History Film / FlightPlan

[[quoteright:260:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/flight_plan_6918.jpg]]

''Flightplan'' is a 2005 thriller film directed by Robert Schwentke and starring Creator/JodieFoster.

Foster plays Kyle Pratt, an airplane propulsion engineer whose husband has mysteriously died from falling off the top of a building. She and her six year old daughter, Julia (Marlene Lawston), are now heading back to Long Island from Berlin aboard the massive new passenger plane she helped design, the [[CoolPlane Elgin 474]]. The body of her husband is in the hold.

Three hours into the flight the two take a nap; when Kyle wakes up, Julia has disappeared without a trace. Everyone on board the plane, including air marshal Gene Carson (Creator/PeterSarsgaard), flight attendant Stephanie (Kate Beahan) and Captain Marcus Rich (Creator/SeanBean) insist that they never saw her daughter, [[{{Unperson}} and that her name is not even listed on the flight's manifest]]. That's when things get crazy.

Critical reception was mixed to negative. While the performances of the principal cast are praised; the plot is criticized as being [[PlotHole riddled with holes]] and FridgeLogic.

Not to be confused with Japanese video game developer [[Creator/FlightPlan Flight-Plan]], or ''Film/NonStop'', another thriller on a plane.

----
!!''Flightplan'' provides examples of the following tropes:

