Con Air

You can find God in the most unusual places. The movie Con Air is one of those places. If you've watched the first clip (above) you've seen that the film is violent and crude with lots of tension and melodrama. It's not a family film (a great deal of violence --- some adult situations and language) but it does portray some very good values in it's heroes.

Though the question about the existence of God is not a central theme of the movie it is one of the threads in the story where God makes a direct appearance (so to speak). The other threads of godliness are found in friendship, loyalty, devotion, commitment and courage in the face of overwhelming odds and circumstances.

Synopsis of the Movie: The name Con Air is a play on the airline named ComAir. The movie name refers to the fact that an airplane is being used to transport a group of dangerous criminals ("Cons" or "Convicts") by air to a high security prison facility.

Most of the passengers (all in shackles) are violent, high-risk, high-security criminals. Only a few are your average run-of-the-mill convict. One in particular --- our protagonist, Cameron Poe --- is a very low-risk prisoner who has really already served his time and is on the flight only as a means of transfering him from where he served . . . . to freedom.

But things go wrong almost immediately . . . the cons take over the plane . . . and the authorities are after them in hot pursuit to bring them down.

Poe is caught between the violent criminals on board the plane and the Feds --- trying to survive so that he can be reunited with his wife and see his daughter for the first time while at the same time trying to save the lives of the prison guards and his best friend who is first in diabetic shock and then wounded by gunfire.

It's complicated and moves fast --- but if you're paying attention you can see some very good qualities surfacing all through a very bad situation.

Con Air
1997
Touchstone Pictures
Directed by Simon West

Meet Garland Green: "He's on the right flight."

Garland Green is a serial-killing, mass-murderer who joins the cast of characters just after the Convicts take over the plane. The cons, posing as security guards, are forced to make one stop in the midst of their getaway to pick up this additional prisoner. If they fail to make this stop their cover will be blown to early in their escape.

Upon learning of this development Poe deadpans, "He's on the right flight."

That's a very dramatic attempt to see something "right" in a very "wrong" scenario!!

But sometimes with all the spin you can spin, all of the positive thinking, all of the optimism you can muster and looking for that silver lining behind that cloud there are just some situations that seem to be destined to be desolate and anything good.

And when just one more bad thing is thrown onto the pile we're not really surprised.

But here's a spoiler: good things do happen in this story . . . and it has a happy ending for our hero.

Believer's in God . . . . Christians in particular . . . . have been prophetically given the promise of good things even in bad times . . . . and a happy ending. That is a part of our faith. A part of what we are asked to anchor ourselves to.

When one bad thing after another is added to an already bad situation --- it doesn't necessarily mean that we are on the wrong flight. Not on the wrong path or out of God's will.

It is possible that, even though your life seems to have been high-jacked, you are on the right flight. You are exactly where God wants you to be.

Hang on. Don't lose hope.
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