| 1 | [[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/con_air_poster_2.jpeg]] |
| 2 | |
| 3 | ->''"They somehow managed to get every freak and creep in the universe on this one plane, and then somehow managed to let them take it over, and '''then''' they somehow managed to stick '''us''' right smack in the middle." '' |
| 4 | -->-- '''Cameron Poe''', summarizing the movie for us. |
| 5 | |
| 6 | ''Con Air'' is an action movie made in 1997, released by Creator/TouchstonePictures and produced by Creator/JerryBruckheimer. |
| 7 | |
| 8 | Army Ranger Cameron Poe (Creator/NicolasCage) loves his wife, Tricia (Monica Potter). Just ask the drunk he killed in the course of defending her when she was pregnant, earning him seven to ten years in prison. He loves his daughter Casey (Landry Allbright), too, taking time every day in prison to communicate with both of them and making sure that he leaves prison a better man than he entered. Cameron Poe is now on parole, and on his way home to see his family. It will be his daughter's seventh birthday. |
| 9 | |
| 10 | Cameron Poe ''is'' a NiceGuy. [[BewareTheNiceOnes Just don't threaten his family.]] [[BerserkButton And especially don't try to keep him from them.]] |
| 11 | |
| 12 | Unfortunately, some criminals are about to learn this the hard way, because Poe and his best friend, the diabetic Mike "Baby-"O'Dell (Creator/MykeltiWilliamson), are put on the ''Jailbird'', a Fairchild C-123 that is not only transporting Poe home, but is also being used by U.S. Marshal Vince Larkin (Creator/JohnCusack) to transport a number of notorious criminals to [[TheAlcatraz a new supermax prison]]. These include: |
| 13 | * Cyrus "The Virus" Grissom (Creator/JohnMalkovich), the "poster child for the criminally insane" and EvilGenius masterminding the plot to hijack the plane to escape to a non-extradition country. |
| 14 | * [[ScaryBlackMan Nathan "Diamond Dog" Jones]] (Creator/VingRhames), a black supremacist who bombed an NRA meeting saying, "They represented the basest negativity of the white race," then wrote a ''New York Times'' bestseller from prison that apparently is getting a movie adaptation starring Creator/DenzelWashington. |
| 15 | * William "Billy Bedlam" Bedford (Creator/NickChinlund), [[ADeadlyAffair who caught his wife cheating on him]], [[DisproportionateRetribution and in response]], he drove four towns over to her family's house and [[FamilyExtermination slaughtered her parents, her brothers, her sisters]], and [[AndYourLittleDogToo even her dog]]. |
| 16 | * Johnny "23" Baca (Creator/DannyTrejo), a SerialRapist with 23 counts, though he claims he'd be "Johnny ''600''" if they knew the truth. |
| 17 | * Joe "Pinball" Parker (Creator/DaveChappelle), arsonist, armed robber, dope fiend, and a "nice guy who just got caught." |
| 18 | * Francisco Cindino (Creator/JesseBorrego), a treacherous South American drug lord bankrolling the vacation once the cons are home free. |
| 19 | * Garland Greene (Creator/SteveBuscemi), a.k.a. "The Marietta Mangler", a SerialKiller with at least 30 victims who disturbs even the hardcore cons because of his body count and the depravity of the crimes. |
| 20 | |
| 21 | Unbeknownst to them, there's an [[TheInfiltration undercover]] DEA agent (Creator/JoseZuniga), under the command of his {{Jerkass}} [[BadBoss Boss]] (Creator/ColmMeaney). |
| 22 | |
| 23 | These criminals are about to learn a hard lesson: Don't. Mess. With Cameron Poe. They don't know Poe from Adam. |
| 24 | |
| 25 | [[Webcomic/{{Homestuck}} And never,]] ''[[Memes/{{Homestuck}} ever]]'' [[http://www.mspaintadventures.com/scraps/dontmoveorthebunnygetsit.jpg threaten the bunneh.]] |
| 26 | |
| 27 | Not to be confused with the [[http://www.conair.com/ Conair Corporation,]] which primarily sells hair care appliances. |
| 28 | |
| 29 | [[Characters/ConAir The characters sheet]]. |
| 30 | ---- |
| 31 | !!I said, put. The tropes. Back in the page: |
| 32 | * AccidentalTruth: Poe spins a story about Cindino being untrustworthy, purely as an argument to keep the surviving policemen alive, but it turns out Cindino really is double crossing them right at that moment. |
| 33 | * ActorAllusion: Creator/ColmMeaney's keychain has [[Franchise/StarTrek a Starfleet badge]] on it. |
| 34 | * AffablyEvil: |
| 35 | ** For a black nationalist who believes that white people are inherently evil, Diamond Dog is one of the friendliest people on the plane and cracks some good natured jokes towards Poe. |
| 36 | ** Swamp Thing is such a jolly, good-humored sort that you almost forget that he's an integral part in a scheme to bust out a planeload of mass murderers, terrorists, and gangsters. He's a drug smuggler himself, but even his actor defends him, pointing out that he didn't kill anyone or get in their faces... |
| 37 | ** Creator/SteveBuscemi's Garland Greene. Sure, he killed 30 people in a way that "makes the [[UsefulNotes/CharlesManson Manson Family]] look like Series/ThePartridgeFamily" and recalls with a CreepyMonotone about how he "drove through three states wearing her head as a hat." But he's an intelligent and philosophical DeadpanSnarker, has [[spoiler:a quite touching scene with a child, [[ChewingTheScenery sings a cheery song while the plane crashes]], and seems sane as he joins a craps table in the end.]] |
| 38 | * AllMuslimsAreArab: Subverted. Diamond Dog is a black American Muslim, who shouts "Allahu akbar" as he is released from his cage. |
| 39 | * AllThereInTheScript: The prisoner Pinball lit on fire to begin the hijacking of the prison plane is named Warlock. He is also sub-credited by the nickname Pinball gave him, "Cochise". |
| 40 | * AloneWithThePsycho: Subverted. The creepy serial killer Garland Greene (Steve Buscemi) is having a one-on-one session with a little girl. After a cutaway, we see him [[EmpathyDollShot walk off with the girl's doll]], implying that she's dead. But a subsequent scene shows that he left her unharmed. |
| 41 | * AmbiguousGenderIdentity: It isn't clear whether Sally Can't Dance is a {{camp gay}} man who wears a dress or a trans woman. Considering this movie was made in TheNineties, one could potentially chalk this up to [[TransEqualsGay ignorance on the filmmakers' part]]. |
| 42 | * AndYourLittleDogToo: "Before I kill you, I'll let you know that the last thing that little Casey Poe will ever smell will be my stinking breath." Oh, it's ''on''... |
| 43 | -->'''Poe:''' You're not getting near my daughter. [[PreMortemOneLiner Buckle up!]] ''(cuffs Cyrus just as the truck they're riding on crashes)'' |
| 44 | ** While introducing the felons boarding the "Jail Bird:" |
| 45 | ---> '''Larkin:''' He ("Billy Bedlam") caught his wife in bed with another man. Left her alone, drove four towns over to his wife's family's house. Killed her parents, her brothers, her sisters, even their dog. |
| 46 | * AnthropicPrinciple: The only reason Poe ends up on the titular plane in the first place is because his trial is overseen by [[HollywoodLaw the dumbest goddamned judge in cinematic history]], because if the case of a trained military man and war hero defending his pregnant wife against a belligerent drunk and accidentally killing him in the process was tried by a ''realistic'' court, there would be no movie. |
| 47 | * AppleOfDiscord: Poe attempts this when asking why a militant black man like Diamond Dog is taking orders from a skinhead white guy. It fails when Diamond Dog explicitly says he's TheStarscream. |
| 48 | * ArmorPiercingQuestion |
| 49 | -->'''Poe''': You know you're in a situation you can't control, right? |
| 50 | -->'''Sims''': I can't control it? I can't control it?! |
| 51 | * ArtisticLicense: Unlike the film's plane, with its harsh utilitarian design, real Con Air flights use standard airliners that are largely indistinguishable from typical passenger planes. Possibly [[JustifiedTrope justified]] in that the ''Jailbird'' was designed specifically to more or less be a flying "maximum security" prison, and as such did away with any comforts or non-essential fixtures that could be taken advantage of by the inmates. |
| 52 | * ArtisticLicenseGeography: After Swamp Thing announces that they need to land the plane in Las Vegas, he says that they have to land on the Strip as the airport is too far away. They then fly over the Hard Rock Cafe, which is closer to [=McCarran=] International Airport than the Strip. Also, the Strip is only a couple of miles from the airport anyways. You can see it from the plane after you land. |