* AdultFear: [[InSPACE In the SKY!]]
* AndThereWasMuchRejoicing: A variation of this where the passengers applaud Carson for arresting Kyle after all the hullabaloo the latter put them through.
* ApatheticCitizens: ''Lots'' of people ''did'' see Julia running around the cabin but after her mother raised a fuss and got the airplane redirected, the assholes ''cheered'' at seeing her dragged back to her seat in handcuffs by Carson, [[spoiler:the bastard who kidnapped her.]]
-->[[spoiler:'''Carson:''' We picked her up, shoved her into a food bin and '''nobody even looked up.''' You understand what I'm saying? '''Nobody cares about Julia!''']]
* ArmorPiercingQuestion: [[spoiler: When confronting her alone on the plane, Kyle asks Stephanie if she has the guts to essentially kill Julie, a little girl and somebody's daughter, in cold blood for money. This is enough to catch Stephanie off-guard long enough for Kyle to deck her.]]
* [[spoiler:TheBadGuysAreCops]]: The big twist.
* BatmanGambit: [[spoiler:Pulled on ''every passenger except Kyle.'' All Carson had to do was sucker Kyle into pissing off the ApatheticCitizens, and they took everything he said as gospel truth since that meant they had someone to blame for the inconvenience. Even if Kyle was [[TheSpock perfectly calm]] despite [[AdultFear her daughter disappearing into thin air]], that would simply creep the passengers out ''even more''. Yeah, the movie's not that far-fetched.]]
-->[[spoiler:'''Carson:''' People will think what I '''tell''' them to think. '''That's how authority works.''']]
* BavarianFireDrill: The core of the [[BigBad Big Bad's]] plan. [[spoiler:Kyle pulls one of her own to turn the tables on the highjackers late in the film. Using the fact that the passengers and crew think she's the highjacker to her advantage to make everyone get off the plane so she can look for the bomb and Julia without interference.]]
* BittersweetEnding: In a sense. [[spoiler: Kyle has found her daughter Julia alive and cleared her name. And Carson [[HoistByHisOwnPetard has been blown up by the very bomb he planted for this conspiracy]]. All the passengers are safe, and the remaining accomplices of the conspiracy are being interrogated. But this is also a hollow victory, as the passengers feel guilty at having earlier cheered on [[VillainWithGoodPublicity Carson]] for arresting [[HeroWithBadPublicity Kyle]]. They'll have to live with the regret that their [[ApatheticCitizens apathy]] nearly cost a little girl her life. But as a small token of apology, one of the passengers Kyle wrongfully accused earlier helps her with her luggage.]]
* BrokenBird: Kyle is clearly this after the untimely death of her husband. She must cast that aside though once her daughter goes missing.
* ComplexityAddiction: The villains could have just as easily [[spoiler:put some explosives in an ordinary briefcase, rigged it with a remote detonator, and just talked to the airline via email. Murdering Kyle's husband and kidnapping her daughter for a DeceasedFallGuyGambit would have worked out brilliantly... if they had used literally ''anyone'' other than '''the woman who designed the damned plane!''']]
** Nothing better shows how overly complicated their plan is than by remembering that step one involved [[spoiler:murdering an American expatriate just so they could use his casket to smuggle the bomb on board the plane, and to get his wife and daughter on board the flight to set up a DeceasedFallGuyGambit. If the authorities had even suspected that Gene was involved in Kyle's husband's death, or if Kyle herself had stayed to cooperate with the investigation if the police suspected foul play, the plan would have been foiled before it even got off the ground]].
* CondensationClue: [[spoiler:The heart Julia drew on the window confirms that Kyle isn't going crazy and hadn't just imagined that her supposedly dead daughter was on the plane]].
* DeceasedFallGuyGambit: [[spoiler:What the villains' plan would have become in its final form. After arriving in their final destination, they would have made all the other passengers leave with Kyle still in custody. Quietly sneaked off the plane, detonated the bomb that was strapped onto Julia vaporizing her body and destroying all evidence she was ever on board and killing Kyle who would still be on board. They then tell their story to the authorities, get praised as heroes and jet to a nice warm, extradition-free island to enjoy their money before anyone realizes that a thing or two doesn't add up]].
* DeathInTheClouds: This plan is a dangerous place to be.
* EvenEvilHasStandards: [[spoiler: Compared to Carson, Stephanie gradually grows nervous as the conspiracy goes on, hinting she's feeling guilty about having to kill Julia as part of the plan. During the climax, when Kyle asks if she would kill a little girl for money, Stephanie's hesitation strongly implies even she doesn't think it's right.]]
* FallGuy: [[spoiler: One of the main goals of the plan is to frame Kyle for the hijacking in order to provide the villains with cover to escape]].
* FinalExchange: After finally rescuing her daughter, Kyle takes the detonator to the bombs on the plane. Carson nearby asks her if she was going to blow up the plane. Kyle answers, "No, only you." Cue an OhCrap moment when he finds where the bombs are.
* GambitRoulette: [[spoiler:Gene]] had to...
** Get Kyle's husband onto the roof of a building and push him off without anyone seeing.
** Know in advance exactly where the body would be taken.
** Risk involving the morgue director in ThePlan.
** Know which flight the coffin will travel on.
** Ensure that he got assigned to that flight and ensure [[spoiler:Stephanie]] gets assigned to that flight.
** Get explosives into a coffin for which he didn't know the combination.
** Rely on Kyle and Julia getting on board without anyone noticing Julia. Rely on Julia not speaking to anyone, not making any noise, and not asking for anything, rely on there being empty seats on a packed inaugural flight of a new aircraft type, rely on Kyle taking Julia to lie on those seats, rely on no-one seeing Julia's removal, rely on no-one noticing a man putting his hand into a sleeping woman's trousers, rely on Kyle going ballistic rather than just calmly talking to people and making requests, somehow manage to get the computerized check-in systems to "forget" Julia, rely on Kyle not requesting the airport authorities check the inevitable CCTV footage, rely on the corrupt stewardess being the one assigned to search the section with the kidnapped child, rely on the captain/airline contacting the morgue (to ask what?) rather than the hospital or police and thus get the fake information, rely on no-one, immediately on hearing of the child's death, asking why her coffin is not on board, rely on Kyle escaping and opening a coffin that she believes is sealed when there are dozens upon dozens of other luggage containers in the hold, rely on the authorities agreeing to the ransom without talking to the so-called terrorist, rely on them actually transferring the money -- how would an alleged terrorist have known if it had been transferred? -- find a way to get the money when the authorities knew exactly where it was, rely on the exploding child leaving no trace with an amount of explosive so small it didn't even hurt two people who were no more than ten meters away when it went off -- which would not happen -- expect someone with no explosives training to know that the explosives present were of such low power that they would be safe no more than 10 meters away, and have the corrupt stewardess remain on the plane (necessary to distract Kyle so that the marshal could free and arm himself) -- how would that have been explained later? Why would she even have remained? This plot, to put it charitably, is simply not within the realm of physical possibility.
* GasLighting: [[spoiler:Much of the action involves the villains trying to convince Kyle, and by extension the rest of the passengers and crew, that she's suffered a break from reality. Subverted in that it's much more effective on the witnesses than the target]].
