/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/25581518/borderlands4.jpeg "Borderlands 4’s first trailer is all out war")
Carry On tries to be Die Hard but fails to really bring anything new to the table outside of a very sinister performance from Jason Bateman.
PLOT: A mysterious traveler blackmails a young TSA agent into letting a dangerous package slip through security and onto a Christmas Day flight.
REVIEW: I will always have a soft spot for airplane thrillers. Whether it’s Red Eye, Air Force One, or even Die Hard 2, the airport/airplane is a dynamic setting. The cameras, the security, the massive amounts of people of all backgrounds moving through the space; there’s a lot of potential. Especially when it comes to a thriller. So I was excited to hear that we’d be getting a new airport action/thriller. Unfortunately, Carry On takes a very long time to get going and doesn’t have nearly enough action beats to justify the runtime.
The story of Carry On follows Ethan Kopek, a TSA agent who is down on his own life choices. When a mysterious man forces him to let a dangerous package through security, Ethan must do what he can to stop it. There’s certainly a Speed element to it. This is really one of those “shut your brain off” kinds of films because as soon as you try to throw logic into it, everything falls apart. Stab someone in the middle of the airport? Well, security apparently isn’t manning the cameras and no one saw anything despite there being hundreds of people around. There are so many coincidences that have to happen that it can be pretty silly. But I know I got a kick out of how much they made the TSA seem important.
Taron Egerton makes for a good lead, even if the character of Ethan Kopek is a bit one-dimensional. I’m sure they could have gotten from point A to B without making Ethan such a loser. But he lacks chemistry with his pregnant girlfriend, Nora (Sofia Carson), making their interactions a bit stale. Given how much Nora serves as Ethan’s motivation during the crisis, it takes away some of that desire for reconciliation. Jason Bateman is absolutely the star of the show providing an intense villain that feels parallel with Dennis Hopper’s Speed villain at times. He’s in control of the situation and has such confidence about it, putting such venom behind his lines. The Traveler is not a nice man. Theo Rossi makes for such an intimidating lackey that, despite the character being one-dimensional, he’s able to make him pop.
If I can help it, I tend to avoid watching trailers for movies as they often spoil too much about the film. But I always watch them afterwards to see how they represented the movie and Carry On feels like a lie. Unlike the trailer, there’s very little humor to undercut the tension and takes a long time to get going. This is certainly more thriller than an action movie. I don’t think is inherently a problem, but it does feel like Netflix is selling a false bill of goods. But the few action beats that do happen are well done (outside of a very CGI car crash).
Carry On also has a very strange representation of death. We get several characters dying, yet there’s not much impact with any of them. They just kind of happen because the story says so and the characters don’t really have time to focus on it. They’re also done in such unceremonious ways that all of them have a “Wait, did they just die?” reaction versus something more definitive. It makes the side characters feel very unimportant. Oddly, the film starts out like it’s going to be some kind of Christmas movie, complete with blaring Xmas tunes and visuals. But this is really just to set up the busy travel day at the airport. However, I have to give the film credit for the usage of the greatest Christmas song of all time, Darlene Love’s “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home).”
Ultimately, Carry On feels like more of a whimper than a bang. For everything that works, there are a multitude of things that don’t. Even so, I still have a soft spot for these kinds of films and Jason Bateman’s performance is absolutely electric. If you don’t let the logic of it all ruin it for you, then this is an interesting thrill ride. But I have a very hard time recommending it as it doesn’t really bring anything new to the table.
CARRY ON RELEASES EXCLUSIVELY TO NETFLIX ON DECEMBER 13TH, 2024.
