Altitude could have been a great air disaster movie before they threw in some supernatural “Twilight Zone” moments which completely took me out of the film. On the positive side, for such a fairly unknown cast, I thought for the most part they had some good chemistry together and the film looks good for a low budget project.
Altitude (2010)
Genre(s): Thriller
Anchor Bay | R – 90 min. – $34.98 | October 26, 2010
MOVIE INFO:
Directed by: Kaare Andrews
Writer(s): Paul A. Birkett (written by)
Cast: Jessica Lowndes, Julianna Guill, Ryan Donowho, Landon Liboiron, Jake Weary
DISC INFO:
Features: Audio Commentary, 2 Featurettes, Concepts Gallery, Trailer
Number of Discs: 1
Audio: English (Dolby TrueHD 5.1)
Video: 1080p/Widescreen 2.40
Subtitles: English SDH, Spanish
Video Codec: VC-1
Region: A
THE MOVIE – 2.75/5
Fear is in the air.
Plot: Five teenage friends – including rookie pilot Sara (JESSICA LOWNDES) – rent a small plane for a weekend getaway. But shortly into the flight, something suddenly goes wrong. The instruments begin to malfunction. The plane won’t stop climbing. A storm is closing in and fuel is running out. Now for everyone on board – which includes the jock wrestler (JAKE WEARY), a sexy artistic type chick (JULIANNA GUILL), Sara’s introverted boyfriend (LANDON LIBOIRON) and the musician who is in love with the artistic chick (RYAN DONOWHO) –, the true horror has just begun.
I actually was looking forward to this film based on the tagline and plot and while it did live up to expectations for the first 40 minutes or so, once it hit the air octopus part of the story and go into “Twilight Zone” and even “Lost” territory, it complete fell apart.
Altitude came across as a fun, claustrophobic thriller where we, the viewer, would spend 80-minutes or so inside a small plane as they try to survive with nowhere to escape. And during the first act and parts of the second act, it was pretty damn good… and then the “Twilight Zone” part I previously mentioned. About half-way through the writer, who no doubt started writing sober must have lit up a joint to give us a sky octopus that mysteriously appears and attacks the plane. So I decided to go along with the science-fiction aspect suddenly thrown into the thriller and the good news is they did decently explain how the octopus got there but the reasoning, which throws some supernatural elements into the pot (I assume it got a tad stronger for the writer), and it was far from satisfying before going back to science-fiction for the ending.
Now, as a whole the movie isn’t bad but the unevenness of the plot doesn’t hold up very well and one plot hole kept nagging at me. In order for me to explain it, I have to give a strong spoiler warning: one of the twists is the events going on is in fact inside the introvert’s mind and gets stronger as his own fear rises. Again, I’m willing to go along with this but there comes a point in the film where he completely freaks out for which the wrestler jock applies a sleeper hold, knocking the introvert out. Question is, shouldn’t the nightmare they were going through, made by Mr. Introvert, go away when he’s unconscious? Or does is it like a computer and his fear continues even while out? So while technically it makes sense in a “Twilight Zone” kind of way, it just kind of irked me for some reason.
Taking that aside and focusing on the relatively unknown cast, I thought they all did a pretty good job. Yes, some of the dialogue is fairly ordinary but they seem to capture the desperation of being on a flight from hell. In particular, Jessica Lowndes gives the best performance, outside of one scene that was pretty cringe-worthy, while the others hold down the fort (or plane) well enough and provide some OK character moments, albeit they are somewhat caricatures (especially the drunken jock).
Altitude was directed by Kaare Andrews making his feature-length debut and doing a good job for the most part setting up the tension and it mostly looks really great for a low-budget feature, although 90% takes place on a small plane. The film was written by Paul A. Birkett who has previously penned several TV movies (including a 2005 film called Crash Landing starring Antonio Sabato Jr.) and like I’ve said a few times already, the thriller aspects were great before devolving into a supernatural/monster/time paradox thriller.
Overall, this isn’t by any stretch a bad movie just one that squandered so much potential early on for some cheap and inane twists. My 2.5/5 rating is for the first half alone and I’m sure some might dig the sky octopus aspect of the plot but for me it took me out of the picture to the point that I kept checking the time code to find out how much more I had to endure.
SPECIAL FEATURES – 2.25/5
Feature Commentary – Director Kaare Andrews sits down for an informative track recounting how he got the directing gig, some aspects of the story, getting the young cast and other bits and pieces of info. Not a bad track but I usually prefer more people in the booth (or wherever) to bounce stories off of one another. Would’ve been nice to include the cast as well… Note: The track is within the Audio submenu not within the features.
Altitude: Behind the Scenes (49:02; HD) – This multi-part featurette chronicles the making of the movie from story to production and post-production. It has the usual behind-the-scenes footage mixed in with comments by the cast and crew as they explain the story, what interested them about it and shooting it. I shouldn’t have to say it, but do not watch this as it will spoil the entire movie.
Green Storm (10:06; SD) – With this featurette we take a look at the green screen shots with voice over by the visual effects supervisor.
Original Concepts Gallery allows you to check out several art and storyboards originally created for the movie. You can just skip this one altogether.
Last up is the trailer (2:02; HD).
The disc opens up with trailers for I Spit on Your Grave (1:10; HD) remake, Frozen (1:52; HD), The New Daughter (2:18; HD), Operation: Endgame (1:51; HD) and The Rig (1:46; SD).
VIDEO – 3.75/5
Altitude is presented with a 2.40 aspect ratio and in 1080p high-definition on a 25GB Blu-ray disc. Although I have a hard time saying this is a fantastic looking video presentation, I did find that during the day or lighter scenes, flesh tones were spot on and there’s just enough of a discernable amount of grain that helps with the detail levels. While the night scenes didn’t look the best, often it’s the darker scenes that expose a film’s visual weakness but here I thought the black levels were consistent and I noticed no signs of pixilation or artifacting during those (numerous) scenes.
AUDIO – 4.5/5
The film comes with a nice Dolby TrueHD track that really encompasses the home theater with plane noises and other audio effects as well as providing clear dialogue throughout. The center and front channels get the most usage but I did notice quite a bit of effects coming through the rear speakers as well from thunder to the squeal of the sky octopus.
OVERALL – 2.5/5
Overall, Altitude could have been a great air disaster movie before they threw in some supernatural “Twilight Zone” moments which completely took me out of the film. On the positive side, for such a fairly unknown cast, I thought for the most part they had some good chemistry together and the film looks good for a low budget project. The Blu-ray itself has a fine picture transfer to go along with high-quality lossless audio.
Brian Oliver, The Movieman
Published: 11/19/2010