Turbulent Skies

Anchor Bay Entertainment

R4 DVD

Everyone loves a good disaster film and this will keep your adrenalin flowing, Sure, it’s a bit cheesy in places and the plot is a bit unimpressive, but it’s all very well done. We start with a stern warning that many air crashes are caused by pilot error, and to highlight this point we get a spectacular air emergency followed by a fiery crash. It’s a good start and sets the scene well.

Cut to Devain Industries, who are launching their CD70 computerised aircraft controller to shareholders and the military. This should remove pilot error by removing the pilot, and we just know that it’s going to fail. The programming was done by a husband and wife team played by Casper Van Dien and Nicole Eggert. Unbeknownst to them the company owner’s brash and arrogant son (played well by Patrick Muldoon, so well that you would love to knock his teeth in and take the slimy grin off his face) has had some programmer cronies modify the program to personalise it more in his image. They have managed to accidentally introduce a virus in the system.

The team is horrified when Mr Devain announces that the first test flight will carry passengers – the shareholders and military men who have just gone through the presentation. At least there will be two pilots on board, just in case.

The CD70 unit fails when the virus kicks in, the plane heads off course towards a massive electrical storm, and it will crash on Cleveland. The pilots are locked out of the system (indeed, knocked out – the CD70 apparently has some sort of defence mechanism added). Tom (the male programmer) simulates the problem on the ground and works out a solution but there is nobody on the plane who can fix it. He must go up in a stealth fighter conveniently fitted with a connecting tube that just happens to fit a hatch in the airliner, get to the cockpit and cut the wire that will disable the CD70. Then they have to get down again. If his mission doesn’t succeed the Air Force will shoot down the airliner before it gets near Cleveland

The tension builds as problem piles on top of problem. It’s all very skilfully done and you will be on the edge of your seat for a long while. This film will never class as a blockbuster, but as a budget release it’s pretty good.

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