Fight or Flight

by Mike McGranaghan

Do you want to see Josh Hartnett running through an airplane, killing bad guys with a chainsaw? The logical answer is yes. (If, by some chance, your answer is no, my next question is: What’s wrong with you?) The actor had a career resurgence with last year’s Trap, in which he gave a wonderfully unhinged performance. In this new picture, he’s even more wonderfully unhinged.

Hartnett plays Lucas Reyes, a former Secret Service agent who had a violent psychotic breakdown and has been living in exile ever since. He receives a phone call from his former boss Katherine Brunt (Katee Sackoff). A suspected terrorist known as “the Ghost” is going to be on an international flight. She wants him to board the plane, figure out which passenger is the Ghost, and bring them back to the United States. Once on board, Lucas discovers that he’s not the only mercenary there. Violent mayhem quickly breaks out. Flight attendant Isha (Charithra Chandran) assists in dealing with the increasingly aggressive situation.

Fight or Flight is in the same category as movies like Bullet Train and Kill, in that its sole purpose is to offer insane fight sequences inside the cramped confines of public transportation. Director James Madigan stages the action with a rapid pace and a sense of visual style. Watching Lucas run up and down the airplane’s aisles, jump over seats, and beat the stuffing out of a bad guy in a small private room is incredibly entertaining. This movie is pure energy.

Hartnett is the engine that drives it. He plays up Lucas’s wild personality in a way that often produces big laughs. There’s a playfulness to his performance. The character gets off on unleashing his violent side, so there’s plenty of room for Hartnett to go broad. Even in the non-action sequences, he brings a charmingly off-kilter vibe to Lucas, getting us to care about him despite his propensity for bloodshed. Sometimes you can tell when a performer is genuinely having fun with a role. This is one of those times, and the fun is infectious.

The action is hardcore but still carried out with great humor. Certain scenes – like Lucas mowing down killers with that chainsaw – are so knowingly outrageous that you can’t help giggling with delight. There are two instances where the plot introduces very serious ideas that really don’t fit with the otherwise lighthearted anarchic tone. (Adolescent sex trafficking? Yikes!) Fortunately, it doesn’t take long for the movie to swerve back into the goofy/bloody chaos that represents its true reason for being.

Fight or Flight is the sort of adrenalized entertainment that leaves you all whooped up when it’s over.

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