* GenreShift: The first half plays out as an interesting psychological thriller, where we begin to believe the main character [[spoiler: actually imagined her daughter and was completely crazy from grief.]] But then it turns out [[spoiler: her daughter actually WAS kidnapped, and every single one of her crazy and far fetched ridiculous theories were right, and terrorists actually DID kill her husband and kidnapped the daughter to get her to look crazy.]] It ends up as just another generic action flick with guns, explosions, and cheesy one liners.
* GenderBlenderName: Kyle is typically a man's/boy's name.
* {{Greed}}: [[spoiler:It's revealed late on in the film that Air Marshal Gene Carson planned on hijacking the plane, framing Kyle as the scapegoat, and blowing up Julia simply because he wants $50 million. A quote he says to Kyle who still has no idea what is going on implies the first thing he will probably do is take a vacation.]]
-->[[spoiler:'''Carson:''' You have no idea how happy I'm going to be to end this case.]]
* HeelFaceTurn: Downplayed. [[spoiler: The flight attendant who was in on the plot with Carson doesn't help Kyle. But she does show a guilty conscience at carrying on the conspiracy at the expense of a little girl, ''somebody's baby''. What's more, she doesn't help Carson any further when Kyle decks her.]]
* KansasCityShuffle: [[spoiler: What the villains are ultimately trying to pull on passengers of the flight. They intended to make everyone think the Kyle was using her claims about Julia to draw attention from the fact that she was hijacking the plane. By focusing on her, no one would pay attention to them and no one would suspect anything]].
* JustAKid / NotNowKiddo: These tropes are the only reason why the {{Big Bad}}'s plan did not fall apart the moment kids all started to say they saw Julia.
* JustPlaneWrong: Yeah, aircraft windshields don't shatter like that, otherwise the pilots would be in [[FlechetteStorm grave danger]] if they ever did.
* MamaBear / KnightTemplarParent: Kyle. Her actions potentially put hundreds of lives at risk and she accuses passengers of terrorism (seemingly just on the grounds of them being/looking Arabic). [[spoiler:Granted, she foiled a terrorist plot and saved the day, but that's coincidental. As far as she's concerned for most of the movie, it's just her daughter who's in danger, not the entire plane]].
* NeverTrustATrailer: The trailers made out the film to be a legitimate horror thriller. Turns out it merely plays with those elements in what is an elaborate kidnapping plot.
* OutGambitted: [[spoiler: Kyle ultimately foils the hijackers by using the fact that the crew thinks she is the hijacker to her advantage; she tells everyone to leave the plane before Carson can do so, knowing that he would have to go along to avoid suspicion. Allowing her to search for the bomb and Julia without interference and completely turning the tables on them]].
* ParanoidThriller: Two thirds of the film is spent unsure of whether the mother is delusional or being conspired against[[spoiler:, but it turns out to be the latter.]]
* PlotHole: Loads. For example; in order to calm her down and get her to accept that she was delusional and that her daughter had died along with her husband, why didn't they verify that there were two caskets instead of one in the hold?
* PublicSecretMessage:
-->[[spoiler: '''GENE:''' Got two questions for you: What're the movies? And how loud do these headphones go?]]
-->[[spoiler: '''STEPHANIE:''' Never quite loud enough.]]
* RealityEnsues: [[spoiler:Just because Stephanie has left Carson's scheming doesn't mean she'll get off just like that]].
* RedHerring: We are led to believe [[spoiler:the Arabs aboard are terrorists]] who kidnapped Julia as a hostage. In the end, it turns out they're not involved at all. [[spoiler:Additionally, the pilot is played by Sean Bean, who has a history of playing villains. He isn't involved at all either]].
* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: [[spoiler:Stephanie, the flight attendant who aided Carson attempted to flee from him after being decked by Kyle]]. Despite this, [[spoiler:she got arrested for her part in aiding his scheme]].
* StandardFemaleGrabArea: Used on Kyle several times, by the captain and by Carson.
* TechMarchesOn: This film came out two years too early for what little plausibility the villains' plot may have had to be completely blown to hell by the rise of modern SocialMedia and smartphones. Just one look at Kyle's blog -- or even a Google search of her ''name'' -- would reveal enough evidence supporting her story to cause the crew to overrule Carson and look deeper.
* UnnecessarilyLargeInterior: The plane is shown to have enough empty and unused space for Kyle to play ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid'' with the airplane staff. Film-makers discussed researching actual commercial plane layouts, including getting copies of blueprints, and then tossing it all out for the demands of the plot.
* {{Unperson}}: Julia is removed from the flight manifest and no one will claim they saw her.
* UnusuallyUninterestingSight: The success of the entire plot relies almost solely on ''nobody'' among the passengers acknowledging that Kyle and Julia had boarded the plane together.
* WeAllLiveInAmerica: FBI agents in [[CanadaEh Goose Bay]]? Don't think so.
* WesternTerrorists: [[spoiler:Gene and Stephanie]].
* WholePlotReference: The plot is ''very'' similar to Alfred Hitchcock's ''Film/TheLadyVanishes'', most notably the missing person's existence being proven by their having drawn on window condensation.
** The missing person being a little girl and her mother's struggles to prove she existed also drew lots of comparisons to ''[[Film/BunnyLakeIsMissing Bunny Lake is Missing]]''.
* AWizardDidIt: The film comes within ''seconds'' of a DownerEnding because...
-->[[spoiler:'''Carson:''' People will think what I '''tell''' them to think. '''[[TheBadGuysAreCops That's how authority works.]]''']]
* WorkplaceAcquiredAbilities: Kyle is an airplane propulsion engineer. Her skills are handy for searching the plane, switching off the light and bringing down the oxygen masks.
----