| 53 | * ArtisticLicenceLaw: The whole reason Poe was in prison in the first place relies ''completely'' on HollywoodLaw. Even if the thugs hid their dead friend's knife, Poe had a witness (his wife, whom he was also defending from said thugs), and self-defense does in fact cover defense of another, ''especially'' when in response to a deadly threat. Even if discounting the heaps upon heaps of bad luck and incompetence plaguing Poe's court defense, it shouldn't even have ''made'' it to court if the investigating officers were any semblance of competent. |
| 54 | * ArtisticLicenseMartialArts: This movie was one of the first works to feature the idea that you can kill someone with a palm strike to the nose because it will make his nose stab his brain. In real life, palm strikes are surprisingly effective blows and you can absolutely knock people out with them (Japanese UsefulNotes/MixedMartialArts used to showcase a lot, as they disallowed closed-fisted punching to the face), but you will rarely kill someone the way described. The human nose is too small and easily deformable to pierce its way to the brain, and even if it did, the latter would need much more damage to be irreversibly destroyed. |
| 55 | * ArtisticLicenseMedicine: |
| 56 | ** Raise your hand if you've ever seen a first aid kit with a hypodermic needle in it. |
| 57 | ** Also, someone going through severe diabetic shock would be completely incapable of attempting to prevent a rape, no matter how feebly. |
| 58 | ** Probably the most egregious depiction of a diabetic in cinema. If Baby-O is sweating profusely and "near death", then that means he's hypoglycemic (his blood sugar is too low and need to consume carbs/sugar to raise it at acceptable levels), and an insulin shot (which lowers blood sugar) is the last thing he needs. |
| 59 | * AssholeVictim: |
| 60 | ** The drunken, lecherous redneck asshole who tried to assault the Poes and kill Cameron with a switchblade is only lamented because his death is the reason Cameron is in jail. |
| 61 | ** [[spoiler:Cindino. After cowardly betraying Cyrus and [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere clumsily attempting to bail the convicts]] without them noticing, an enraged Cyrus [[ManOnFire burns him alive]].]] |
| 62 | ** Nobody likes Johnny 23, nobody questions why the hell is he handcuffed to a door and beaten up after they take off from Lerner Airfield, and [[spoiler:the only reason the policemen who find his body are appalled at finding his corpse is because of [[AnArmAndALeg what happened to his corpse]].]] |
| 63 | * AwardBaitSong: "How Do I Live" by Music/TrishaYearwood, who covered the first cut by Music/LeAnnRimes. |
| 64 | ** As a footnote, Rimes' version did better on Adult Contemporary radio, while Yearwood's version did better on the country charts. Both lost the Oscar to [[Film/{{Titanic 1997}} "My Heart Will Go On"]]. |
| 65 | ** It was also nominated for both an UsefulNotes/AcademyAward for Best Song and a UsefulNotes/GoldenRaspberryAward for Worst Song. (The latter was lost to the entire score for ''Film/ThePostman''.) |
| 66 | * AxCrazy: |
| 67 | ** Johnny-23 is a serial rapist and quite proud of it. His entire sub-plot revolves around him trying to rape [[TheSmurfettePrinciple Guard Sally Bishop]], even if everybody else ([[EvenEvilHasStandards even his fellow convicts]]) don't want him to. |
| 68 | ** Cyrus "the Virus" brags that he's killed more men than cancer. During the film itself, he is personally responsible for almost 30 deaths, most being prison guards and National Guard soldiers. |
| 69 | * BadassBookworm: Larkin is a walking thesaurus, quotes Creator/FyodorDostoevsky (whose literature speaks of life in prison), and personally sets out to apprehend the escaping convicts, even though he's alone, and knows he's horribly outnumbered. |
| 70 | * BadBoss: |
| 71 | ** Malloy concealing a gun into Sims' ankle gets him killed when he tries to [[TooDumbToLive take over the plane.]] |
| 72 | ** Francisco Cindino is a leader of TheCartel and the one footing the bill for the jailbreak operation because he is one of the prisoners that were going to go to the new prison. Poe manages to prevent Grissom from allowing the hostages to be killed by reminding him that Cindino is a backstabbing bastard, doing things like blowing up a car bomb while his own cousin was in it.. and sure enough, Cindino and his Cartel goons were planning on leaving without anybody else. |
| 73 | * BaldOfEvil: Cyrus "the Virus" Grissom. |
| 74 | * BigBad: Cyrus "the Virus" Grissom. |
| 75 | * BigDamnHeroes: |
| 76 | ** When Baby-O's been shot and begins lamenting that there might not be a god. Needless to say, Poe has finally had enough. |
| 77 | -->'''Cameron Poe:''' '''''I’m gonna show you God does exist.''''' |
| 78 | ** Before this, Larkin saves Poe from Cindino's thugs. |
| 79 | ** "Make a move and the bunny gets it." (Attack choppers suddenly appear behind Cyrus) |
| 80 | ** Also, Diamond Dog to Cyrus, although Diamond explains that the relationship is merely one of convenience based on a common goal. |
| 81 | * BilingualBonus: |
| 82 | -->'''Cindino:''' Cy-\ |
| 83 | '''Cyrus:''' -onara![[note]]"Sayonara" = Japanese for "Goodbye"[[/note]] |
| 84 | * BirdPoopGag: A man is seen complaining that he always gets bird poop on his car just after he washes it; trying to wipe it off the window makes him miss the light and delays him enough so that Pinball's body lands on his car. |
| 85 | * BlackDudeDiesFirst: |
| 86 | ** Pinball is the first of the named convicts to die. Averted in a couple of the white nameless convicts die in the inital take over. |
| 87 | ** Averted in the case of Baby-O but he gives it a good shot by first nearly dying of diabetes and then getting a gunshot wound after being saved with a shot of insulin. |
| 88 | * BlatantLies: |
| 89 | -->'''Vincent:''' Where are you taking my plane, Cyrus?\ |
| 90 | '''Cyrus:''' [[ImGoingToDisneyWorld We're going to Disneyland!]]\ |
| 91 | '''Vincent:''' [[LampshadeHanging You're lying, Cyrus.]]\ |
| 92 | '''Cyrus:''' So are you, Vince. |
| 93 | * BloodFromTheMouth: Agent Sims when he gets shot in the torso by Cyrus. |
| 94 | * BondOneLiner: After Poe [[spoiler:kills Billy Bedlam]] - "Why couldn't you put the bunny back in the box?" |
| 95 | * BrickJoke: |
| 96 | ** When the cons arrive at Lerner Airfield, they have a near collision with another pilot there. They spook him and he runs off into the desert. Later when they leave, he's still running through the desert. |
| 97 | ** Garland Greene is unaccounted for after the ending plane crash. We don't see any of him until right before the credits... [[spoiler: when he turns out to have made an absolute fortune gambling in UsefulNotes/LasVegas.]] |
| 98 | * BringMyBrownPants: Cyrus told Larkin (via radio) that the Agent Sims pissed his pants after he shot him. |
| 99 | -->'''Cyrus''' (''singing''): "Ohhhh, nothing makes me sadder than the agent lost his bladder in the... ''aaaiiiirrrrrplane!''" |
| 100 | * BullyingADragon: Poe winds up in prison because three general lowlifes attack a soldier who is wearing Ranger tabs. The thought process there probably involved a tremendous amount of alcohol. [[Website/DarwinAwards For the best, really.]] |
| 101 | * CarCushion: [[spoiler:Pinball]] falls from the plane onto a moving car. |
| 102 | * CarFu: Poe crashes a motorcycle into [[spoiler: Diamond Dog]]. |
| 103 | * CassandraTruth: Larkin: "A body fell from the sky with a note on it." Malloy and Larkin's boss just laugh him off. |
| 104 | * ChekhovsGun: |
| 105 | ** Malloy's car, which he leaves behind at the office. Vincent jacks it to get to Lerner on time.´ |
| 106 | ** Minor version, but still bears mention: the tiny pistol Malloy hands over to Simms is the one Cyrus uses to ShootOutTheLock of the Jailbird's weapons locker. |
| 107 | * ChekhovsLecture: When the cons skid to a halt at Lerner Airfield, Diamond Dog is about to execute three prison guards. Poe tries to reason with Diamond Dog not to kill them until the cons board the second plane with Cindino, the cons' contact at the airfield. Poe argues that Cindino may not be one to be trusted based on what Poe knows of Cindino's history. Diamond Dog is unconvinced until Cyrus interrupts the exchange. Poe tries the same argument with Cyrus and convinces him. Cyrus orders Diamond Dog to stand down and for the cons to dig and pull their plane out from the dirt. Its relevance to the story seems minimal until it turns out that Poe was right; Cindino planned to double-cross the cons all along. This scene was clever in hindsight because Poe was simply trying to save the guards' lives, and may have actually made up his Cindino story in an attempt to break the partnership, and thus [[spoiler: prevent the cons from escaping to Mexico before the authorities show up.]] |
