WHAT’S IT ABOUT
A young airline security guard is blackmailed by a mysterious passenger who threatens to smuggle a dangerous package onto a plane on Christmas Eve.
MOVIESinMO REVIEW
Everyone debates whether Die Hard is a Christmas movie (it totally is in my opinion), and Hollywood keeps trying to recreate its magic – you know, the one where Bruce Willis saves Christmas Eve from terrorists. Netflix’s newest attempt, Carry-On, desperately wants to join that tradition but stumbles through its runtime like a passenger late for their connecting flight. The movie stars Taron Egerton as Ethan Kopek, a TSA agent at LAX who’s only there because his pregnant girlfriend Nora (Sofia Carson) works at the airport too. His life’s kind of a mess – he failed to make it into the police academy, and Nora’s clearly disappointed in his lack of ambition. On Christmas Day, when most people are opening presents, Ethan decides to finally step up his game. He convinces his boss Phil (Dean Norris) to let him operate the security scanner, which is apparently some kind of prestigious position you have to earn. That’s when Jason Bateman’s mysterious bad guy shows up with the classic “do what I say or your girlfriend dies” threat through an earpiece. Here’s where things get eye-rolling ridiculous. The movie expects us to believe that a major airport like LAX has security so loose that Ethan can keep wandering away from his post without consequences. He somehow bumps into the villain multiple times (including during a bathroom puke scene that feels straight out of a bad comedy), and nobody bats an eye. There’s even a random stabbing in Terminal 7 that people react to with all the concern of a delayed flight announcement. The only decent action sequence happens in the baggage sorting facility, which conveniently has no security cameras – because apparently, that’s totally normal in a post-9/11 world. Detective Elena Cole (Danielle Deadwyler) starts investigating from the outside, but her character feels wasted, like she wandered in from a different, better movie. The talented Deadwyler deserves more than this underwritten role. Meanwhile, the plot keeps piling on increasingly unbelievable scenarios, building to a finale that tries to crank up the excitement but ends up feeling as artificial as airplane food. Look, the actors really do give it their all – Egerton brings his usual charm, and Bateman can play menacing better than you’d expect from the guy from Arrested Development. But they’re fighting an uphill battle against a script that seems written by someone who’s never set foot in an actual airport. The Christmas setting feels completely tacked on, like they added some decorations at the last minute to cash in on the holiday movie crowd. If you’re hoping for something in the league of Die Hard 2, Con Air, or Air Force One – movies that proved you can make airports and planes exciting without completely abandoning reality – you’re going to leave disappointed. Even recent shows like Hijack on Apple TV+ managed to create genuine tension in an aircraft setting. Carry-On, though? It’s more like a long flight delay – occasionally entertaining when you’re people-watching, but mostly just a waste of time you’ll never get back. This is the kind of movie you might watch during Christmas dinner when you’re three glasses of wine deep and don’t mind if someone dozes off during the middle act. You won’t miss much – the plot holes are big enough to fly a 747 through, and the ending wraps everything up with all the subtlety of an airport security announcement. Save yourself the trouble and watch one of the classics instead.
OUR RATING – A TARMAC 3