CARRY-ON

Name: CARRY-ON
Item: CARRY-ON
Author: Review

"Terrific Thriller, with Strong Moral Clarity"

Content: -2 Extreme caution for older teenagers and adults.

Entertainment Quality:

	None	Light	Moderate	Heavy
Language
Violence
Sex
Nudity

Credits →

What You Need To Know:

CARRY-ON is an excellent Netflix thriller about a young TSA agent named Ethan, who’s threatened by a mysterious villain known only as Traveler. Traveler demands a dangerous package be allowed to clear inspection and onto a plane full of people. If Ethan doesn’t comply, his pregnant girlfriend will be shot and killed. This gives the movie a large dramatic tension and a personal and emotional sense of mission.

Director Jaume Collet-Serra directed some of Liam Neeson’s best action movies. He brings his impressive skills to the table. He’s created a movie that moves ultra-fast, with lots of exiting suspense. CARRY-ON has strong performances by its three leads and a deep bench in its supporting cast. The movie takes place on Christmas Eve in a packed airport. So, it’s a great homage to the first two DIE HARD movies but stands on its own as one of the best thrillers in recent years. CARRY-ON has a clearly defined hero and villain, giving it strong moral clarity. However, it has many obscenities, three strong profanities and a live-in pregnant girlfriend. So, Movieguide® advises extreme caution.

Content:

(BB, C, Ho, LL, VV, S, A, M):

Dominant Worldview and Other Worldview Content/Elements:

Strong moral, pro-life worldview, with light redemptive elements, of a hero risking his life to save thousands of others, marred slightly by him cohabiting with his pregnant girlfriend (although no sex is shown), plus two supporting male characters are “married”;

Foul Language:

22 obscenities (including 12 “s” words) and three GD profanities;

Violence:

Strong and light action violence incudes two people are shot by bullets but with almost no blood, and they survive, a man punches a woman, but in context it was necessary and his only option, several hand-to-hand combat scenes with punching and kicking, and two scenes of people being choked although not fatally, a high-speed and destructive fight occurs in a car on a crowded highway, a man dies from being trapped with nerve gas.

Sex:

No implied or depicted sex scenes, but an unmarried couple are shown clothed in bed talking and discussing the woman’s pregnancy, two men say they are “married” to each other, a few men make risqué locker-room type jokes about sex devices;

Nudity:

None.

Alcohol Use:

A man pours some alcohol into another man’s coffee cup without his knowledge, then gets him in trouble, and the other man loses his job.

Smoking and/or Drug Use and Abuse:

No smoking or drugs;

Miscellaneous Immorality:

Villain threatens to kill a pregnant woman and tries to force a TSA agent to put many lives at risk by blackmailing him to pass a dangerous carry-on bag through inspection.

More Detail:

CARRY-ON is a terrific homage on Netflix to the action classic DIE HARD, but it stands on its own as one of the best action thriller in recent years. The movie takes flight by offering top-notch excitement with a clearly defined hero and villain.

Starring Taron Egerton as heroic TSA agent Ethan Kopek and Jason Bateman as the mysterious, relentless villain known only as Traveler, this thrill ride nearly has it all in terms of story, character, action, and execution. It has terrific performances, a sharp script filled with non-stop action and surprising twists, and a pulse-pounding musical score. Director Jaume Collet-Serra, who also helmed some of Liam Neeson’s best action flicks, ties everything together with impressive precision.

Like DIE HARD, it takes place on Christmas Eve and has some fun with Christmas songs. Like DIE HARD 2, its thrills are set in an airport. In in every other respect, however, CARRY-ON is a very fresh movie. Ethan Kopek is a 30-year-old TSA agent who’s been lazily doing the minimum to keep his job. However, with his live-in girlfriend Nora (Sofia Carson, also strong) pregnant, he decides that today’s the day to ask his boss, Phil (Dean Norris), for a raise while he’s in the Christmas spirit.

Phil tells Ethan to prove his worth by moving up from body inspections to monitoring a luggage scanning machine. Ethan’s replacement of the usual scanner, Lionel, means that a very dangerous situation is now in Ethan’s hands. A mysterious unnamed man known only as Traveler (Jason Bateman) orders Ethan to put an earbud in his ear. He tells Ethan he must allow one particular bag containing a dangerous package to pass through inspection, or a sniper will shoot and kill Nora, who also works at the airport, as an airline manager.

Thus begins an incredibly intense cat-and-mouse game of wills, as Ethan tries various means to alert security but is constantly foiled by Traveler. When he realizes what’s actually in the bag he’s clearing, Ethan realizes he must spring into action, or the 60,000 people in the airport will die.

Can Ethan save the day, and his girlfriend and unborn child?

CARRY-ON is the kind of thriller rarely made anymore, as its fast-paced action doesn’t resort to ludicrous bombast to make an impact. The foot chases, hand to hand combat, car chase and shootings are all delivered with maximum punch because they are filmed realistically (albeit bloodlessly), drawing viewers in completely.

It also has a refreshingly clear line on good and evil with Ethan and the Traveler, and a compelling sense of high stakes and moral clarity. Taron Egerton makes Ethan an Everyman to root for, much like Bruce Willis’ classic performance as John McClane in the “Die Hard” movies. Also, Bateman plays an excellent villain in a role that’s completely against type for him.

The reason this movie stands well above the usual Netflix original movie fare is that it’s part of a multi-picture deal with Steven Spielberg’s DreamWorks studio, ensuring that the quality will be stellar in every way. CARRY-ON will please action fans, especially viewers who enjoy having a likeable hero with some moral values. However, the movie has violence, many obscenities, three strong profanities and a live-in pregnant girlfriend. Also, two supporting male characters are “married.” So, Movieguide® advises extreme caution for sensitive adults.

Watch CARRY-ON →

Quality:

- Content: -2