Based on a true story: this means you have to cheat to tell an effective story, but cheat brilliantly, remodelling the whole story, not miserably adding and subtracting minor plot elements. If you want to be faithful to the real events, do a documentary. This would have been much more interesting to understand the whole thing.
L'Assaut jumps straight ahead on land-mines: picking a couple of characters that are not heroes, but only good people trying to do their job best in a more or less coordinated manner. GIGN (SWAT) officer Thierry is not interesting beyond his training and his commitment to save live. Adding a heavy subplot about lethal risks Vs. family life is ludicrous at best, but mostly plain boring. As are the rest of the nice guys: what with all the intercut between GIGN team, crisis management meetings that look no more tense than a random corporation board meeting, and subplots to fill in the void before the main action, you have a very cheap rendition of a real-life suspenseful event.
The terrorists come out the best characters in the whole movie, and the group leader is the only fine piece of acting at all. Real facts somewhat distract from the real tension building inside the plane (hijacking lasted a couple of days) instead of building up suspense.
The stupid multiplicity of viewpoints, the sprinkling of facts instead of a tense storyline simply makes this movie a very lame one. The good people involved in the real hijacking really deserved a much better homage.
L'Assaut jumps straight ahead on land-mines: picking a couple of characters that are not heroes, but only good people trying to do their job best in a more or less coordinated manner. GIGN (SWAT) officer Thierry is not interesting beyond his training and his commitment to save live. Adding a heavy subplot about lethal risks Vs. family life is ludicrous at best, but mostly plain boring. As are the rest of the nice guys: what with all the intercut between GIGN team, crisis management meetings that look no more tense than a random corporation board meeting, and subplots to fill in the void before the main action, you have a very cheap rendition of a real-life suspenseful event.
The terrorists come out the best characters in the whole movie, and the group leader is the only fine piece of acting at all. Real facts somewhat distract from the real tension building inside the plane (hijacking lasted a couple of days) instead of building up suspense.
The stupid multiplicity of viewpoints, the sprinkling of facts instead of a tense storyline simply makes this movie a very lame one. The good people involved in the real hijacking really deserved a much better homage.