| 108 | * ChekhovsSkill: Poe is shown working out religiously in prison, including numerous pull-ups and even handstand push-ups. This comes in ''very'' handy when he finds himself hanging from the ladder of a speeding fire engine at the end of the movie, and is able to hang on with one arm and protect himself from Cyrus’ attack with the other arm, eventually ramming a wooden spike through Cyrus’ ankle. |
| 109 | * TheChessmaster: Cyrus, being the mastermind behind the hijacking. |
| 110 | * ClusterFBomb: Everyone but Poe and his family are liberal in their use of swears. |
| 111 | * ColourCodedForYourConvenience: The prisoners: Normal inmates get Blue, the really scary ones get Orange, and the pants-wettingly scary Steve Buscemi gets White. |
| 112 | * CompanyCrossReferences: Touchstone Pictures wasn't above sneaking in a few references to [[Creator/{{Disney}} the company that owned them]]. Early in the movie, a prisoner calls one of the guards "lady", to which she responds "Lady is a dog in a Walt Disney movie. My name is Bishop." Later on, one of the prisoners says they're taking the hijacked plane to Disneyland. |
| 113 | * ContrivedCoincidence: Lampshaded in the page quote. Cameron Poe gets released from prison on his daughter's birthday, only to wind up on a plane hijacked by inmates, and is forced to stop them because his best friend is trapped on the plane will die if he doesn't get off and receive insulin. Of course this is just the tip of the iceberg... |
| 114 | * CoolCar: Malloy's car, a silver Corvette Stingray convertible with "AZZ KIKR" as a VanityLicensePlate. When Larkin finds out where the convicts are going to land and change planes, a mechanic tells him that he could make it there in time if he had "a fast car". [[ChekhovsGun Cue Larkin looking at Malloy's parking spot]]. |
| 115 | -->'''Duncan Malloy:''' Sunsets are beautiful. Newborn babies are beautiful. This, this is fucking spectacular. |
| 116 | * CoolPlane: The ''Jailbird,'' a Fairchild C-123 Provider that has been souped up and turned into a [[PrisonShip flying prison transport.]] |
| 117 | * CowboyCop: Duncan Malloy. |
| 118 | * CrazyEnoughToWork: Larkin makes clear at one point that the idea of convicts actually being able to take over the plane (or at least the level of preparation to accomplish this that Cyrus and the others are currently showing) was never foreseen. |
| 119 | * CrazySane: Garland's speech comparing the 'insanity' of his murders to working 50 years and dying in a retirement home without the dignity to take a piss seems to imply he believes himself to be this. |
| 120 | * CrimeOfSelfDefense: Cameron Poe, the (sympathetic) main character, is put in prison for accidentally killing someone in defense of his pregnant wife because A) one of the ''three'' scumbags who was trying to assault him [[HideTheEvidence got rid of the knife]] his late buddy pulled, B) his idiot lawyer advised him to plead guilty, C) the HangingJudge on the case says that as an inactive soldier with expert combat training, he should have been more careful since his assailants were unarmed -- even though there were three of them. This one is especially bad since it relies hugely on HollywoodLaw. It's quite unlikely he'd even be prosecuted (his wife witnessed the entire thing), and he would have a very good chance at trial if they did, so it's unlikely his lawyer would advise a guilty plea. Additionally, it was shown to be a federal case despite no indication the deaths occurred in federal jurisdiction. Plus, a judge giving a defendant a harsher sentence because he's a veteran would be career suicide for the latter and an easy appeal for the former. |
| 121 | * CruelAndUnusualDeath: |
| 122 | ** [[spoiler:Cyrus dies by being chained to the ladder of a speeding fire engine, hurled through a bridge and onto some electrical wires, and finally getting his head crushed in a rock crusher.]] |
| 123 | ** [[spoiler:Johnny 23 dies when one or both of his handcuffed arms are torn from the rest of his body.]] |
| 124 | ** Garland Greene was particularly fond of these, bragging about sawing a woman's head off and wearing it as a hat for days. |
| 125 | * DarkReprise: Garland and a little girl sing "He's Got the Whole World In His Hands". He sings it again as the plane crashes into the Las Vegas strip. |
| 126 | * DeadpanSnarker: Garland Greene offers sarcastic commentary on the other prisoners' actions during the film. |
| 127 | * DeathByLookingUp: |
| 128 | ** [[spoiler:Cyrus Grissom vs. rock crusher.[[note]]Though considering he was lying on his back, it was more like 'Death By Brief Moment of Ocular Focus'.[[/note]]]] |
| 129 | ** A more straightforward example occurs during the shootout in the boneyard, when one of the cons has an entire plane fall onto him, and rather than move, he just looks up and screams. |
| 130 | * DescriptionPorn: Larkin gives detailed backgrounds on Billy Bedlam, Diamond Dog and Cyrus the Virus, but skimps when it comes to Poe. This makes sense, as Poe is a parolee whose crimes are hardly worth noting, while the other three are lifers with national recognition, at least in Diamond Dog's case. |
| 131 | * DieHardOnAnX: Die Hard on a plane taken over by the country’s most dangerous criminals. Poe even spends much of the film in a white vest, although it doesn't get as dirty as John [=McClane=]'s. |
| 132 | * DisproportionateRetribution[=/=]MisplacedRetribution: Paraphrased from the movie: Billy Bedlam caught his wife in bed with another man. He left them alone, but drove four towns over to his wife's family's house. He proceeded to kill her parents, her brothers, her sisters, [[KickTheDog and even]] [[AndYourLittleDogToo her dog]]. |
| 133 | * DissonantSerenity: Garland Greene, though he might actually be on anti-psychotics at the time. |
| 134 | * DistractedByTheSexy: Pinball meets a cute girl while stashing the transponder and forgets to get back on the plane. |
| 135 | * DontTouchItYouIdiot: Larkin orders the guards that are with him at Cyrus Grissom's cell to not touch anything as he races to try to warn that the convicts have made plans to take over the plane. One guard picks up a lunch box that has "Do Not Open" written on it, and another guard reminds him that they have orders to not touch anything. He opens it. [[TooDumbToLive It was a bomb.]] |
| 136 | * DonutMessWithACop: During the chase scene finale, two RedShirt cops join in, dropping their donuts to do so. |
| 137 | * TheDragon: Nathan "Diamond Dog" Jones. |
| 138 | * DragonWithAnAgenda: Cameron Poe asks black supremacist Diamond Dog why he's content to be second in command to white Big Bad Cyrus Grissom. Dog replies that while his long term agenda is vastly different from that of Cyrus, he needs to escape before he can get back to it -- going along with Cyrus is "a means to an end". |
| 139 | * {{Dramatization}}: There ''is'' a passenger jet service dedicated to the secure transport of convicted felons; the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justice_Prisoner_and_Alien_Transportation_System Justice Prisoner and Alien Transportation System]] AKA "JPATS". Many actually ''do'' call it "Con Air." But notably? They use this movie as an example of what ''not'' to do; Inmates scheduled to fly are given little or no advance notice of their flights specifically to prevent any kind of escape plans. ''Every'' con onboard a flight gets the full loadout of handcuffs, ankle ''and'' waist chains. Things escalate from there to reinforced mittens and face masks. |
| 140 | * TheDreaded: Cyrus, Diamond Dog, Johnny-23 and the rest of the cons on the plane are ruthless, murderous thugs who have caused countless death and destruction. Yet every single one of them is scared out of their minds when Garland Greene comes onto the plane. Dog, in particular, is terrified to even go near a guy half his size. |
| 141 | * DressingAsTheEnemy: Some of the cons dress as guards during the stop in Nevada, as they need to keep up the pretense of everything being fine so they can pick up Cindino, who's funding the effort, and Swamp Thing, who knows how to disable the locator beacon. |
| 142 | * DullSurprise: Poe, when he sees Duncan's sports car attached to the back of the plane he's in: "[[SeenItAll On any other day, that might seem strange]]." |
| 143 | * ElitesAreMoreGlamorous: Poe was an Army Ranger. Unlike in many examples, not only does this set up his combat skills, but also refusal to [[NoOneGetsLeftBehind leave a friend behind]] (plus a sympathetic female guard) as it's part of the Ranger creed (even said via voiceover at the beginning). |
| 144 | * EmpathyDollShot: The doll of the little girl that Garland talks to, he takes with him as he walks back to the plane, [[spoiler:setting up a BaitAndSwitch that he killed her off-screen.]] |
