7500: A pilot's worst nightmare

7500 (2019) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated R, for violence, profanity and dramatic intensity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 6.19.20

This is a nifty little thriller: great premise, taut execution and excellent use of its claustrophobic setting.

Wounded and trapped in the cockpit with an unconscious attacker, Tobias (Joseph
Gordon-Levitt) nervously watches the cabin security monitor, waiting to see what the
other two terrorists will do next.

It’s also a real-time nail-biter, and those aren’t easy to handle; tension must be sustained credibly. Director Patrick Vollrath pulls it off in his solid feature debut; he shares scripting duties with Senad Halilbasic.

A prolog montage, monitoring activity at an airport security checkpoint, telegraphs what is to come: An overhead surveillance camera lingers briefly on several dodgy men, and we know we’re in for a hijacking.

In the cockpit of a passenger aircraft, pilot Michael (Carlo Kitzlinger) and co-pilot Tobias (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) run through the pre-flight checklist for their short hop from Berlin to Paris. Friendly chatter is exchanged with Gökce (Aylin Tezel), Tobias’ flight attendant girlfriend; everything is routine.

But not for long.

Minutes after take-off, Gökce brings Michael and Tobias some snacks; she knocks and stands outside the locked security door, waiting to be noticed via the monitor screen inside the cockpit. Michael flips the switch that unlocks the door … and that’s what three Muslim extremists have waited for. They rush forward, armed with knives improvised from broken glass; one yanks her aside, as the other two charge into the cockpit.

The resulting skirmish is furious but brief. The leader, Kenan (Murathan Muslu), mortally wounds Michael, but is overpowered and knocked unconscious; despite getting a nasty slash on his left arm, Tobias forces the younger Vedat (Omid Memar) back out of the cockpit, and re-locks the door.

Michael succumbs to his injury; the distraught Tobias, acting on panic and adrenaline, pushes the body to one side, and ties Kenan to the captain’s chair. He then immediately radios the situation to Berlin air-traffic control (“Code 7500: unlawful interference”) and arranges an emergency landing in Hanover.

Ah, but the terrorists haven’t given up. When it becomes clear that pounding on the security door is useless — the third man, Daniel (Paul Wollin), is absolutely terrifying on the black-and-white monitor screen, as he goes into a berserker rage — they grab a passenger and threaten to kill him, unless Tobias opens the door.

The situation … develops from there.

Aside from the gut-punch of what has gone down — most people these days have an instinctive fear of terrorist-on-plane scenarios — Vollrath and cinematographer Sebastian Thaler cleverly keep us in the cockpit with Tobias. Aside from the initial airline terminal montage, the anxiety mounts further because we never leave this confined space.

That makes this a “man in a can” movie, akin to 2002’s Phone Booth (Colin Farrell trapped by a sniper extortionist) and 2013’s Locke (Tom Hardy on a long and traumatic car drive). Sustaining tension in such a limited setting requires clever scripting, and 7500 pulls it off.

Vollrath also makes excellent use of the overhead security monitor, which gives the increasingly desperate Tobias — helpless to intervene, while stuck in the cockpit — a horrific window into what’s taking place in the cabin.

Vollrath clearly understands that the blurry figures shown on silent, monochromatic footage from an overhead security camera is unsettling even when the image is benign. During the flight’s initial moments — before we hit crisis mode — watching Gökce and fellow flight attendant Nathalie (Aurélie Thépaut) go about their routine chores somehow feels ominous … particularly when the lower portion of the curtain, which separates them from the cabin, keeps twitching.

Supervising sound editor Daniel Iribarren rattles our nerves even further. There’s no music score, which heightens the juxtaposition of well-placed silence, ambient noises and — as one quite disturbing example — the relentless thumps and thuds, as Daniel initially tries to batter down the security door.

All of this would be mere smoke and mirrors without a solid protagonist; Gordon-Levitt delivers quite capably. As introduced, Tobias is soft-spoken and deferential: perhaps only recently promoted to co-pilot. Once confronted with the crisis that all pilots dread, he’s initially overwhelmed — who wouldn’t be? — and the panic on Gordon-Levitt’s face is palpable.

But he quickly rallies, his expression becoming grimly resolute, as he capably follows protocols that must’ve been rehearsed repeatedly, during flight school. Then, of course, the situation turns dire with Daniel’s threat, and Tobias is put through sheer hell; Gordon-Levitt persuasively sells the man’s heartbreaking agony, as he’s forced to watch the unwatchable, and weigh alternatives and impossible decisions.

The story also focuses on Vedat, who — at just 18 — likely was persuaded to participate via appeals to idealism. But once things turn violent, he becomes a frightened and wholly overwhelmed teenager. Memar deftly navigates this transition, passion yielding to uncertainty and disillusionment. His role becomes more prominent in the third act, when Vollrath and Halilbasic play their riskiest card: the one plot bump that viewers may not accept.

Even so, 7500 remains a 92-minute nail-biter that moves briskly, via Hansjörg Weissbrich’s skillful editing. For a little film made on a modest budget of $5 million, it generates a lot of suspense.