Executive Decision

Suspense at 33,000 feet with Kurt Russell

An intelligence analyst (Russell) inadvertently joins a special forces operation to save a Boeing 747-200 hijacked by terrorists before it is used to attack DC. Steven Seagal plays the mission commander, Halle Berry a flight attendant and Oliver Platt an aeronautics engineers, amongst other notables.

“Executive Decision” (1996) is an airliner-in-trouble flick from the angle of “Under Siege” (1992) directed by the editor of “Die Hard 2” (1990). I bring up the latter because this one’s very similar except that it takes place in the air rather than an airport.

I didn’t expect to like it because it’s basically “Die Hard” on a plane and I didn’t think a worthwhile movie could be made with such a cramped setting, but work it does. Sure, a lot of the runtime involves rescuers strategizing in the bowels of the airbus using hi-tech equipment, like hidden cameras, but the creators respect the intelligence of the viewer and there are several innovative bits along with great suspense.

It was obviously prescient of 9/11, filmed six years prior to that infamous attack.

The movie runs 2 hours, 13 minutes, and was shot in SoCal at Norton Air Force Base, San Bernardino, but also Chino Airport, Mojave Desert (crash scene), Sierra Madre (Chechen Mafia House). The wedding kidnapping sequence was shot in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

GRADE: B