The majority of the film features a series of decent fight scenes taking place all over the Money Plane. Then comedic bits are interwoven with the action featuring deadly prop bets and evil people being evil. Let’s not forget a Money Plane staff with zero conscious ready to take on every evil whim. Back to the action, while Copeland does his fair share of fighting, the bulk of it goes to Katrina Norman, who is quite adept at close-quarters movie fighting. It’s all in good fun, but tame (more on this later).
The most memorable moments of Money Plane go to Kelsey Grammer. He’s just so juicy as the film’s badest bad guy and he could play villains for the rest of his life. He comes pretty close to recreating his sinister persona as Toy Story 2’s Whisky Pete. That voice of his could just kill you. In contrast, the way he handles a semi-automatic weapon won’t. I liked Money Plane, mostly because of personal fandom for Grammar, Copeland, and Richards, but not for much else.
“…a ‘B’-action movie in every sense of the term…”
Let’s be real. This film falls short of producing any John Wick-style action. Money Plane is a “B”-action movie in every sense of the term as even the idea of a Money Plane sounds good on paper, but not so much in low-budget execution. The airborne casino is clearly in the air only by movie-magic as nothing spills during some “turbulent” moments. I have to question just how easy it is to hack bitcoin so easily. The espionage and science are implausible at best…but were you really expecting a realistic plot?
My complaint is the film just doesn’t take its action or humor far enough, and as gruesome as some situations are meant to be, it’s coming off as incredibly tame. I don’t know if it was done on purpose for the sake of Copeland’s young fans, but the film needed to go big and elevate the intensity to inject much-needed excitement. There have to be ways of doing it without being crass or overly gory and remain on budget (like a critic would know).
Money Plane will be remembered as Adam Copeland’s first feature lead role with some heavy-hitters to back him up. The film is good, tame fun, but in desperate need of memorable, action moments for water-cooler talk.
"…Copeland’s first feature lead role with some heavy-hitters to back him up."
