‹ All movies

The Rewatchables ·

Con Air

year 1997decade 90sdirector Simon Westgenre Drama
host Bill Simmonshost Shea Serranohost Chris Ryan
All 15 categories

Most Rewatchable Scene · 16:19

Cusack's scouting-report introduction of the inmates

Candidates open with the rainstorm fight in which Nick Cage kills the drunk; the whole fight makes one host mad every time because the lawyer, the guy from Miami Vice, gives terrible advice to plead guilty and it comes out as ten years. The hosts debate going not guilty unless a deal is agreed with the judge, and conclude that Cameron Poe is kind of a dumbass who should have just got in the car and later got off the plane rather than stay for his diabetic buddy and his insulin.

Cusack's scouting report for the inmates is phenomenal; a host wishes more graphics and background had flashed up for each guy, Creed-style, six minutes long, and would have watched it forever.

The Neil McCauley “A Book about Metals” Award for Best Line from the Movie · 1:00:42

"put the bunny back in the box"

Nominees: 'put the bunny back in the box'; Cyrus's 'Define irony. A bunch of idiots dancing on a plane to a song by a band that died in a car crash'; and 'Sorry, boss. There's only two men I trust. One of them's me. The other's not you', which gets a vote because it sounds like something one of the hosts has said to another human being in his life.

The film

Con Air (1997)

Directed by Simon West · Drama

115 minutes

IMDbLetterboxdJustWatch
Cast

Selected cast credits · Film reference

Nicolas Cage Cameron Poe, a paroled former Army Ranger who works with the authorities to retake the titular flight.
John Cusack U.S. Marshal Vince Larkin, who discovers Poe's role in retaking the plane.
John Malkovich Cyrus "The Virus" Grissom, a highly intelligent career criminal and mastermind of the escape plot.
Ving Rhames Nathan "Diamond Dog" Jones, a black nationalist convicted of terrorism and Grissom's second-in-command.
Mykelti Williamson Mike "Baby-O" O'Dell, Poe's diabetic friend and cellmate.
Rachel Ticotin Officer Sally Bishop, the flight's only female corrections officer who is protected by Poe after being attacked by Johnny 23.
Monica Potter Tricia Poe, Cameron Poe's wife.
Landry Allbright Casey Poe, Cameron Poe's seven-year-old daughter.
Colm Meaney DEA Agent Duncan Malloy
Steve Buscemi Garland "The Marietta Mangler" Greene, a notorious serial killer . Director Simon West and Buscemi based the character on real-life serial killers Ed Gein , Ted Bundy , Charles Manson , Jeffrey Dahmer , John Wayne Gacy and Edmund Kemper .
Nick Chinlund William "Billy Bedlam" Bedford, a mass murderer convicted for killing his unfaithful ex-wife's family .
Danny Trejo John "Johnny 23" Baca, a serial rapist , nicknamed for his number of sex offense convictions.
Dave Chappelle Joe "Pinball" Parker, a low-level inmate convicted of heroin, armed robbery, and arson charges.
M.C. Gainey Earl "Swamp Thing" Williams, a convict with aviation expertise who serves as Cyrus' pilot.
Jesse Borrego Francisco Cindino, a treacherous South American drug baron and terrorist who helps Grissom (offscreen) plot the hijacking. Borrego studied Colombian narcoterrorist kingpin Pablo Escobar for the portrayal of this character.
Renoly Santiago (credited "Renoly") as Ramon "Sally-Can't Dance" Martinez, a cross-dressing inmate convicted of narcotics charges.
Brendan Kelly Conrad
John Roselius Deputy Marshal Skip Devers.
Jose Zuniga DEA Agent Willie Sims
Steve Eastin Officer Falzon, the leader of corrections officers on board the flight.
Kevin Gage Billy Joe, a drunken bar patron whom Poe kills in self-defense.
Dabbs Greer Old Man under Truck, Lerner Airfield

Everything from the episode

In the order the hosts got to it. Open a row for the discussion.

16:19

Most Rewatchable Scene

Cusack's scouting-report introduction of the inmates; stealing the second plane at the boneyard; the cons taking over...