* KansasCityShuffle: [[spoiler: What the villains are ultimately trying to pull on passengers of the flight. The intended to make everyone think the Kyle was using her claims about Julia to draw attention from the fact that she was hijacking the plane. By focusing on her, no one would pay attention to them and no one would suspect anything]].

Foster plays Kyle Pratt, an airplane propulsion engineer whose husband has mysteriously died from falling off the top of a building. She and her six year old daughter, Julia (Marlene Lawston), are now heading back to Long Island from Berlin aboard the massive new passenger plane she helped design, the Elgin 474. The body of her husband is in the hold.

* ArmorPiercingQuestion: [[spoiler: When confronting alone on the plane, Kyle asks Stephanie if she has the guts to essentially kill a little girl in cold blood for money. This is enough to catch Stephanie off-guard long enough for Kyle to deck her.]]

* RealityEnsues: [[spoiler:Just because Stephanie has left Carson's scheming doesn't mean she'll get off that easily]].

* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: [[spoiler:The flight attendant who aided Carson attempted to flee from him after being decked by Kyle]]. Despite this, [[spoiler:she got arrested for her part in aiding his scheme]].

** Rely on Kyle and Julia getting on board without anyone noticing Julia. Rely on Julia not speaking to anyone, not making any noise, and not asking for anything, rely on there being empty seats on a packed inaugural flight of a new aircraft type, rely on Kyle taking Julia to lie on those seats, rely on no-one seeing Julia's removal, rely on no-one noticing a man putting his hand into a sleeping woman's trousers, rely on Julia going ballistic rather than just calmly talking to people and making requests, somehow manage to get the computerized check-in systems to "forget" Julia, rely on Kyle not requesting the airport authorities check the inevitable CCTV footage, rely on the corrupt stewardess being the one assigned to search the section with the kidnapped child, rely on the captain/airline contacting the morgue (to ask what?) rather than the hospital or police and thus get the fake information, rely on no-one, immediately on hearing of the child's death, asking why her coffin is not on board, rely on Kyle escaping and opening a coffin that she believes is sealed when there are dozens upon dozens of other luggage containers in the hold, rely on the authorities agreeing to the ransom without talking to the so-called terrorist, rely on them actually transferring the money -- how would an alleged terrorist have known if it had been transferred? -- find a way to get the money when the authorities knew exactly where it was, rely on the exploding child leaving no trace with an amount of explosive so small it didn't even hurt two people who were no more than ten meters away when it went off -- which would not happen -- expect someone with no explosives training to know that the explosives present were of such low power that they would be safe no more than 10 meters away, and have the corrupt stewardess remain on the plane (necessary to distract Kyle so that the marshal could free and arm himself) -- how would that have been explained later? Why would she even have remained? This plot, to put it charitably, is simply not within the realm of physical possibility.

* [[spoiler:TheBadGuysAreCops: The big twist.

* TheBadGuysAreCops: [[spoiler:The big twist.]]

* OnlyInItForTheMoney [[spoiler: It's revealed late on in the film that Air Marshal Gene Carson planned on hijacking the plane, framing Kyle as the scapegoat, and blowing up Julia simply because he wants $50 million. A quote he says to Kyle who still has no idea what is going on implies the first thing he will probably do is take a vacation]]
-->[[spoiler:'''Carson:''' You have no idea how happy I'm going to be to end this case.]]

* RedHerring: We are led to believe the Arabs aboard are terrorists who kidnapped Julia as a hostage. In the end, it turns out they're not involved at all. Additionally, the pilot is played by Sean Bean, who has a history of playing villains. He isn't involved at all either.