| 145 | * EstablishingCharacterMoment |
| 146 | ** Molloy parking his car on a handicap space before Larkin could finish talking to him. |
| 147 | ** Cyrus [[WickedCultured speaking Spanish]] to Johnny-23. |
| 148 | * EvenEvilHasStandards: |
| 149 | ** Cyrus Grissom's killed more people than cancer, and he hates rapists. And while (as noted in RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil below) he's turning a blind eye to Johnny-23's particular rap sheet, he makes clear that he will not tolerate Johnny engaging in that kind of behavior during the hijacking, and stops him from doing so with Guard Bishop. |
| 150 | --->'''Cyrus:''' Can you fly, Johnny?\ |
| 151 | '''Johnny-23:''' No.\ |
| 152 | '''Cyrus:''' You keep that in mind when you look at her, because if your dick jumps out of your pants, [[DeadlyEuphemism you jump out of this plane]]. |
| 153 | ** Diamond Dog is scared out of his mind by Garland Greene and doesn't like having to be the one to release him from his restraints. |
| 154 | ** After Cyrus [[spoiler:coldly ignites Cindino for backstabbing and walks away, [[https://youtu.be/wPVAq94Tk9M?t=25 DD looks at Cindino, then looks at Cyrus, stunned]].]] |
| 155 | * {{Expy}}: Poe and Larkin are basically John Mason and Stanley Goodspeed (a grizzled convict with a military past and a pacifistic yet courageous BadassBookworm) from Creator/JerryBruckheimer's previous film, ''Film/TheRock''. The difference is that Creator/NicolasCage played the nerdy Goodspeed there, and the manly Poe here. |
| 156 | * ExtremelyShortTimespan: The bulk of the movie takes place on July 14, 1997, the day of Poe's parole. |
| 157 | * FakeoutOpening: The film begins with a montage about the US Army Rangers. |
| 158 | * FamilyExtermination: Billy "Bedlam" Bedford is in prison for killing his wife's entire family after finding her in bed with another man. |
| 159 | * FatalFamilyPhoto: Averted. Cameron survives the movie despite constantly mentioning the daughter he's never met, and even having a photo of her he's obsessed with. But then again, he's TheHero. |
| 160 | * FlippingTheBird: When he realized Warlock wasn't going to stop the plane so he could get on, Pinball flips him off before getting run over and pulled into the wheel well. Warlock just laughs. |
| 161 | * {{Foreshadowing}}: Poe's heroism in refusing to just escape at his friend's expense was foreshadowed with him being an Army Ranger, who have NoOneGetsLeftBehind as a part of their creed (even recited at the beginning of the film). |
| 162 | * FreudianSlip: Pinball meets a pretty girl, and pretends to be a prison guard. |
| 163 | -->'''Pinball''': "I work for the Department of Erec... Corrections". |
| 164 | * GenuineHumanHide: Garland Greene claims he once killed a little girl and then drove through the state wearing her face as a hat. |
| 165 | * GivingUpOnLogic: Poe's reaction at seeing the ''Jailbird'' has somehow ended up dragging a Corvette Stingray as it's taking off in the third act is a deadpan "On any other day, that might seem strange." |
| 166 | * GoodNewsBadNews: Pinball is dispatched to find three white convicts named Carl, Benson, and Popovich, because they need to deliver them to the unsuspecting guards below to keep up the ruse that nothing is wrong on the plane. The goods news is that he found all of them. The bad news is that they're all dead because they were shot during the initial takeover of the plane or during Willie Sims's attempt to retake it, making them three men short and forcing them to send out the guards in their place. |
| 167 | * GunsAkimbo: Diamond Dog briefly dual-wields pistols during the shootout with the National Guard. |
| 168 | * HadToComeToPrisonToBeACrook: Larkin and Malloy argue about the prison system's effectiveness since this tends to happen. Cyrus the Virus is the biggest example. |
| 169 | * HairpinLockpick: Cyrus and Nathan use needles to unlock their handcuffs. |
| 170 | * HangingJudge: A mild example with the judge that oversees Poe's CrimeOfSelfDefense. After Poe declares himself guilty (because his attorney told him that the judge would grant mercy if he did so because of apparent lack of evidence for his defense), the judge decides instead to declare Poe a "living weapon" because of his military training and that he should be held to "different standards" than non-military men, and gave him seven-to-ten years in prison. The speech makes it pretty clear that the judge held a prejudice against the military, and the extenuating circumstances (Poe defending his pregnant wife) didn't matter, which in reality would have likely gotten him off completely. |
| 171 | * HeadCrushing: Incorrigible criminal Cyrus Grissom ends up with his head positioned beneath a working pile driver, after a bizarre set of circumstances. He can only rage in futility as the large weight drops onto his face, liquifying his head. |
| 172 | * TheHeroDoesntKillTheVillainess: Spoofed. Cameron Poe kills several of the criminals during the plane crash (and afterwards, Cyrus the Virus) until he runs into CampGay inmate Sally-Can't-Dance, who has been referred to and treated as female the entire time. Poe just knocks "her" aside with a simple slap to the cheek, leaving Sally as one of the few crash survivors. |
| 173 | * HeroicBSOD: Poe briefly enters one after being forced to kill Bedlam to maintain his cover. |
| 174 | * HeroStoleMyBike: Poe and Larkin steal Las Vegas police bikes to chase down the remaining escaped cons. |
| 175 | * HesDeadJim: The barkeeper checking on the switch-knife punk Poe killed in melee. |
| 176 | * HeyYouHaymaker: After Cyrus' failed attempt to ShootOutTheLock, he drops the empty rifle. Sally picks it up and calls out "Cyrus!" He turns around with an angry "What?", and she [[PistolWhipping slams him in the head with the rifle butt]]. |
| 177 | * HollywoodLaw: The film is probably the single most egregious case of Hollywood Law ever devised. |
| 178 | ** Cameron Poe had an airtight case for self-defense, and the judge's reasoning of Poe being a "human weapon" for throwing the book at him despite a guilty plea should've been laughed out of an appeals court. But that would've ruined the film, now, wouldn't it? |
| 179 | ** Murder is a state crime, so the trial should have occurred in an Alabama court, and Poe should have been sent to an Alabama state prison. |
| 180 | ** The judge says due to Poe's military skills he's a "[[HumanWeapon deadly weapon]]" and thus not subject to the same laws as others when provoked. Not so -- people with military skills retain the same rights to self-defense as anyone else. The fact some thugs were BullyingADragon is their bad luck. |
| 181 | ** Diamond Dog's story about getting a book deal would be incredibly unlikely in America, due to the Son of Sam laws that some states have that keep convicted criminals from profiting off their crimes. |
| 182 | ** On a lesser note, they do ''not'' transport convicts this way in real correctional systems. The movie shows us why. |
| 183 | ** A prison housing some of the most twisted, violent, ruthless, and cunning criminal geniuses in the world would probably keep these types isolated from one another to prevent them from devising ''exactly this'' sort of scheme. |
| 184 | ** Parole has been abolished in the federal prison system since 1984 except for some circumstances that don't apply here, although they can earn time off for good behavior and be under supervised release. |
| 185 | ** Federal prison guards wear jackets reading "Department of Prisons", when they work for the Bureau of Prisons (but the correct name is, oddly, still on the prison bus). |
| 186 | * HonorBeforeReason: Cameron Poe is a former Army Ranger, and refuses to leave a fallen man behind and a female prison guard to be raped and tortured by Johnny-23, even if keeping quiet would mean freedom. Poe specifically states that he couldn't face his daughter if he didn't act this way. "Never will I fail my comrades" and "I will never leave a fallen comrade behind to fall into the hands of the enemy" are explicitly part of the [[http://www.goarmy.com/ranger/heritage/ranger-creed.html Ranger Creed]] that all prospective Army Rangers must memorize as part of their training. |
| 187 | * HorrifyingTheHorror: Even most of the other criminals are scared of Garland Greene. |
| 188 | * HumanShield: Discussed and applied by Cyrus during the shootout between him and the Agent Sims on board. |
| 189 | -->'''Cyrus:''' You know, the next time you choose a human shield, you're better off not picking a two-bit negro crackhead. |
