Maybe I was in a forgiving mood, but I didn't think 'Panic In The Skies!' - exclamation! - was that bad. On a sliding scale for plane-disaster movies, it was somewhere near the top. The cliches, given that the genre demands at least a few, were limited: nobody had a mobile phone easily at hand (Airspeed), and there were no pilots (Rough Air), doctors, or nuns with guitars among the passengers. Nor were ground control on hand to help. There was the lone child, the pregnant woman and/or newly pregnant stewardess, plus the elderly couple, but I would have started to get really nervous without some familiar stereotypes. What about the Bar-B-Pilots, though, or the dog attack in the cargo hold? And for the 'stewardess who holds it all together before falling in love with the conman hero', we got 'stewardess who falls to pieces' as a bonus package (normally the hero pilot's role). How's that for equality? The computer graphics let the climax down a little, but all in all, I really didn't end up cringing in my seat (see Final Descent, and its train sequel, Final Run. Guffaw, snort).
Review of Panic in the Skies