Cusack's scouting-report introduction of the inmates; stealing the second plane at the boneyard; the cons taking over the plane

In the discussion (7)
Approx. transcript time · 00:16:19Read transcript
  • Candidates open with the rainstorm fight in which Nick Cage kills the drunk; the whole fight makes one host mad every time because the lawyer, the guy from Miami Vice, gives terrible advice to plead guilty and it comes out as ten years. The hosts debate going not guilty unless a deal is agreed with the judge, and conclude that Cameron Poe is kind of a dumbass who should have just got in the car and later got off the plane rather than stay for his diabetic buddy and his insulin.
  • Cusack's scouting report for the inmates is phenomenal; a host wishes more graphics and background had flashed up for each guy, Creed-style, six minutes long, and would have watched it forever.
  • Asked, as the fight-scene expert, whether there has ever been a crouch fight scene like the bunny-back-in-the-box fight: close-quarter fights exist, like the bathroom stall in Mission Impossible or the front-seat-and-back-seat car fight in the Raid, but this is the first crouch one. — Shea Serrano
  • More candidates: Cruzito trying to escape and steal the second plane, whom one host just calls Cruz; the whole boneyard sequence where the cons trap the soldiers and the plane explosion; the 'that's a rock' exchange while the plan is explained; and the plane landing on the Vegas Strip, making seven candidates.
  • A clear winner is declared: Cusack doing the introduction, the scouting report. An honorable mention is floated for the long montage of letters to his daughter, the hosts repeating 'Dear Casey', enjoying her two-word letter asking whether he is ever coming home, wondering whether the wife stopped writing, and relishing the unintentional comedy of him writing calmly while mattresses go over the balcony during a prison riot.
  • Asked for picks, one host goes with stealing the second plane for its unintentional comedy, propane and gas everywhere at an abandoned airfield, including Colm Meaney's car getting crashed into the tower; another goes Cusack, liking him in roles where he is a little smarter than everybody, as in Runaway Jury, and calling him one of the best parts of the movie despite seeming frustrated to be in it; a third has the cons taking over the plane.
  • The takeover is admired for the needle buried in the hand to pick the handcuffs, which the hosts would like Mythbusters to test, like other movie-easy things such as lighting gasoline by tossing a cigarette; it was so windy Cusack's wig flew around all movie yet people lit things. Johnny 23 stays in character, Cage has to prove again that he is a good guy, and his accent is great.
Share this discussion More Most Rewatchable Scene answers
27:51

What’s Aged the Best?

Malkovich saying the title twice; Nick Cage as an actor-first action hero; Cage's hair; Dave Chappelle; the 'Cy... an...

Malkovich saying the title twice; Nick Cage as an actor-first action hero; Cage's hair; Dave Chappelle; the 'Cy... anara' kill line; Buscemi's 'insane' speech; Malkovich as the heavy

In the discussion (9)
Approx. transcript time · 00:27:51Read transcript
  • Malkovich saying the title in the movie, two different times, is a favorite thing and the hallmark of Bruckheimer movies, like 'welcome to the Rock'; the hosts imagine Bruckheimer reading the script in the bathtub and jotting a note that nobody says the title.
  • Nick Cage has aged the best: he has become a punching bag, but people forget he won an Oscar and was an awesome action hero in the 90s, holding the Grantland action-hero championship belt for two or three years; unlike 80s action guys such as Stallone, Schwarzenegger and Seagal, he, Bruce Willis and Mel Gibson were actors before they were action heroes, and he rattles off post-murder one-liners like the bunny line.
  • The secret of the movie is that ridiculous things happen but the characters are played by smart, good actors buying in: Cusack, Malkovich, Ving, Buscemi and Cage are all great, and Malkovich is 100% evil, believing everything he is saying.
  • Cage's hair has aged the best, this being the best year for it: thinning, so he grew it out wavy, with no explanation for going from high and tight out of the army to an outrageous mullet in prison while bettering himself and learning Spanish, looking like a bass tech for Poison.
  • Chappelle has aged incredibly well, and there is more racially charged humor than remembered, which one host flatly labels racist, including a lot of characters using a slur for each other; Chappelle is nonetheless very funny. The Cyrus kill line 'Cy... anara' (transcribed 'Sigh! Anatta'), which he had prepared and was waiting for someone to call him Cy, is another thing that aged best.
  • The Buscemi and Cage exchange after Cage comes back up from the kill below is played as a clip: whether working 50 hours a week for 50 years and hoping to die before the indignity of the toilet is insane. Buscemi goes to nine other levels, 'most murders are a crime of necessity rather than desire', and would give the greatest TED talk; a host admits that movies mocking people for having a job hurt his feelings, as with Heat.
  • Malkovich has aged the best for this host, on his run of villains like In the Line of Fire, really in the pocket as the heavy, funny, smart and scary, knowing exactly how far to go; it was a great period when action movies stopped requiring jacked-up Jose Canseco types and instead hired incredible drama actors to elevate stupid material for less money than the action guys cost. — Chris Ryan
  • The trend started with Rickman in Die Hard and led to Lithgow and Malkovich; asked which Malkovich role comes to mind first, the answers are In the Line of Fire, Dangerous Liaisons and Teddy KGB, with Con Air right underneath; he looks the same in every movie yet his characters feel different, as in the Killing Fields, and Mile 22 gets a thumbs up with reservations.
  • For another host the best is Nick Cage.
Share this discussion More What’s Aged the Best? answers
37:41

What’s Aged the Worst?