| 190 | * HumanWeapon: Mentioned by the HangingJudge who sentences Poe to justify throwing the book at him. [[HollywoodLaw It's as stupid as it sounds]]. |
| 191 | -->'''Judge:''' Cameron Poe, you have pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the first degree. With your military skills, you are a deadly weapon, and are ''not'' subject to the same laws as other people that are provoked, because you can respond with deadly force |
| 192 | * IdiotBall: The pilot of the plane, learning that there was a fire and a probable disturbance on his plane, does the right thing and trips the alarm and alerts Carson City (their next stop) of a problem on board. What does he do next? Instead of locking the cockpit door where they would be safe (the inmates were extensively searched for any and all weapons) and landing ASAP, the pilot tells the co-pilot to get a ''gun'' and check it out. One wonders how Cyrus's ingenious escape plan would have fared without this error in judgment. |
| 193 | ** Even more so with the fact that until Cyrus got the gun, the guards were on the verge of getting the situation with the cons under control again which would have left an unarmed Cyrus against all of them. His ''entire plan'' seemed to hinge on him getting someomne to bring the gun out to him and that he would be able to overpower them and not get shot...not exactly a genius plan. |
| 194 | ** And for reasons that are entirely unclear, the two heavily armed Cobra gunships LAND when they reach Lerner Airfield, which they would ''never'' do in a combat situation, meaning that rather being able to simply blast the plane on the ground as it tried to take off, they just sit helplessly on the ground. |
| 195 | ** Let's also hear it for the guards in Cyrus' prison. When they realize that he's been planning an escape attempt that is almost certainly now underway, they summon Larkin. Larkin swiftly inspects the cell, realizes where Cyrus is going, and runs out of the cell in a panic, telling them firmly "Don't touch anything!" What does one of the guards do? He ''immediately'' sits down, picks up a box with a piece of masking tape on the lid saying ''[[SchmuckBait DO NOT OPEN]]'', and '''he opens it''', right after another guard tells him not to.[[note]]One possible explanation; he was looking for evidence, like he had just seen Larkin doing. Even though that's ''not the guard's job'' or training.[[/note]] Boom. The explosion nearly impales ''and'' decapitates Larkin, which would've been great for Cyrus. |
| 196 | ** Really, the entire movie happens due to law enforcement holding the idiot ball tight and not letting go. A plane full of psychotic and dangerous convicts is watched over by only a couple police officers and not, say, the military or a whole squadron of officers, Malloy nearly shoots down a tourist plane because he was so gung-ho about shooting down the plane full of convicts, and Poe gets sentenced to prison for five years despite protecting his then-pregnant wife from sexual assault/attempted rape. |
| 197 | * ImGoingToDisneyWorld: When Larkin asks Cyrus what he's doing with the plane, he shouts out "We're going to Disneyland!" |
| 198 | * ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice: Billy Bedlam gets impaled on a broken strut in the cargo bay during his fight with Poe. |
| 199 | * ImpliedDeathThreat: Cyrus warns Johnny 23 [[EvenEvilHasStandards not to rape anybody]], otherwise "you jump out of this plane". |
| 200 | * ImprobableInfantSurvival: [[spoiler:It seems like Garland Greene, who is touted as a horrific serial killer, is about to kill the little girl he runs into near the abandoned airfield, but he doesn't.]] |
| 201 | * InconvenientlyVanishingExoneratingEvidence: Poe is attacked outside a bar by a drunk with a knife and kills him. One of the drunk's friends grabs the knife before the police show up. This, combined with an incompetent lawyer and an anti-military judge results in Poe being sent to the Super Max which starts the plot. |
| 202 | * InformedAttribute: Garland Greene had supposedly killed more people than any convict on the plane, and had the absolute highest amount of security for transporting him. However, whilst he definitely alludes to having formerly killed people, we never really see any of his murderous aspects on-screen, to the point where it looks like he just ''might'' have been cured of them. |
| 203 | * InspectorJavert: Malloy has trouble believing Poe (or any convict) is good. [[RabidCop He also instantly calls for the plane being shot down from the sky]] even if there's still a few guards being kept as hostages on board, pointing out that the prisoners are just too dangerous to be given a chance for getting away and [[TheyKnewTheRisks the hostages knew this was a risk on their line of work]]. |
| 204 | * InstitutionalApparel: Criminals in jumpsuits of some other color. See ColourCodedForYourConvenience. |
| 205 | * IronicEcho: Casey's letter. |
| 206 | -->'''Poe/Cyrus''': "My birthday is on July 14. My daddy is coming home on July 14. I'm gonna see my daddy for the first time ever on July 14." |
| 207 | * {{Irony}}: Notorious criminal Cyrus "The Virus" Grissom allegedly earned his juris doctorate while incarcerated. An advanced law degree earned by someone who'd gleefully break every law known to man. |
| 208 | * IsntItIronic: As the inmates dance to [[Music/LynyrdSkynyrd "Sweet Home Alabama"]], Garland Greene defines irony as "a bunch of idiots dancing around on a plane to a song made famous by a band that died in a plane crash." |
| 209 | * IWontSayImGuilty: Averted. Poe pleads guilty at the advice of his idiot attorney, thinking he'll get a reduced sentence. The judge instead hits him with the full sentence under dubious pretenses. |
| 210 | * {{Jerkass}}: |
| 211 | ** The judge who sentenced Poe to prison did so with an extremely flimsy reason. |
| 212 | ** Agent Malloy is an unapologetic RabidCop who parks his CoolCar in a handicapped space right after he boasts how awesome it is ([[EstablishingCharacterMoment his first two lines in the film, even]]). |
| 213 | ** Guard Falzon who takes away Poe's photo of Casey from him at the initial plane boarding and is generally an unlikable shithead. |
| 214 | ** Interestingly, the only major convict who ''isn't'' this is Garland Greene, and he's a [[Literature/TheSilenceOfTheLambs Hannibal Lecter]] rip-off. |
| 215 | * JerkassHasAPoint: |
| 216 | ** When the plane's about to crash, Malloy points out that civilian casualties could be enormous, which could've been avoided had they shot the plane down in the desert, and considering the plane crashes right in the middle of the UsefulNotes/LasVegas strip... yeah, a lot of people would definitely be dead. |
| 217 | ** Larkin sarcastically acknowledged that letting the plane crash land made a mess. |
| 218 | * JurisdictionFriction: Despite the prison flight being handled by the US Marshals, it became a DEA case by DEA Agent Malloy after DEA Agent Sims was shot dead by Cyrus. |
| 219 | * KarmaHoudini: [[spoiler:Garland Greene, though all his villainy is in his backstory.]] During the movie [[spoiler:Garland instinctively realizes Poe is a good guy pretending to be a hard con, and has a lengthy dialogue about ironic situations about how a good man has to act evil to survive. The fact that Garland intentionally leaves a little girl alive during the plane refueling hints that by the end of the movie Garland has decided to act good.]] |
| 220 | * KarmicDeath: |
| 221 | ** When his dead body is found, Johnny 23's tattooed arm is detached from his body, but still shackled in his cage. |
| 222 | ** As Pinball tries to get the plane to stop so he can get on, the only prisoner to see him is the Native American whom he picked on and set on fire to start the hijacking. Naturally, he doesn't tell anyone what he saw, indirectly causing Pinball's death. |
| 223 | * KilledOffscreen: The fate of the pilot of the ''Jailbird'' by Cyrus, who shoots him after radioing into traffic control; despite claiming to spare him if he didn't say anything out of line. Whether the pilot [[TooDumbToLive did inform control about the situation in full]] or if Cyrus simply [[ILied lied about sparing him to begin with]] is left up in the air. |
| 224 | * LargeHam[=/=]WorldOfHam: Everyone. Cage is in good company here. |
| 225 | * TheLastThingYouEverSee: You know what? [[BerserkButton That makes Poe mad]]. |
| 226 | * LevitatingLotusPosition: Poe pulls this off by doing pushups in a LotusPosition during his montage. |
| 227 | * LifesavingMisfortune: The movie has a gag where a man is saved from being crushed by a falling corpse because he has to clean up pigeon crap on his windshield. |
