Carolco Pictures
Not part of a collection.
Air America
The few. The proud. The totally insane.
Air America was the CIA's private airline operating in Laos during the Vietnam War, running anything and everything from soldiers to foodstuffs for local villagers. After losing his pilot's license, Billy Covington is recruited, and ends up in the middle of a bunch of lunatic pilots, gun-running by his friend Gene Ryack, and opium smuggling by his own superiors.
- Original title
- Air America
- Language
- EN
- Country
- US
- Budget
- $35,000,000
- Revenue
- $57,661,269
JPV852
Aug 11, 2025 · via TMDB
Entertaining enough action-war movie thanks to the charisma of both Mel Gibson and Robert Downey Jr. The film also has some solid action scenes and direction, to go along with Roger Deakins's cinematography. From what I read about this, doesn't seem like many had fun making the movie, including Deakins and Downey. Still, I found it enjoyable even if Gibson's character shift didn't felt surface level. **3.0/5**
GenerationofSwine
Jan 12, 2023 · via TMDB
I have a special love for this film, if for no other reason that the bulk of my college experience was spent on the cold war, the alphabet soup of PBSUCCESS, MKULTRA, JMWAVE, PAPERCLIP, COLDFEET, MKOFTEN, The Phoenix Program, ARTICHOKE, and my favorite (just because of how bad it sounds) Midnight Climax. So a comedy about Air America was absolutely priceless. And, given that I am not one of those history nuts that cares about historical accuracy I can still sit back and enjoy something like this. I mean, honestly, so long as it's not a complete and total re-write... Hollywood can take it's liberties and edit what happened for drama, because, really, it just means that now people have heard of Air America. And, honestly, when you choose to study the Cold War, people tend to think you're a conspiracy nut when you mention things like this, PBSUCCESS, Russians assassinating people with radiation poisoning and umbrella guns... ... So when something like this comes along, it's like yes... now people won't think I'm as crazy as Alex Jones. And, you know, it features a song from the Seeds (and any real punk fan is going to drool over that) along with one of the better, if down played, soundtracks from the Vietnam Era. So it certainly has the music win. And it's Gibson kind of hamming it up and doing a slightly saner version of his Lethal Weapon self... if oddly pacifistic. And RDJR, fresh out of rehab, proving to the world that he is actually capable of being a great actor when he is sober. What you have is kind of an action movie without a lot of violence, set in the middle of a war zone, and based off of one of our intelligence black eyes in a way that doesn't take it too seriously, isn't heavy-handed or pretentious, masks any preachiness in a fun story, and really gets the point across without having to be Alan Alda at his worst. Plus, it's a movie about skullduggery that doesn't resort to the Mission:Impossible/James Bond high action tropes. So, in a way, it's kind of a spy movie done right and... turned into a comedy.
CinemaSerf
Nov 14, 2022 · via TMDB
When "Billy" (Robert Downey Jr.) loses his pilot's licence after a lively misdemeanour, he finds himself working in war-torn Laos with the team at "Air America". This is a CIA-backed operation consisting of a disparate bunch of pilots whose job it is to fly in supplies to local villages. It's there that he meets "Gene" (Mel Gibson) and also where he realises that not only is it pretty dangerous out there, but that his paymasters are into the narcotics trade in quite a big way and, to make matters even more dodgy - one of his colleagues goes in for some illicit gun-running too. It does move along quickly enough, but the whole thing has a rather comic book feel to it. The writing is poor, the themes repeat themselves once too often and there is little chemistry from anyone on screen as the adventures rather lamely bumble along accompanied by a medicare AOR-style soundtrack. To be fair, it looks like Gibson is having some fun and it's always nice to see Burt Kwouk demonstrating just how little versatility he had as an actor - always looking perplexed, but otherwise all this is missing is Charlie Sheen.
User reviews courtesy of TMDB.
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Amazon Video
Apple TV Store
Google Play Movies
YouTube
Fandango At Home
Mel Gibson
Gene Ryack
Robert Downey Jr.
Billy Covington
Nancy Travis
Corinne Landreaux
Ken Jenkins
Major Donald Lemond
David Marshall Grant
Rob Diehl
Lane Smith
Senator Davenport
Art LaFleur
Jack Neely
Ned Eisenberg
Pirelli
Marshall Bell
O.V.
David Bowe
Saunders
Burt Kwouk
General Lu Soong
Tim Thomerson
Babo
Harvey Jason
Nino
Yanee Tramoth
Gene's Brother-in-law
Ernie Lively
Truck Driver
Burke Byrnes
Recruiter
Michael Dudikoff
General Lee (uncredited)
Sinjai Plengpanich
May Ling
Wasan Uttamayothin
Nightclub Singer
Fraser Taggart
Aerial Camera
Roger Deakins
Director of Photography
Peter Robb-King
Key Makeup Artist
Lois Burwell
Makeup Supervisor
Jason Blum
Production Office Assistant
Vic Armstrong
Stunt Coordinator
Billy D. Lucas
Stunts
Dana Dru Evenson
Stunts
Donna Evans
Stunts
Doug Coleman
Stunts
John Cenatiempo
Stunts
Roger Spottiswoode
Director
Callum McDougall
Second Assistant Director
John Higgins
Gaffer
Janet Hirshenson
Casting
Andrew G. Vajna
Executive Producer
Mario Kassar
Executive Producer
Jon Jashni
Producer
Alicia Stevenson
Foley Artist
Dan O'Connell
Foley Artist
Charles Gross
Original Music Composer
Lon Bender
Supervising Sound Editor
Richard Rush
Screenplay
The Sky's the Limit
By Any Means
LSD: Trip to Where?
Forrest Gump
Apocalypse Now
Charade
Boogie Nights
Malcolm X
The French Connection
Give Us Wings
Gone Baby Gone
Blow-Up
Diner
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
Irreversible
Traffic
American Graffiti
Mission: Impossible
God Forbid a Worse Thing Should Happen
Pride and Extreme Prejudice
The Hamini
Layer Cake
Dark Horse
Wag the Dog
The Tiger Gang
Mission: Impossible III
The Great Love
Sleepless in Seattle
Mermaids
Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Wildlands: War Within The Cartel
Nowhere
White Pop Jesus
City of Hope
The Assassination of Richard Nixon
The War Is Over
The Recruit
The Sum of All Fears
Pepi, Luci, Bom
Meet the Fockers
Alice's Restaurant
Dune
The Business
Mission: Impossible II
Wonderland
Kombi Nation
Carter
Women Is Losers
The In-Laws
Enigma
Chelsea Girls
No Code of Conduct
Forces of Nature
Under Siege
Massacre on Aisle 12
Cobra Mission 2
Queen of the Night
Gangster
The Naturalist
Jsou určité hranice
A Film in the Theatre
Oliver Twist
The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
Rescue Dawn
Hostile Takeover
The Shepherd
I Am David
RED
Clear and Present Danger
Conspiracy Theory
The In-Laws
F.I.S.T.
RED 2
The Phoenician Scheme
Double Threat
Sun Dogs
Lift
The Seven-Ups
Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls
Knight and Day
Skyjacked
Firefox
The 355
The High and the Mighty
xXx
Gotcha!
Dear Eleanor
How to Rob a Bank
Aug 10, 1990
