Pushing Tin
**1/2
Cinema
Releases - October 29, 1999
Rated on a 4-star
scale. USA. Directed by Mike Newell. Written by Glen Charles and Les Charles;
based upon the article "Something's Got to Give" by Darcy Frey. Starring
John Cusack, Billy Bob Thornton, Angelina Jolie, Cate
Blanchett.
The air-traffic controllers' boss doesn't want
the airlines phoning to complain that their planes are late. "That's why
I like Russell," he tells trusted worker Nick 'The Zone' Falzone (John Cusack).
"He pushes tin."
Nick does not like Russell. He thinks that the
rival controller, played by Billy Bob Thornton, is a loose cannon, and is
also miffed that the man has stolen the spotlight. Before his arrival, and
his miraculous arrangements of difficult situations in the sky, it seemed
that nobody's skill was a match for Nick's.
The opening scenes of "Pushing Tin"
make this clear while letting us absorb the tense routine of New
Jersey air-traffic control centre TRACON. Working there is an everyday storm
of complex hazard, where scenarios involving hundreds of peoples' lives arise
every couple of minutes, and are solved by looking at radar screens and barking
mathematical guesswork into itchy headsets. No wonder the employees have
forged strong bonds and become a sort of surrogate family -- they're like
members of an army platoon in a war that won't end until they reach retirement
age or have nervous breakdowns.
Russell seems to stand outside this, and his rivalry
with Nick grows on the TRACON floor before moving into their personal lives
and then returning to the workplace with potentially terrifying consequences.
But there is comedy and drama as their relationship develops, most memorably
in Nick's one-night affair with Russell's spouse Mary (Angelina Jolie), and
the way Russell gets him back even better by implanting unconquerable suspicions
in Nick's head about his own bride Connie (Cate Blanchett).
The particulars of the story aren't very important,
though -- just the way they propel the central feud. Impressively, most of
the disputes arise and progress naturally from personalities and situations,
rather than implausibly manufactured roadblocks. What the film brings home
to us more than anything is that the intricate web of vehicles in the sky
is woven by people who know their jargon and are prepared to deal with stress,
but can have regular, or even petty, suburbanite problems. If these dilemmas
were ever to distract their victims, there would be tragic consequences --
just look at the recent train disaster near Paddington
station.
The most effective individual scenes in "Pushing
Tin" are those in the control room, because they're taut, original and even
educational. The film strays outside this set rather often, but that's okay,
because the appealing cast make things worthwhile: Cusack and Blanchett are
good-looking, lively and sharp; Thornton and Jolie can always be relied upon
to bring likeable humanity to kooks.
But I can't recommend this film, because its final
twenty minutes go so wrong they put a damper on the whole experience. I ask
you -- should any remotely serious film about the lives and loves of air-traffic
controllers end with sudden bursts of sentimental whining, characters talking
about "throwing yourself to the wind to find your inner serenity" or men
considering hurtling themselves into a frozen stream before settling on the
path of a landing plane? Unless your answer is "no", you're reading the wrong
critic.
COPYRIGHT© 1999 Ian
Waldron-Mantgani
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