movie we go through different emotions. At the beginning we tend to dismiss the Denzel as irresponsible for his relationships and the way he consumes alcohol. The later on, when we see him taking control of the plane, we admire him immensely and see him as the ideal pilot. When seeing him in court, we think that he has been wrongly accused as it seems that he had tried to do everything in his power to save his passengers and his plane. When the truth comes to light and we realize that he has been going to work subconsciously drunk, we tend to scorn him and look down on him, asking ourselves, “How can he?”
Finally when he is sent to jail and tried to reform we tend to feel as though we should encourage him and all that has gone part, including that he has been piloting his plane while under the influence, has all been forgotten when we realize that he is not the inhuman hero we thought him out to be but rather the humane person, one of us and that this is a problem which can happen easily to any one of us. This is when we realize, that like Denzel, we too are not immune.
Works Cited:
McCarthy, Todd (October 15, 2012). "Flight: New York Film Festival Review". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved October 24, 2012.
Horn, John (October 20, 2012). "How the movie 'Flight' got off the ground". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved November 4, 2012.
