Flightplan

When Stephanie is handed the flashlight to check avionics, the lamp is above her hand.

In the next shot, it is below her hand.

After Kyle is knocked down by the Arab, she has a small gash on her cheek.

When she's asking the stewardess later what part of the plane she searched, there is no sign of any injury.

The gash resurfaces later.

When the oxygen masks are hanging, the camera jostles to convey turbulence but the hanging oxygen masks hang stationary and don't move.

When Kyle is banging on the captain's door to speak to him she has her boarding pass in her right hand.

Two shots later her hand is empty.

When the French person on the screen is finished speaking, she remains there even though another language is playing.

When Carson is taking Kyle to the bathroom, they stop outside the restroom and she holds her hands up to have him unlock the cuffs.

The camera then cuts to another angle, and her hands are down.

Early in the movie when Kyle is leaving with Julia her hair is in a tight bun with no wisps loose.

In the taxi there are wisps of hair down, then at the airport her hair is back in the original (no mess) bun again.

The avionics computers shown in the film appear to be an array of Cray supercomputers in the circular configuration typically seen in a supercomputer lab.

In reality, avionics computers are small, ruggedized embedded systems which are distributed throughout the plane.

Avionics computing requires highly reliable redundant systems, not massive computing power.

A shot of the cockpit shows 2 sets of engine instruments.

When the aircraft is shown, it has 4 engines.

Throughout the film, the characters refer to the passengers leaving the plane as "deboarding".

In the airline industry, this is called "deplaning.

" Boarding a plane is called "enplaning.

" As the plane is speeding down the runway in Berlin, Kyle is seen buckling her seat belt and a flight attendant is walking down the aisle.

Air travel regulations require that seat belts be fastened before aircraft taxiing.

Flight crews are supposed to be seated and buckled in as well.

A short while after the oxygen masks come down only a few masks are still hanging.

The masks are gone and the trap doors they came out of are back up and closed.

When you see the shot of the landing gear touching down on the runway on landing, notice the aircraft does not flare.

(Flaring an aircraft means to bring the nose up on landing so that the main landing gear touches down first, then the nose gear.

If a plane lands as shown in the movie, there is a risk of the landing gear collapsing, causing the aircraft to crash.

) Over the course of the movie, Kyle's search for her daughter takes us further and further into the various compartments and holds of the aircraft, eventually taking us into areas far beneath flight deck.

The problem here is with the layout of the bowels of the aircraft.

As shown, this airliner's computer room is large and cavernous, with much empty and unused space.

In reality, virtually every square inch of any passenger liner has a purpose, and with the exception of passenger and crew areas, every other part of an airliner is unbelievably cramped, filled with cargo, electronics, hydraulics, or emergency equipment.

Such a waste of space, as depicted in this film, simply wouldn't exist.

At one point Kyle is in the galley with most of the plane's crew (at least all the ones we've been introduced to) and its captain.

The camera takes a rotating view of Kyle and at the end of its rotation on the left-hand side, the smallest bit of "untreated" green screen is visible.

The PA at the airport in Berlin welcomes the passengers to "Berlin International airport".

However, Berlin does not have one, but two international airports, Tegel and Schönefeld (and at the time of the movie, also Tempelhof), so the PA would have specified which one.

In the exterior shot at the airport you can clearly see that the "Leipzig/Halle Airport" signs at the jet bridge are pasted over because the adhesive foil color does not match exactly the color of the jet bridge.

After the plane is evacuated, Kyle figures out the scam and assumes the role of hijacker in order to thwart the real hijacker(s).

She appears to have two hostages, yet no one attempts to initiate hostage negotiations with her from outside of the plane during the whole subsequent cat-and-mouse scene.

Also, one of the "hostages" leaves and law enforcement doesn't receive her.

When the airplane is shown being "de-iced" before takeoff, it is obvious that the trucks are simply spraying soapy water all over the airplane.

Real de-icing/anti-icing fluid is applied only to the wing and tail surfaces, and would not be wasted on the passenger windows.

Furthermore, real de-icing/anti-icing fluid (treated propylene glycol) is pinkish, gooey, and very expensive.

There are no overnight flights between Berlin and New York.

Due to time changes, if a plane left Berlin at, say, 8pm, it would arrive in New York at approximately 1am.

Flights from Europe to the east coast virtually all leave in the morning to early afternoon, and arrive in the States afternoon to early evening.

When Kyle goes to talk to the captain through the cockpit door, the air Marshall pins her to the door.

Her mouth is pressed to the door near the peep hole but in the next shot, she is to the left of the peep hole.

At the end of the film the plane makes an emergency landing in Newfoundland, Canada.

For some reason the FBI is in charge at the airport.

However, the RCMP has jurisdiction in Canada, not the FBI.

Also, the FBI claim that they are holding the coroner in Berlin, but they have no jurisdiction in Germany.

This movie style reminded me of Hitchcock. It was suspenseful and entertaining.

1st watched 12/16/2008 –(Dir-Robert Schwentke): Unappealing thriller-like movie that instead of becoming a unique Hitchcockian-type movie it turns into a typical bad-guy, good-guy movie. Jodie Foster does well enough playing the woman with a daughter that mysteriously vanishes on the airplane on the way back to the U.

The movie has an insane plot and it works until it doesn't. This was so plain and slow paced it ended up upright boring, but I liked the premise so it gets a couple of stars just for that.

The actors are all on key here, but as the movie progresses, tension deflates as the far-fetched plot kicks in. Even if a single passenger saw or interacted with the little girl, the whole complicated crime plan would be ruined.

Despite the several highly unlikely parts of the plot, enjoy the thriller and ignore the holes in the storyline. No-one could miss the child being brought aboard, no-one could alter the passenger manifesto and the sky marshal was never once asked for his credentials, the aircraft captain didn't even know he was on board!

This is probably not what a director wants to hear about his movie, but 2005's Flight Plan is a nice, non-descript action flick that provides a compliment of suspense that exactly equals what you're hoping for in a non-threatening action movie.Putting the always lovely--and often sympathetic--Jodie Foster on a jetliner over the Atlantic, with a missing child and a plane-load of irritated passengers wanting her to sit down and shut up, is a pretty solid way to blow 100 minutes.

Here you see Jodie at her best, balancing anxiety with brittle determination. An absolute sterling performance on all levels.

Kyle Pratt (Jodie Foster) is an aviation engineer. Her husband dies in Berlin falling off a building.

This movie is nice to watch. Its no blockbuster but very entertaining.