At 86, Clint Eastwood doesn’t have much time left for frills or over-elaboration, a great benefit to viewers of his latest directorial effort, “Sully.”
Speaking of people who know how to land the damn plane, there’s Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger (Tom Hanks), who you’ll remember as the pilot of US Airways Flight 1549, the aircraft that made a successful water landing on the Hudson River in 2009. Sully is joined in the cockpit by Jeff Skiles (Aaron Eckhart, who probably could have powered the Airbus to safety with his robust push broom mustache).
From about 2,800 feet in the air, the whole crash comes down to two words exchanged between the pilot and his first mate: “Birds.” “Whoa.” The engines are shot, the plane goes down. Given the total duration of the flight was a mere 208 seconds, how do you fill the rest of a feature length film? Eastwood crafts a straightforward but multilayered flashback structure.
On the ground Sully receives a hero’s welcome that, in a culture of media saturation, feels more like a punishment. Sully is forced to stay at a Marriott on Times Square and, when he goes out for a jog, he must flee the paparazzi in the only clothing he has after losing his luggage in the Hudson – workout attire from K-Mart.
“Sully” is a well-done look at the bottom of the Great Recession, when money was so tight that at least 155 people had no choice but to fly from La Guardia to Charlotte on US Airways. Even Sully has financial trouble – his wife Lorraine (Laura Linney) adds to his stress level by calling to remind him that their rental property is sitting empty. Sully cuts a rather forlorn figure, with his flip phone, clunky class ring and staid US Airways blazer, so pressed for time he has to eat a tuna sandwich from the airport gift shop.
The film also subtly addresses the legacy of 9/11 when it shows New Yorkers watching the plane lose altitude amidst the skyscrapers – their minds go blank with fear of another terror attack.
Much of the narrative focuses on the National Transportation Safety Board and its investigation of the crash.
Their computer simulations showed the plane could have theoretically turned back to La Guardia and made it. But, as Jeff says, “they’re playing Pac-Man,” not sitting in a cockpit responsible for what Sully calls the “souls aboard.” And it’s rather frustrating that, despite a thorough grilling of the pilots, the NTSB never does unravel the mystery of what kind of name Chesley is.
Hanks is expectedly excellent though it does take a while to get over the disappointment that Eastwood doesn’t take on the role of Sully himself (given that they’re both tall, steely gentleman approached later in life by the California Republican party to run for public office). But you do see a little of the director when Sully squints and explains, in the face of digital simulations of the flight, that he “eyeballed” the landing.
Through Sully’s eyes the four minutes of Flight 1549 happen over and over again – the past isn’t ever past. At the end of the film, listening to the full black box transcript uninterrupted, you feel how 208 seconds can be your whole life.
‘Sully’ is playing at Sonoma Cinemas 9. Showtimes at cinemawest.com.
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