| 228 | * LunaticLoophole: At the end, when all the other convicts have either been arrested or killed, Garland Greene just walks away. |
| 229 | * MadeOfExplodium: Trope Exemplar. Planes explode, cars explode, all of the windows on a bridge detonate when a couple of them are hit by Cyrus and part of a ladder, all bullets make a spark when they hit something metal no matter how flimsy, and the climactic shootout at the Lerner Field junkyard is full of fireballs that are only ''partially'' justified by the convicts placing propane tanks around to trap the cops and National Guardsmen coming to get them in a kill box. |
| 230 | * ManOnFire: |
| 231 | ** The hijacking begins when Pinball pulls a small tube of oil and matches out of his mouth, squeezes the oil out on Warlock, and lights him on fire. Warlock is burned, but ultimately survives. [[spoiler:(At least, he survived longer than [[KarmicDeath Pinball]].)]] The commotion from the fire permits Pinball to swipe Guard Bishop's keys and free Diamond Dog and Cyrus. |
| 232 | ** Cyrus casually [[VaporTrail flicks his lit cigarette into the mix of avgas and gasoline]] that [[spoiler:Francisco Cindino]] is standing in after the jet crashes into the gas pumps, turning him into a human torch. |
| 233 | * MeaningfulEcho: Poe is called "That guy" by the two most important people in his life; Tricia (in reference to his DarkAndTroubledPast) and Baby-O (to remind him he's not a soldier anymore). |
| 234 | * MeaningfulName: Johnny 23, so named because he was convicted of 23 counts of rape. He claimed to have raped more than 23 women, though. |
| 235 | * MistakenForJunkie: In the midst of the explosive chaos at the desert airfield, Poe dives under a car only to find an old mechanic already hiding there. After assuring the old man that he means no harm, he asks for a syringe. The old man tells him he shouldn't be using, but Poe clarifies he needs a first aid kit. |
| 236 | * MonumentalDamage: Jailbird One smashes into some of the Vegas Strip's well known casinos. |
| 237 | * NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast: Cyrus the Virus. |
| 238 | * NiceGuy: Cameron Poe. The crime that put him in jail was accidental, and happened because he was trying to defend his wife. The film implies that he wasn't so nice before becoming an Army Ranger ("you almost were... ''that guy'' again", from Trish, when the rednecks rile him up inside of the bar), though. |
| 239 | * NiceJobBreakingItHero: |
| 240 | ** "Nice work, son. Not only did you ''not'' save this dude's life, you done made best friends with Cyrus the damn Virus." |
| 241 | ** Larkin convinces Malloy not to shoot down the plane in the desert and it crashes into the Vegas strip. |
| 242 | * NiceJobFixingItVillain: Diamond Dog asks Poe to help him fix the landing gear. This gives Poe the opportunity to get a message to Larkin to warn them of where the plane was really heading. |
| 243 | * NoOneGetsLeftBehind: Cameron Poe is an awesome Rambo Jesus that way. He was an Army Ranger, who have this as part of their creed, so Poe refuses to leave his friend behind, nor the female prison guard. |
| 244 | * NoSell: Near the ending, Poe walks towards the BigBad who destroyed his peaceful ride home. A nearby con raises his gun and shoots at the striding Poe, who gets hit in the upper arm. He just keeps walking and kicks the con's ass. |
| 245 | * NotQuiteDead: Apparently the plane crash in Vegas didn't kill off all the bad guys and they manage to escape with a fire truck. |
| 246 | * NotSoDifferentRemark: Garland compares Poe to other famous serial killers which infuriates him. |
| 247 | -->'''Poe''': [[ShutUpHannibal I got nothing in common with them! With you! Don't you talk to me!]] |
| 248 | * OffstageVillainy: Garland Greene is presented as one of the most horrific and prolific serial killers who ever lived, and is certainly feared by the other criminals, but all his crimes occurred before his introduction. He boasts of killing a little girl and wearing her face as a GenuineHumanHide, [[spoiler:yet he thankfully refrains from killing a girl he runs into. The end rather implies that he's gone good, but his past crimes still make him an ''extreme'' KarmaHoudini.]] |
| 249 | * OneHitKill: During the initial takeover, Cyrus hits one of the guards ''very'' hard in the face as he charges the cockpit. The guard is later seen being dragged by his feet, something not recommended with someone who's still alive. |
| 250 | ** Poe ends up accidently killing one of the men who attack him and Trisha in the beginning of the movie with a palm strike to his nose. |
| 251 | * OneSteveLimit: Sally Bishop and Sally-Can't-Dance, though it's subverted due to the [[AmbiguousGenderIdentity latter's birth name being Ramon]]. |
| 252 | * OnlyAFleshWound: Poe piercing a wooden pole through Cyrus' leg causes some screaming but doesn't put him out of action. |
| 253 | * OohMeAccentsSlipping: What you get when you cast Nic Cage as a Southern former Army Ranger. |
| 254 | * OutrunTheFireball: Poe, jumping through a window to save himself from the exploding gas station. |
| 255 | * ParkingPayback: Set up by the universe. Malloy parks his car in a handicapped space early in the film, before everything goes to hell. [[HeroStoleMyBike Larkin steals the car to get to Lerner Airfield fast]] early in the third act, and it [[ThePreciousPreciousCar gets completely smashed]] shortly after he gets there. |
| 256 | * PetTheDog: Cyrus backs up Cameron when the latter defends Bishop after Johnny 23 tries to rape her. It helps that Cyrus [[EvenEvilHasStandards hates rapists]]. |
| 257 | * PistolWhipping: After Cyrus' failed attempt to ShootOutTheLock, he drops the empty rifle. Sally Bishop picks it up and calls out "Cyrus!" He turns around with an angry "What?", and she [[HeyYouHaymaker slams him in the head with the rifle butt]]. |
| 258 | * PlanningWithProps: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqR9bID5Tpc&feature=related Cyrus demonstrates the plan]] to surround the police convoy using soda cans, engine parts and debris. The rock doesn't mean anything, though. |
| 259 | * PoliticallyIncorrectHero: The prison guard in charge of transporting the prisoners says to Pinball "Boy, you are one skinny Negro." |
| 260 | * PoliticallyIncorrectVillain: Both members of the BigBadDuumvirate are notable racists. Cyrus the Virus says a lot of racist comments toward Pinball and Baby-O, later clarifying to Pinball that he meant it. Diamond Dog is a black supremacist terrorist who believes that all white people are inherently evil. However, both of them are still [[PragmaticVillainy pragmatic enough]] to team up with each other, if only for the time being. |
| 261 | * ThePreciousPreciousCar: Malloy's car is a vintage Corvette Stingray that he makes clear he considers incredibly precious. Larkin steals it and it gets smashed as the convicts escape Lerner Airfield in the third act, and Malloy gets utterly ''pissed'' when it comes crashing down five feet away from him. |
| 262 | * PreMortemOneLiner: "Cy..." "...onara!" |
| 263 | * PreserveYourGays: Sally-Can't-Dance, who's [[AmbiguousGenderIdentity trans or gay]], is one of the few survivors. |
| 264 | * PrisonRiot: |
| 265 | ** A part of the montage following Cameron Poe's imprisonment shows him reading his daughter's letters in his cell as other prisoners riot. |
| 266 | ** The hijacking of the ''Jailbird'' starts off with one of these by way of Pinball setting Warlock on fire before attacking the guard dragging him away and freeing his fellow prisoners. |
| 267 | * PrisonShip: The airplane is a prison transport. |
| 268 | * PrisonsAreGymnasiums: The film featured Nicolas Cage's character doing this while in prison, though he seemed to be in good enough shape already. |
| 269 | * ProfaneLastWords: Non-verbal version. Pinball's last act before being killed by the ''Jailbird'''s landing gear is to give the convict he set on fire (and is the only one who noticed he's running alongside the plane) the finger. |
| 270 | * PunctuatedPounding: "You don't... treat... women... like...''that''!" |
| 271 | * QuirkyMinibossSquad: Viking, Curly and Sally guard the way to the cockpit. Poe disposes of them easy. |
| 272 | * RabidCop: Malloy. Several deaths occur because he insisted on his undercover agent bringing a gun to the plane even when he's supposed to be a prisoner (and when Larkin puts his foot down and insists it won't happen, Malloy still manages to pass him a pistol secretly and remains completely unapologetic about it ("if I had known that the plane was going to be taken over, I WOULD HAVE GIVEN HIM AN UZI!!!")). He also constantly advocates just killing all of the prisoners, hostages [[InspectorJavert and actually lawful prisoners playing mole]] be damned (when Larkin points out that they ''have'' hostages, Malloy answers that TheyKnewTheRisks). And when the "Jailbird" is trying to take off from the field... |