The Sally Can't Dance character; losing Chappelle at 43 minutes; Cusack's hair and air of being above the movie; the ...

The Sally Can't Dance character; losing Chappelle at 43 minutes; Cusack's hair and air of being above the movie; the prison guard's Current Affair, Hard Copy and Geraldo references; the guitar solo after the God line; the insulin subplot; Johnny 23

In the discussion (8)
Approx. transcript time · 00:37:41Read transcript
  • The Sally Can't Dance character is rough and not great; they probably would have cut it now, and even in the late 90s it was awkward and weird rather than something 1997 audiences thought was good.
  • Getting rid of Chappelle at 43 minutes has aged the worst; Chappelle could have helped the last two thirds, so cut somebody else and keep Pinball, the funny guy. The guess is they only had him for about three days, that he came up with his own dialogue, and that they did not know what they had.
  • Cusack's hair hurts: this is the first time it was going back as the 90s went along, like his best friend Piven, and he shows up with a flowing mane that flies around like a huge Trump wig in the convertible scenes. One host feels the movie is beneath him the whole time, an undertone of not believing his agent told him to do it, while another loves Cusack and places this right around Grosse Pointe Blank.
  • In Cusack's defense, Rosenberg wrote the parts for Cusack and Buscemi with them in mind; Colm Meaney's character even uses 'loquacious', and they are all idiots compared to Cusack, who is the one person in the movie, in sandals, who could have been you while everybody else is a superhero.
  • The gregarious, hilarious prison guard on the plane, a David Tao type (as transcribed), has aged the worst with his line about seeing eleven Current Affairs, two Hard Copies and a genuine Geraldo interviewee, shows that are all long gone. Also the cheesy guitar solo that kicks in when Cage, told by Bubba Gump that there is no God, declares that he will show God exists, after which Cage walks through a gunshot to the left arm without flinching.
  • The insulin subplot has aged poorly: there is no need for the diabetic shock the entire movie, since Cage could simply stay for Rachel Tickatin (as transcribed), who would be jumped by Johnny 23. Michael T. Williamson (as transcribed), whom a host really likes, spends the film shouting for his insulin, including 'get off my insulin' during the riot, and a secret favorite moment is Cage's weary 'Jesus' when Williamson gets shot.
  • Earlier, while picking nits, a host had meant to save the secretly armed DEA agent for aged worst: he pulled the Fredo Corleone, grabbed the gun, sweated and seemed out of control.
  • Johnny 23 has also aged the worst, though arguably it was aging badly even as the movie came out.
Share this discussion More What’s Aged the Worst? answers
43:45

The Dion Waiters Award for Best Heat Check Performance

Dave Chappelle

Dave Chappelle

In the discussion (2)
Approx. transcript time · 00:43:45Read transcript
  • It comes down to Chappelle or Buscemi, though Buscemi may not have been in enough of the movie, even if he probably does qualify; an argument is made for Swamp Thing, who does a nice job in just a few scenes, funny and a little charming despite being the wildly racist Aryan Brotherhood prisoner, and one host would hang out with him.
  • Asked who they picked for the heat check, the answer is Chappelle, who was great and incredible in what is almost a nothing part with no real role in the movie; the objection that you cannot pick Chappelle because of the racism material is met with the point that he only did the one line, and the pick stands.
Share this discussion More The Dion Waiters Award for Best Heat Check Performance answers
50:26

Apex Mountain

Nicolas Cage

Nicolas Cage

In the discussion (5)
Approx. transcript time · 00:50:26Read transcript
  • Only three names are on the list, with Buscemi thrown on; Nick Cage is a yes by far, though whether this or The Rock is the peak of his career is debated, with Con Air having made over 200 million bucks.
  • Asked whether they like this or The Rock more: this one for sure, so much better because it is not as 'serious'. Two of the hosts have discussed before that Connery is not that good in The Rock, an old man running around Alcatraz in a Scottish accent, whereas Ed Harris is incredible in it; the premise fails because Harris was going to shut it down anyway and nobody would have died if they had called his bluff. The preference is for prison movies and big, beefy Cage, who was miscast as a chemical super freak nerd in The Rock.
  • This is the Nick Cage movie: after the Oscar and The Rock, Con Air announced a major star going for stardom, and it seemed he would be in our lives for the long haul, which proved wrong when about five years later it was over and he started making weird movies. Today's generation gets twisted up in superhero clothing or Iron Man's metal suit, so there is no 80s-and-90s style action star anymore.
  • On Cage the vote is yes from one host, with another said to be a no, and the yes is allowed; Trejo is a no, his career apex being Machete, or right now as a brand with his tacos and businesses, or when the show gave him his own category.
  • Malkovich is a no, his apex being Dangerous Liaisons; Buscemi is a no but can be in there; one of the great things about the movie is that it caught a lot of people not at their apex but all really good at what they were doing.
Share this discussion More Apex Mountain answers
54:48

