Movies Set on a Plane

Ten films that understood a sealed metal tube full of strangers is already a horror premise.

Entries
10
Category
Film
Updated
  1. A 1950s propeller airliner cockpit, the yoke unmanned, a covered dinner plate of fish resting on the captain's seat.

    10. Zero Hour!

    Hall Bartlett · 1957

    The movie Airplane! paid to copy. Arthur Hailey adapted his own TV play: the crew gets food poisoning and a haunted ex-pilot who hasn't flown in a decade must land a DC-4. It is earnest and tense and you will laugh anyway. Not its fault.

  2. A small docking hatch on the belly of an airliner at night, a stealth jet tethered beneath it in the clouds.

    09. Executive Decision

    Stuart Baird · 1996

    Steven Seagal is billed near the top and exits the movie early, at altitude, a twist that perked Roger Ebert right up. Kurt Russell, an analyst who is not a soldier, has to finish the job. Directed by an Oscar-nominated editor, which is why it never sags.

  3. Green snakes coiled around overhead bins and dangling oxygen masks in a sunlit airliner cabin.

    08. Snakes on a Plane

    David R. Ellis · 2006

    Samuel L. Jackson took the job because he read the title. The internet hyped it so hard that New Line spent five days reshooting to go R and add the line fans had already written for him. Then it opened below forecasts. You can love a movie without buying a ticket.

  4. A child's heart drawn in breath fog on a frosted airplane window, an empty child-sized seat belt beside it.

    07. Flightplan

    Robert Schwentke · 2005

    Jodie Foster's daughter vanishes mid-flight on a fictional double-decker jumbo her character helped design, and nobody remembers the kid boarding. The crew is rude enough that a flight attendants' union called for a boycott, which counts as a review.

  5. A cell phone glowing on an airplane tray table with a stopwatch beside it reading 20:00.

    06. Non-Stop

    Jaume Collet-Serra · 2014

    Liam Neeson plays an air marshal getting texts that someone dies every 20 minutes unless $150 million turns up. Julianne Moore is aboard, and so is Lupita Nyong'o, two days before winning her Oscar. It made $223 million. Never text a man with a particular set of skills.

  6. A blue and white jumbo jet parked on a tarmac at dusk, a single parachute lying folded on the stairs.

    05. Air Force One

    Wolfgang Petersen · 1997

    Harrison Ford as a president who personally fights Gary Oldman's hijackers, then tells one to get off his plane. Bill Clinton saw it twice and noted the real one has no escape pod. Fifth-biggest film of 1997. The real Air Force One also lacks Harrison Ford.

  7. A stuffed toy bunny strapped into the jump seat of a battered cargo plane, the Las Vegas Strip glowing below the open ramp.

    04. Con Air

    Simon West · 1997

    Nicolas Cage, a mullet and a planeload of convicts on a cargo plane called the Jailbird, with John Malkovich as Cyrus the Virus. It crash-lands on the Las Vegas Strip and won a Razzie for Worst Reckless Disregard for Human Life and Public Property. Earned it.

  8. Two airplane seats at night, a hotel keycard and a paperback on one tray table, a ballpoint pen on the other.

    03. Red Eye

    Wes Craven · 2005

    Wes Craven took a break from slashers for 85 minutes of Rachel McAdams seated next to Cillian Murphy, who is polite right up until he isn't. It was pitched as Phone Booth on a plane. Murphy later called it a good B movie. On a red-eye, a B is a great grade.

  9. A quiet airliner galley at morning light, a coffee pot on its burner and a beverage cart pulled into the aisle.

    02. United 93

    Paul Greengrass · 2006

    Greengrass tells it in roughly real time, with unknown actors as passengers and FAA manager Ben Sliney playing himself on the worst morning of his career. Two Oscar nominations, including Best Director. The only film here nobody has ever called a fun ride, correctly.

  10. An inflatable autopilot doll's empty seat in a cockpit, a plate of fish dinner on the console, clouds through the windshield.

    01. Airplane!

    Jim Abrahams, David Zucker and Jerry Zucker · 1980

    The trio paid about $2,500 for the rights to Zero Hour! and kept its plot, characters and chunks of its dialogue. Leslie Nielsen, until then a serious actor, became a comedian on the spot. Made for $3.5 million, grossed $171 million. Surely you saw this coming.

Honorable mentions

  • A jetliner flying upside down low over a field and a white country church, sunlight on its belly.

    Flight

    Robert Zemeckis · 2012

    Zemeckis's first live-action film in 12 years opens with Denzel Washington rolling a crippled airliner upside down to save it, loosely inspired by Alaska Airlines Flight 261. Then it lands and becomes a movie about drinking. Best crash on the list, mostly on the ground.

Dishonorable mentions

  • A 747 cabin decorated with tinsel and paper snowflakes, handcuffs dangling from an armrest.

    Turbulence

    Robert Butler · 1997

    Ray Liotta as an accused serial killer on a 747, with flight attendant Lauren Holly learning to land it. It cost $55 million and grossed $11.5 million. Ebert gave it one star. It still got two direct-to-video sequels, the most turbulent thing about it.

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