Pushing Tin (1999) A Capsule Review by Nathaniel R. Atcheson
Director: Mike Newell Cast: John Cusack, Billy Bob Thornton, Cate Blanchett, Angelina Jolie, Jake Weber, Kurt Fuller Screenplay: Glen Charles, Les Charles Producers: Art Linson Runtime: 124 min. US Distribution: 20th Century Fox Rated R: language, sex
Copyright 1998 Nathaniel R. Atcheson
John Cusack and Billy Bob Thornton are in top comedic form in Pushing Tin, a strange little movie about air traffic controllers. Directed by Mike Newell (Donnie Brasco, Enchanted April), the film is hilarious and entertaining for the first hour and a half, but slumps into senselessness for its conclusion. The characters are well-drawn and perfectly acted by the cast, and the movie works when it focuses on the rivalry between the two stars. But it could have been a great movie if it had found the right way to end (which would have included no baptism scenes in a Colorado mountain stream). It also doesn't have a lot to do with air traffic controlling -- we get the feeling this story could have been about stock brokers on Wall Street. Nonetheless, Pushing Tin has more charms than annoyances, and is therefore worth a look.
Psychosis Rating: 7/10
Visit FILM PSYCHOSIS at http://www.pyramid.net/natesmovies
Nathaniel R. Atcheson
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews