The film is stronger with its moment-to-moment tension than with its cynical, shallow media satire.
42
The PlaylistKevin Jagernauth
The PlaylistKevin Jagernauth
There is a better, more contemplative movie to be made with this material, but with Brand and the filmmakers opting for cheap thrills, it leaves the movie, like the passengers on the plane, stuck on the tarmac.
Default’s search for ultra-realism ironically starts to make it look ultra-artificial.
30
Village VoiceChris Packham
Village VoiceChris Packham
It sacrifices its voice to the premeditated non-style of a first-person pseudo-documentary, a form that often has the paradoxical effect of making everything it shows us seem more fake than usual.
Director Simon Brand devotes so much running time to fear-mongering and grotesque stereotypes that a last-ditch effort at moral ambiguity and a critique on muckraking barely register.