Best Movies That Take Place On A Plane

Best Movies On A Plane

As far as one of the set pieces a movie can have, airplanes rank right up there with the best. For being in such a small, confined space, so many things can happen on an airplane, and plane movies have featured almost anything you can imagine. Terrorists, prisoners, psychos, snakes, and yes, even gremlins have made their way onto an airplane.

The following plane movies are some of the best to fly onto the big screen. Most are filled with suspense, but one will have you laughing non-stop. Here are the best movies that take place on an airplane.

10. Airport (1970)

Airport, based on the 1968 Arthur Hailey novel of the same name, is a disaster film that began a string of famous disaster movies. This plane movie boasts an all-star cast led by Burt Lancaster, Dean Martin, Jean Seberg, Jacqueline Bisset, and Van Heflin.

It tells the story of a disgruntled failed contractor (Heflin) who boards a plane in Chicago with the intention of killing himself by blowing up the plane. It becomes a race to see if the plane can be landed before it crashes.

9. Snakes on a Plane (2006)

The title of the movie says it all. Other than that, the only thing you need to know about this plane movie is that Samuel L. Jackson leads it. And it has one of his Samuel L. Jackson moments that make this movie completely amazing. The story, for what it’s worth, has Jackson playing agent Neville Flynn, who is trying to keep a witness alive while the plane is being overridden by deadly snakes. Snakes on a Plane is classic Samuel L. Jackson.

8. United 93 (2006)

Some movies on a plane are meant to entertain, whether it’s non-stop thrills or side-splitting comedy. Others are meant to tell true, harrowing stories of heroes who make the ultimate sacrifice. United 93 is based on the tragic events of 9/11, telling the story of passengers aboard United Airlines Flight 93 who bravely fought with terrorists to gain control of the airplane. While much of what happened on the flight is conjecture, it doesn’t take away from the emotional pull of the film.

7. Air Force One (1997)

Harrison Ford has played numerous heroic characters throughout his storied career and in 1997, he played the President of the United States, James Marshall. The President, along with a number of high-ranking officials of his staff and his family, are aboard Air Force One when it is taken over by terrorists. Gary Oldman leads the terrorists and is especially effective at it. The showdown between Ford and Oldman is one to see in this effective and fun plane movie.

6. Con Air (1997)

There is nothing better than putting Nicolas Cage on a plane filled with despicable convicts and cutting them loose. Cage is Cameron Poe, an honorably discharged Army Ranger who, while defending his wife, kills a man. After serving time for eight years, Poe is now on his way home to meet his daughter for the first time. Standing in his way, though, is a plane filled with inmates on their way to a supermax prison.

What should have been a simple flight home turns into a battle of survival against the worst dregs of society. John Cusack and John Malkovich co-star.

5. Red Eye (2005)

There is something about psychological thriller plane movies that rachet up the tension. Director Wes Craven pilots away from his typical horror panache for a more low-key thriller in Red Eye. It stars Rachel McAdams as a woman who is pulled into a political assassination plot by a fellow passenger (Cillian Murphy).

4. Flightplan (2005)

Is she crazy or is she not? That is the question that must be answered in Flightplan, a tense plane movie starring Jodie Foster. Foster is Kyle Pratt, a grieving woman who is on a flight with her 6-year-old daughter, taking the body of her deceased husband back to the United States.

When Kyle awakens from a nap on the plane, her daughter is missing. Now she is being told that there is no record of her daughter boarding the plane and her sanity is now in question.

3. Executive Decision (1996)

Executive Decision is another well-put-together suspense thriller of a plane movie. Kurt Russell, Halle Berry, Joe Morton, and Oliver Platt star in this tense action film. Russell is along for the ride as a U.S. Army intelligence consult who is secretly transferred onto a hijacked plane by terrorists who threaten to release a deadly Soviet nerve agent in US airspace.

2. Non-Stop (2014)

Liam Neeson goes all-in with the action genre in Non-Stop. In this tense plane movie, Neeson is Bill Marks, an alcoholic Federal Air Marshall who is on a flight from New York to London. While on the flight, he begins to get text messages claiming someone on the flight will die every 20 minutes unless their financial demands are met. Time is short for Marks and the crew, especially when it appears that Marks is the one calling the murderous shots.

1. Airplane! (1980)

Airplane! is the mother of all plane movies and frankly, it isn’t close. The Zucker brothers (David and Jerry) along with Jim Abraham, in their directorial debuts, threw everything they could into this movie just to see if it would stick. Thankfully, in this parody of airplane disaster films, almost everything did. The film stars Robert Hays and Julie Hagerty as ex-lovers who find themselves together on a plane bound for Chicago.

What comes next is 87 minutes of some of the most hilarious and memorable moments aboard a troubled flight. Airplane! marked a turning point in the career of Leslie Nielsen, who took his deadpan role as Dr. Rumack and turned it into the comedic bumblings of Lt. Frank Drebin in The Naked Gun franchise.