Angry Robot

This is not the sort of festival flick I normally see. It’s a middlebrow awards-bait survival drama whose by-the-numbers thrills, yuks and manipulations are in theory redeemed by the triumph-of-the-human-spirit message. That said, it didn’t lose me until well into its second hour, but when it did, it lost me HARD.

Ben (Idris Elba) is a controlling, cerebral brain surgeon. Alex (Kate Winslet) is a risk-taking photographer. When their flight is cancelled, rather than miss a wedding and/or fail to perform life-saving surgery, the two strangers charter a tiny plane flown by an aging fellow with a heart condition so they can crash onto a remote mountain in the middle of winter, splint broken limbs, fend off animal attack and … maybe fall in love?

Spoilers. I don’t know if it was when Ben reveals his wife died OF A BRAIN TUMOUR and he literally says “she became my patient.. but I couldn’t save her.” Or was it when at the last minute – and rescue is within walking distance – he steps into a bear trap. Or was it cutting to the dog’s “reaction” to “comic” effect for the 75th time. Whatever it was, this movie transformed in my mind from passable time-passer to eyerolling time-waster with the speed of a … flying thing that crashes into a fucking mountain. And it’s still getting worse the more I think about it.