One of the very few slightly more unexpected moments of Sully are right in the beginning. And for a while seems a slightly more linear approach to telling the story has been ditched to try to hide the simplistic nature of the film.
Tom Hanks plays real life hero Chesley Sullenberger in Clint Eastwood‘s latest, Sully. Tom Hanks rarely acts badly and he does well here too, and compared with Wikipedia’s record of the real events, seems Clint Eastwood tried to stay fairly faithful to the ‘original story’, at least how it is remembered today.
One of the better parts of the film is probably Aaron Eckhart‘s role as Sully’s co-pilot. Apart from that, the film’s unavoidable and predictable outcome without any real glitches make it a bit uninteresting.
The film very much brings to mind Denzel Washington‘s Flight, which is not stuck following a true story, and thus has much more freedom with the story line. And perhaps rightly for that reason it is also much more interesting, even if it also has its own problems.
Sully was, however, still entertaining and maybe thanks to fairly short running time, Tom Hanks managed just about to keep the story together. I would have expected much more from Clint Eastwood though.
The miraculous nature of the real emergency landing, and the exceptional character of Chesley Sullenberger, are maybe those situations where real life is more amazing than fiction. However, a good film requires a bit more and that is what the film makers seemed to have forgotten. Or maybe they were just blinded by the real events.
I didn’t mean to sound quite so negative as I did watch the whole film and did mostly enjoy it. Do judge for yourself and at least check out a few trailers. If in doubt, read a couple of more reviews.