The Joey Pants “That Guy” Award

Monica Potter

Monica Potter

In the discussion (6)
Approx. transcript time · 00:54:48Read transcript
  • The award goes to the actor or actress who makes you say 'oh, that guy' or 'oh, that girl' without remembering the name; Cruzito is out because his name is known, and MC Gaines' (as transcribed) Swamp Thing is nominated, one host not knowing who MC Gaines is, only that it was Swamp Thing.
  • Whether Swamp Thing was in the 'American Badass' video is wondered, since he looks like he would be; a host rewatched the video, having liked Kid Rock at the time, and was dismayed to find Confederate flags shown fast at first and then prominently featured.
  • Rachel Tickatin (as transcribed), whose name the hosts struggle to pronounce, is not a that-girl for one host because Total Recall, Man on Fire and this are enough of a body of work; she is called fantastic and a patron saint of the show for Man on Fire and this, deserving a better career, and her supposed Fisher King credit is corrected to 'Mercedes rule' (as transcribed).
  • The winner for one host is Rinaldi Santiago (as transcribed), texted earlier, who has really only been in two movies: the controversial Sally Can't Dance here and, more importantly, the little guy in Dangerous Minds who wins the class prize, feuds with Emilio, and has a weird one-on-one date with Michelle Pfeiffer, buying a jacket for it when the other two do not show up.
  • Another vote is Monica Potter, over the objection that people know her name from the Prefontaine movie, Parenthood and Patch Adams; the voter did not know her name either, having seen Patch Adams a couple of weeks ago and realized only then that she was the woman from Con Air.
  • Asked what he thinks, this host goes Potter, which is welcomed with a 'boom'. — Chris Ryan
Share this discussion More The Joey Pants “That Guy” Award answers
58:08

The Ruffalo / Hanna / Rubinek / Partridge Overacting Award

Colm Meaney

Colm Meaney

In the discussion (2)
Approx. transcript time · 00:58:08Read transcript
  • There has never been an easier winner: Colm Meaney, awful in this movie, dialed up to insane levels and overpowering everybody in every scene. In one scene Cusack out-overacts the overactor, pleading from the helicopters flying behind the plane that Cage is a friend just trying to get home to his wife and kids, 'don't fire', with Meaney echoing 'don't fire'; Meaney was terrible in Mystery Alaska too.
  • Meaney is simply out of his comfort zone, dialing everything to ten out of ten, and the Cusack scene is bad; other nominees are Trejo, the most animated he has ever been as he really tries to be evil, and the soundtrack, because it never stops.
Share this discussion More The Ruffalo / Hanna / Rubinek / Partridge Overacting Award answers
59:28

Is This Movie Better With…?

Michael K. Williams

Michael K. Williams

In the discussion (2)
Approx. transcript time · 00:59:28Read transcript
  • With two of the three already in the movie, Michael K. Williams wins by default, though the hosts do not want to add anyone; he could have been another prisoner on the plane, perhaps 'Osiris' in the imagined new version alongside Miles Teller, or the politically correct 2018 version of Johnny 23, an arsonist rather than a Bitcoin or blockchain guy.
  • At the top of the show the category is invoked: two of the three, 66%, are in this movie, which alone might make it a first-ballot Rewatchables Hall of Famer.
Share this discussion More Is This Movie Better With…? answers
1:04:49

Who Won the Movie?

Nicolas Cage

Nicolas Cage

In the discussion (4)
Approx. transcript time · 01:04:49Read transcript
  • Asked who won the movie, the answer is that there is only one: it has to be Nick. — Shea Serrano
  • Cage's is a legacy-defining role, the moment he announced himself as the biggest star on planet Earth, with Kid Rock's song the right one about it, Confederate flags and all, awkward twenty years later; it has to be Nicolas Cage, nobody else.
  • A case is made for Buscemi, the guy with four lines: he is so good that they clearly added the end scene of him playing craps, which means he tested through the roof and Bruckheimer wanted him back for one more scene, maybe eyeing a sequel; the answer is still Nick Cage.
  • This is one host's favorite Nick Cage performance, the one time he put all the pieces together: white tank top tucked into dad jeans, the mullet, the amazing letters, 'Dear Casey', the promise to bring a bunny, secretly kind of funny.
Podcast choices
Share this discussion More Who Won the Movie? answers