FLIGHT RISK: Gibson’s Return Nosedives

By Harrison J. Bahe

In this high-stakes suspense thriller, Academy Award® nominee Mark Wahlberg (Actor in a Supporting Role, 2006 — The Departed) plays a pilot transporting an Air Marshal (Michelle Dockery) accompanying a fugitive (Topher Grace) to trial. As they cross the Alaskan wilderness, tensions soar and trust is tested, as not everyone on board is who they seem.

Mel Gibson has been quiet these past few years due in part to his Anti-Semitic tirades and abusive behavior toward women. In a lot of ways, Hollywood has blacklisted the actor/director and he’s been cast in mainly direct-to-streaming drivel and low budget theatrical outings. Gibson is somewhat making a return to the limelight with his newest film Flight Risk. Which, I’m sorry to say, may go down as Gibson’s worst film to date. Which is a shame because Gibson has some amazing films under his directorial belt such as Braveheart, The Passion of the Christ, Apocalypto, and Hacksaw Ridge. It’s sad to see such a celebrated directed with such a diverse filmography fall so low.

First off, let’s address the elephant in the room: the hair choices for Mark Wahlberg. In a world where memes are born the instant something hilarious appears in the media, it might not have been a wise idea to give your well-known lead actor a bald cap and a thick Southern accent. There’s no doubt that Wahlberg had his fun with the character, but the look of the character is so off putting and unintentionally funny looking that it was hard to consider the man a threat at all. He does do some heinous things, yes. I’ll give him that but most of the time, it’s him just making elaborately worded threats with only hints of his sadism floating to the top. Not to mention his hilariously over-the-top demise in the third act. It made this film critic laugh out loud as opposed to cheering for the villain’s end.

The film feels incredibly outdated and features multiple clichés that would have felt right at home in a direct-to-video release in the early 2000’s. Whether this was Gibson’s intention or not remains to be seen but when the director has multiple winners in his filmography, one certainly must wonder at some of the directorial choices made here. The humor is also misplaced. Topher Grace seems to be channeling his inner Eric Forman from That 70’s Show. He drops ill timed jokes that just don’t land. If the characters in the show aren’t amused by his attempts at humor, the audience certainly isn’t and since the humor doesn’t work, this action/thriller film feels tonally uneven.

Flight Risk felt off right in the opening scenes which featured a 100% artificially intelligent generated image of a snowy motel in the Alaskan wilderness. That, paired with the ill-timed jokes dropped by Topher Grace’s character, set the tone for what the rest of the film would be, and it never quite took off beyond that. There is a very specific audience for this film that would certainly appreciate the general badness of the film to burn some time in a dark cinema for 100 minutes. Kudos to them! Oh, how the mighty have fallen. I can only imagine that any financiers were nervous to fund such a controversial director like Mel Gibson, but it was nice to see the credit for his return to the director’s chair, despite the film being a smear on his otherwise legendary filmography. It’s an uneven action/thriller featuring a funny looking villainous Mark Wahlberg who’s clearly having fun with the demented role of a balding southern assassin and may very well be the first bad movie of 2025, which is why I give Flight Risk:

2 Ambulances out of 5

Flight Risk has been Rated R for Language and Violence by the Motion Picture Association of America.