| 273 | -->'''Larkin''' ''(trying to stop the "Jailbird" from taking off)'': Shoot the tires!\ |
| 274 | '''Malloy''': Fuck the tires! I'm going for the pilot [Swamp Thing]! |
| 275 | * TheRadioDiesFirst: When Larkin arrives at Lerner Field, he finds the air traffic controller dead and the control tower radio busted. |
| 276 | * RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil: |
| 277 | ** Serial rapist Johnny 23 gets this line thrown in his face by Cyrus. |
| 278 | ---> '''Cyrus:''' I despise rapists. For me, you're somewhere between a cockroach and that white stuff that accumulates at the corner of your mouth when you're really thirsty. But, in your case, I'll make an exception. |
| 279 | ** Later, Cyrus threatens Johnny 23 to at least wait until they are out of the country before doing such shenanigans with Bishop. And when he actually does try something with Bishop on board and Cameron Poe gets hold of him, well...see PunctuatedPounding above. |
| 280 | * RasputinianDeath: The ultimate fate of [[spoiler: Cyrus the Virus]]. Wait - I think he just twitched in that rock crusher... |
| 281 | * RatedMForManly: Guns, cops, cons, a lot of shirtless scenes, stuff exploding, male virtues like honor, etc. |
| 282 | * RecklessGunUsage: During the final chase scene, Larkin tosses his gun onto the road when it runs dry. On the one hand, he should have brought spare magazines to a firefight and on the other, no U.S. Marshal would carelessly discard their weapon for someone to pick up. |
| 283 | * RedBaron: Some of the cons have nasty-sounding nicknames applied to them. Cyrus "the Virus" is just one of them. |
| 284 | * RedemptionEarnsLife: Garland Greene again. At the end of the movie he is alive and probably free, too. He is the KarmaHoudini, if we look at his past. But he refrains from killing the defenceless little girl, thus (in some way) redeeming himself and earning this karmic prize. |
| 285 | * RedShirtArmy: The National Guard sent to apprehend the con's at the boneyard, who come there in a rescue operation. Driving straight down through rows of junked airplanes that just screams "perfect spot for an ambush" they proceed to indeed get ambushed by forewarned cons, who kill a lot of them easily. Larkin has to bail them out using a bulldozer to provide cover for them to break through, although once through the ambush they pretty quickly force the Cons to fall back to the plane and retreat. |
| 286 | * RedundantRescue: Most of the surviving guards make it off the plane on their own power. |
| 287 | * ReminiscingAboutYourVictims: Garland Greene does this. It's how we know he killed a girl and used her head as a hat. |
| 288 | * RevengeByProxy: Billy Bedlam's revenge on his cheating wife. |
| 289 | -->'''Agent Sims:''' The mass murderer?\ |
| 290 | '''Larkin''': The same. He caught his wife in bed with another man. Left her alone, drove four towns over to his wife's family's house. [[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill Killed her parents, her brothers, her sisters,]] [[KickTheDog even her dog.]] |
| 291 | * RippedFromTheHeadlines: The movie was inspired by a newspaper article about a plane that transports convicts. |
| 292 | * ScaryBlackMan: Diamond Dog. He's a MalcolmXerox without the glasses or the soapbox. Strangely, he's one of the most well-spoken characters in the entire movie, and wrote a ''New York Times'' bestseller in jail. And was interviewed by Geraldo. And there was talk in-story about a movie being made about him, with Creator/{{Denzel|Washington}} being cast to play him. |
| 293 | * SchmuckBait: The cops are investigating the stuff Cyrus left behind his cell wall planning out the plane hijacking. Vince leaves the cell, and tells the guards not to touch anything. They see that one of the boxes is marked "Do Not Open". The bomb inside it explodes when they open it. |
| 294 | * ScrewThisImOuttaHere: The OldCon onboard the plane volunteers to take one of the dead convicts place, saying that he’s ‘too old for this shit.’ |
| 295 | * SerialKiller: Garland Greene is a serial killer who killed dozens of people along the East Coast in what's implied to be unusually horrific ways (the only thing he says is he'd wore one of his victims [[GenuineHumanHide head as a hat]]). Even many other hardened cons fear him, though [[OffscreenVillainy he never harms so much as a fly in the film]], even sweetly having tea with a young girl. At the end, it's implied he's cured of his homicidal impulses somehow. |
| 296 | * SerialRapist: Johnny-23 is named for his twenty-three counts of rape. Cyrus "the Virus" Grissom, the resident BigBad, despises him, making a point of telling him to keep it in his pants when around the only female guard, or "you jump out of this plane." He boasts to said female guard, "They'd call me Johnny 600 if they knew the truth", and later tries to attack her, leading to a ''very'' well-deserved beatdown from Cameron Poe. |
| 297 | -->'''Cameron:''' [[PunctuatedPounding YOU! DON'T! TREAT! WOMEN! LIKE! THAT!]] |
| 298 | * SesquipedalianLoquaciousness: Half the TropeNamer. John Cusack's Marshal Vince Larkin: |
| 299 | -->'''Larkin''': [Cindino's] known to be somewhat garrulous in the company of thieves.\ |
| 300 | '''Malloy''': Garrulous? What the fuck is garrulous?\ |
| 301 | '''Larkin''': That would be loquacious, verbose, effusive. How about "chatty"?\ |
| 302 | '''Malloy''': [to Devers] What's with Dictionary Boy?\ |
| 303 | '''Larkin''': [[InsultBackfire "Thesaurus Boy", I think, is more appropriate.]] |
| 304 | * ShippedInShackles: Garland Greene was introduced while restrained in a manner similar to [[Film/TheSilenceOfTheLambs Hannibal Lecter]], complete with mask. [[{{Expy}} This was likely intentional.]] |
| 305 | * ShootOutTheLock: How Cyrus opens the gate to the plane's front section. [[DownplayedTrope It does take an entire magazine]] [[MoreDakka from an assault rifle]] to do it, though. |
| 306 | * ShoutOut: Nathan Jones's nickname, Diamond Dog, is a reference to Music/DavidBowie's 1974 [[Music/DiamondDogs album with the same name]]. |
| 307 | * SignificantReferenceDate: Cameron Poe's daughter's birthday [[note]] and the day Poe would meet her for the first time[[/note]] was July 14, the anniversary of the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storming_of_the_Bastille Storming of the Bastille]], an historical event that foreshadows what happens onboard the "Jailbird" (it's taken hostage by convicts). [[note]]About 1000 people participated in the 1789 event, with seven prisoners said to be imprisoned there at the time. The number of named prisoners onboard at the beginning of the film? Seven: Pinball, Odell, Billy Bedlam, Johnny 23, Diamond Dog, Cyrus, and Cameron Poe.[[/note]] |
| 308 | * SissyVillain: Sally Can't Dance, one of the villainous prisoners, is a {{camp gay}} guy in a dress, or trans woman ([[AmbiguousGenderIdentity it isn't clear]]). |
| 309 | * SituationalSexuality: The escaped convicts all throw {{Wolf Whistle}}s at [[SissyVillain Sally-Can't-Dance]] after s/he's found a dress at the abandoned airfield. Cyrus even stuffs a rifle magazine into the VictoriasSecretCompartment while instructing Sally to guard the hostages. |
| 310 | * SlashedThroat: Diamond Dog slits a guard's throat with his cuffs during the initial takeover. |
| 311 | * SleevesAreForWimps: Poe, who spends most of the movie in a tank top. |
| 312 | * TheSlowWalk: Poe's trademark. Even when he tries to outrun an explosion, the scene gets a lot of slow-mo. |
| 313 | * SoundtrackDissonance: Pinball falls off the plane to the tune of "A Summer Place". Also Garland Greene singing "He's Got The Whole World In His Hands" while the plane crashes. |
| 314 | * SpitefulSpit: |
| 315 | ** Inmate Popovich spits at guard Falzon and tells him "Fuck you, pig". |
| 316 | ** While celebrating the escape from the boneyard, the skinny black inmate and Viking can be seen spitting the guard hostages. |
| 317 | * SpontaneousHumanCombustion: Mentioned; after Pinball intentionally sets a fellow prisoner on fire in order to create a distraction for the other more dangerous prisoners about to attempt to hijack the plane, in the middle of all the confusion Pinball shouts that [[BlatantLies it was an act of spontaneous combustion]]. |
