ANOTHER ATTEMPT, ANOTHER REJECTION?
Director: Clint Eastwood
Cast: Tom Hanks, Aaron Eckhart, Laura Linney
Nowadays, the tested Oscar recipe has boiled down to the mixture of a biopic with an A-lister at the screen. While SULLY checks those categories with an intriguing pairing up of veteran actor-turned-director Clint Eastwood and equally experienced Tom Hanks to grace the viewers with the real life events of ‘Miracle on the Hudson’, the movie begs the question as to whether the duo landed their endeavor with a praiseworthy hold, but only to see themselves lacking by a bit to make a splash in the award circuits.
Tom Hanks, the two times Oscar winner in the leading actor category, has been hovering around his next Academy Award nomination in the likes of CAPTAIN PHILLIPS (2013) and BRIDGE OF SPIES (2015). On the other hand, Eastwood, who had his trails blazing after the success of the controversial movie AMERICAN SNIPER (2014), was looking to emulate the same with the dramatization of an event which echoes the very pulse of his directorial niche i.e of essentialist American heroism.
SULLY portrays a psychological study of Chesley ‘Sully’ Sullenberger (Tom Hanks), who safely executed an emergency water landing of a commercial airliner on January 15, 2009, with the assistance of first officer, Jeffrey B. Skiles (Aaron Eckhart). The movie exhibits the veteran director’s personal style of a quiet narrative, although through a jarring sketch of the events which retains the thrill, albeit mildly, for events those are known to any informed viewer. A year which saw dissections into the ethics and consequences behind heroism through two blockbusters in CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR and BATMAN v SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE also experienced a rather cinematically elevated attempt into the same territory when the American hero is left questioning his own actions during the NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board) investigation, which proved to be a process of finding a scapegoat. Sully’s internal dilemmas are projected through nightmares that are fleshed out aptly by the actor’s oscillation from his trademark calm demeanor to a harrowed face.
Eastwood’s directorial venture is simple and yet multilayered to wring out the most from an event that could have easily shaped up to be paper-thin in substance. The politics behind the investigation, the brief moments of the flight and the nightmares of the pilot are cohesively put together from an acute filmmaking perspective to complement a temporally non-linear storytelling. The movie runs smoothly to its conclusion in a constant harmonious clash of Sully’s internal and external conflict. Tom Hanks brings the character into the screen with his believable aura of humility, only to be highlighted by the quips of his co-pilot Skiles (Eckhart) that serves as much needed breeze of lightheartedness in the otherwise compact seriousness.
The cinematic endeavor, however, finds itself in a maze of its own – a maze of stasis, which is coupled with little to no narrative ambition from the hand of an artist who exploits his own formula to its fullest and enjoys his status of having to prove nothing anymore. While the movie certainly eases into its own rhythm, its constant pursuit of depicting American heroism restrains any kind of actual internal complexity in the protagonist’s personality, which the movie briefly hints at. The paragon of heroism begs of a totally idealist portrayal and thus sacrificing any kind of drama which the director tried to back with Sully’s past. The feeble attempt at making the viewers invested into the lives of the passengers also falls short and rather chisels away the structural compactness. Eastwood’s crisp direction is certainly praiseworthy but somehow marred with the criminally under usage of the supporting cast in Aaron Eckhart and Laura Linney.
The movie hinges greatly upon the event of the landing itself and the rescue of the 155 passengers and the crew afterwards, which is directed with ultimate precision and thus captures the very soul of the movie. An incident that witnessed the solidarity of a vast population served to be a glimmer of hope amidst the political gloominess is graced with the director’s clear and simple vision. 208 seconds of aerial tug of war between Sully and fate proves to be a cinematic masterpiece but 95 minutes of the movie itself ends with hunger for more.
Tom Hanks, in his character, injects a life of its own, but somehow misses the mark that would have swiftly landed him in the award nominations. The portrayal plays mostly inside the boundaries of safety. Swollen with the aura of Oscar bait, the movie largely delivers for critical acclamation, but lacks the challenge for Hanks that Keaton or Redmayne undertook. SULLY comes to fruition with Hanks’s touch but may remain another near miss for the veteran actor when the hype for Academy Awards rolls in.
Review By Agnimitra Roy
My Verdict
3
SULLY is a decent cinematic option for viewers who are boggled by the overexposure of blockbuster movies and would love to indulge in a calm storytelling.