* BittersweetEnding: In a sense. [[spoiler: Kyle has found her daughter Julia alive and cleared her name. And Carson [[HoistByHisOwnPetard has been blown up by the very bomb he planted for this conspiracy]]. All the passengers are safe, and the remaining accomplices of the conspiracy are being interrogated. But this is also a hollow victory, as the passengers feel guilty at having earlier cheered on [[VillainWithGoodPublicity Carson]] for arresting [[HeroWithBadPublicity Kyle]]. They'll have to live with the regret that their [[AppatheticCitizens apathy]] nearly cost a little girl's life. But as a small token of apology, one of the passengers Kyle wrongfully accused earlier helps her with her luggage.]]
* ComplexityAddiction: The villains could have just as easily [[spoiler:put some explosives in an ordinary briefcase, rigged it with a remote detonator, and just talked to the airline via email. Murdering Kyle's husband and kidnapping her daughter were an unnecessary complication meant to give them a Fall Guy to cover their escape. ]]
** Nothing better shows how overly complicated their plan is than by remembering that step one involved [[spoiler:murdering an American expatriate just so they could use his casket to smuggle the bomb on board the plane, and to get his wife and daughter on board the flight to set up a DeceasedFallGuyGambit. If the authorities had even suspected that Gene was involved in Kyle's husband's death, or if Kyle herself had stayed to cooperate with the investigation if the police suspected foul play, the plan would have been foiled before it even got off the ground.]]
* CondensationClue: [[spoiler:The heart Julia drew on the window confirms that Kyle isn't going crazy and hadn't just imagined that her supposedly dead daughter was on the plane.]]
* DeceasedFallGuyGambit: [[spoiler:What the villains' plan would have become in its final form. After arriving in their final destination, they would have made all the other passengers leave with Kyle still in custody. Quietly sneaked off the plane, detonated the bomb that was strapped onto Julia vaporizing her body and destroying all evidence she was ever on board and killing Kyle who would still be on board. They then tell their story to the authorities, get praised as heroes and jet to a nice warm, extradition-free island to enjoy their money before anyone realizes that a thing or two doesn't add up.]]

* FallGuy: [[spoiler: One of the main goals of the plan is to frame Kyle for the highjacking in order to provide the villains with cover to escape.]]

* GasLighting: [[spoiler:Much of the action involves the villains trying to convince Kyle, and by extension the rest of the passengers and crew, that she's suffered a break from reality. Subverted in that it's much more effective on the witnesses than the target.]]

* KansasCityShuffle: [[spoiler: What the villains are ultimately trying to pull on passengers of the flight. The intended to make everyone think the Kyle was using her claims about Julia to draw attention from the fact that she was highjacking the plane. By focusing on her, no one would pay attention to them and no one would suspect anything.]]
* JustAKid / NotNowKiddo: These tropes are the only reason why the [[BigBad Big Bad's]] plan did not fall apart the moment kids all started to say they saw Julia.

* MamaBear / KnightTemplarParent: Kyle. Her actions potentially put hundreds of lives at risk and she accuses passengers of terrorism (seemingly just on the grounds of them being/looking Arabic). [[spoiler:Granted, she foiled a terrorist plot and saved the day, but that's coincidental. As far as she's concerned for most of the movie, it's just her daughter who's in danger, not the entire plane.]]
* {{Outgambitted}}: [[spoiler: Kyle ultimately foils the hijackers by using the fact that the crew thinks she is the hijacker to her advantage; she tells everyone to leave the plane before Carson can do so, knowing that he would have to go along to avoid suspicion. Allowing her to search for the bomb and Julia without interference and completely turning the tables on them.]]

* TechMarchesOn: This film came out two years too early for what little plausibility the villains' plot may have had to be completely blown to hell by the rise of modern SocialMedia and smartphones. Just one look at Kyle's Facebook, Foursquare or LinkedIn, or even a Google search of her name, would reveal enough evidence supporting her story to cause the crew to overrule Carson and look deeper.

* MoneyDearBoy [[spoiler: it's revealed late on in the film that Air Marshal Gene Carson is hijacking the plane simply because he wants $50 million.]]

* Money,DearBoy [[spoiler: it's revealed late on in the film that Air Marshal Gene Carson is hijacking the plane simply because he wants $50 million.]]

* MoneyDearboy [[spoiler: it's revealed late on in the film that Air Marshal Gene Carson is hijacking the plane simply because he wants $50 million.]]