| 318 | * SpottingTheThread: Poe makes up an excuse about having another fifteen years to serve so he can stay on the plane instead of getting off in Nevada. Bedlam later confronts him, noting that Poe's supposed sentence would put him in North Block, where Bedlam was also housed, yet the two have never met. Poe dismisses their unfamiliarity as having no desire to interact with any of the 150+ prisoners on North Block, Bedlam included, but Bedlam remains suspicious of him from then on. |
| 319 | * TheStarscream: Diamond Dog admits he is one of these to Poe, saying he'll go along with Cyrus and follow his orders until he doesn't need him anymore, and then "the Day of the Dog begins." |
| 320 | * TheStinger: After the fade to black, Garland Greene is shown having a drink at the Craps tables. |
| 321 | * StrawmanPolitical: Malloy keeps accusing Larkin of being this. |
| 322 | --> '''Malloy''': Of course you can't reach [Larkin]! He's probably off saving the rainforests, or recycling his sandals or some shit! |
| 323 | * StupidCrooks: When the new inmates get on the plane in Carson City and see the plane has been taken over by their fellow inmates, one of them inmediatly starts yelling in cheer and has to be silenced by Pinball as the plane is still surrounded by local law enforcement and could easily hear him. |
| 324 | * SurrenderBackfire: Non-lethal example. Poe's [[CrimeOfSelfDefense entire situation]] occurs, or at least was exacerbated, by him following the advice of his lawyer to plead guilty to his charges and let the judge show mercy, not knowing that his case was being presided by a HangingJudge. |
| 325 | * TalkingThroughTechnique: Apparently, the inmates communicated with another through stencils. |
| 326 | * TemptingFate: It's discussed what a brilliant idea it was to put all of the most dangerous criminals in the country on the same plane. Larkin's assistant hopes nothing goes wrong. He replies that [[DramaticIrony the plane is a well-oiled machine]]. He was frankly asking for it. |
| 327 | -->''"All they'll have to worry about is stale peanuts and a little turbulence."'' |
| 328 | * ThereIsAGod: As Mike "Baby-O" O'Dell is dying on the plane, he tells Nicholas Cage's character that sometimes he wonders if there's a God. Cage's character tells him he'll show him there is one, and then starts kicking Con butt. |
| 329 | * TitleDrop: Upon taking over the plane, Cyrus gets on the intercom and announces, "Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. I have the only gun on board. Welcome to Con Air!" |
| 330 | * TooDumbToLive: |
| 331 | ** A pair of guards are left to watch over Cyrus's prison cell, with clear orders from Larkin not to touch anything in the hidden compartment they just uncovered. One of them ignores him completely, opening a box with the words [[SchmuckBait "DO NOT OPEN"]] written across the top. [[StuffBlowingUp Kaboom.]] |
| 332 | ** DEA agent Sims gets killed by Cyrus after blowing his cover and trying to take the plane back by himself while armed only with a very small pocket pistol. |
| 333 | ** One of the drunken thugs in the opening ends up dead after attacking Poe. It must have been a prolific amount of alcohol to think attacking a soldier wearing Ranger tabs would end any way but badly. |
| 334 | ** Unsurprisingly, bringing a gun on a flight proves to be the downfall of both the co-pilot and pilot of the ''Jailbird'' as Cyrus uses it to kill them both. Bonus points for Cyrus using it to hold the pilot hostage, then shooting him after radioing into traffic control anyway. Unlike the co-pilot, who is shot in the gut trying to kill Cyrus, we never see the specifics that set off the pilot's death. |
| 335 | * TrainingMontage: In the title sequence we see Nicolas Cage's character working out [[PrisonsAreGymnasiums in his prison cell]]. |
| 336 | * TriumphantReprise: Has two. |
| 337 | ** "How Do I Live?" is first heard when Poe comes home from the army to find his wife Tricia and their unborn daughter Casey. It is heard again in the end when he finally meets Casey in person. |
| 338 | ** "Sweet Home Alabama" is heard first when the cons escape the boneyard, then again in the end when we see [[spoiler: Garland Greene is still at large]]. |
| 339 | * UnflinchingWalk: |
| 340 | ** Played with. The cons are walking away from a burning plane, and when it explodes, Cyrus doesn't react and keeps walking, but everyone else flinches or turns around to look. |
| 341 | ** [[spoiler:Poe walks ''towards'' a gun-toting con after the plane crashes and is on fire, taking a bullet in the shoulder without pausing.]] |
| 342 | * UnusuallyUninterestingSight: |
| 343 | ** No one cares that Poe cuffed Johnny-23. |
| 344 | ** Upon seeing Malloy's car tethered to the plane: |
| 345 | --->'''Poe:''' On any other day that might seem strange. |
| 346 | * VanityLicensePlate: AZZ-KIKR for Malloy's car. |
| 347 | * VaporTrail: Cyrus casually flicks his lit cigarette into the mix of avgas and gasoline that [[spoiler:Francisco Cindino]] is standing in after the jet crashes into the gas pumps, turning him into a ManOnFire. |
| 348 | * VideoCredits: With everyone happy and laughing with "Sweet Home Alabama" as BGM. |
| 349 | * VillainousBreakdown: Cyrus, usually very composed and in control, standing on the open ramp of the plane in flight, holding a pistol to the head of the bunny, yelling at an assault chopper. |
| 350 | * VivaLasVegas: Where the bad guys plan to land in, and where the plane crashes. |
| 351 | * WatchThePaintJob: Malloy's car doesn't survives the events of the movie. Even when he lets Larkin off the hook for its destruction, he still mentions that he loved it. |
| 352 | * WifeBasherBasher: Cameron Poe becomes one when he catches Johnny trying to rape a female guard. See PunctuatedPounding, wherein he slams the bastard's head ''repeatedly'' into a bulkhead while teaching him Chivalry 101. The very ''reason'' he was in jail ''in the first place'' was to defend his wife from being attacked by three drunken idiots. |
| 353 | -->"Do '''[[PunctuatedForEmphasis not]]'''! Treat! Women! Like! '''''THAT'''''!" |
| 354 | * WildGooseChase: When the convicts remove the plane's tracking device and places it on a scenic tours flight. |
| 355 | * TheWorfBarrage: When Malloy finally gets his Cobra to start shooting up the plane, there is a patently absurd sequence where sustained bursts of 20mm Gatling gun rounds just bounce off the ramp and otherwise bounce around like they are little more than small arms rounds. When in reality, the cannon shells would blow straight through one side of the plane and out the other turning it into a fireball in a handful of seconds. |
| 356 | * WouldHitAGirl: Quite a few of the prisoners are guilty of very violent crimes against women. |
| 357 | ** Johnny 23 of course as a SerialRapist who was convicted of 23 counts of it and tries several times to have his way with Bishop, even going so far as to make her number 24. Poe takes it [[NoHoldsBarredBeatdown as well as expected]] when he sees this. |
| 358 | ** A couple of Billy Bedlam’s victims were his wife’s mother and sisters. |
| 359 | ** Garland Greene mentions to driving around three states wearing a girl’s face as a hat and quite possibly had a few more female victims. |
| 360 | ** While Cyrus considers RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil. He has no problems killing Bishop once his plans have been ruined and to draw out the “traitor” who’s been feeding information to the authorities. She's also slammed in the head by Pinball during the initial hijacking. |
| 361 | * WouldntHitAGirl: During his FoeTossingCharge, the last person on the line is Sally-Can't-Dance, who is -- depending on your interpretation -- either CampGay or a trans woman. Poe nearly punches Sally, hesitates, then slaps instead. |
| 362 | * WouldHurtAChild: Before the plane crashes in Vegas, Cyrus angrily tells Poe that the last thing that his daughter will ever get to smell “will be my stinking breath” [[PapaWolf Poe doesn’t give him the chance to get anywhere near little Casey.]] |
| 363 | * WrongInsultOffence: |
| 364 | -->'''Vince Larkin:''' ''[to Sims while walking to the surveillance truck]'' We pick up Mr. Cindino in Carson City. From then until the plane hits Alabama, we've got two hours to get him to talk. We got you a seat right next to him, and he's known to be somewhat garrulous in the company of thieves.\ |
| 365 | '''Duncan Malloy:''' Garrulous? What the fuck is garrulous\ |
| 366 | '''Vince Larkin:''' That would be loquacious, verbose, effusive. How about chatty?\ |
| 367 | '''Duncan Malloy:''' ''[to Devers]'' What's with Dictionary Boy?\ |
| 368 | '''Vince Larkin:''' "Thesaurus Boy" I think is more appropriate. |
| 369 | ---- |
| 370 | ->''[[BondOneLiner Why couldn't you put the tropes back in the page?]]'' |
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