The documentary, currently streaming on HBO MAX – “Class Action Park” is one of the rare documentaries that has to be seen to be believed. From the late 1970s to the mid 1990s, entrepreneur Gene Mulvilhill created a water park he called “Action Park” in Vernon New Jersey. For reasons that will not make sense to anyone who sees this documentary, this entertainment resort became the most dangerous in the history of the United States. Despite 5 deaths and hundreds of injuries, this park continued to operate unchecked for almost 20 years. One would have thought that because of all the lawsuits and injuries, the State government of New Jersey would have shut the park down, but this never happened – until word of mouth and financial issues finally closed the park for good on September 2, 1996.

There are numerous side stories in this documentary and interviews with many of the former workers and one woman who lost her son who died on one of the most dangerous rides in Action Park. The owner of the facility, the late Gene Mulvilhill, never settled any of the many lawsuits, choosing instead to fight every one of them to make others think twice about suing him. The rides were never inspected and even built by workers who had no engineering experience and as a result just about every ride in the resort was extremely dangerous.

Mulvilhill even created his own fictional insurance company, so he would not have to pay the very high insurance rates to cover the park. The events that led to this resort being open for so many years is another documentary in itself, to investigate the corruption of that allowed this park to be open for so long with no government regulation.

I highly recommend “Class Action Park” as one of the best documentaries of his kind I have ever seen.

The new movie on Amazon Prime “7500” is about the hijacking of a passenger Jet by a group of terrorists. What I liked about this movie is the acting, mainly from the lead actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt and the realistic action throughout this film. What I did not like is the ongoing trend with terrorist movies – giving new ideas to insane criminals in this world. In this case using glass – made into knives to stab and kill people while trying to take over the controls of the passenger Jet. One has to wonder if this is a solution to getting a weapon on board any plane, because how can the x-ray machines detect glass?

One of the worst offenders of this is the movie “Executive Decision”, released in 1996 where the terrorist took over a plane in an attempt to crash it into Washington DC, releasing a nerve agent that would have killed thousands of people. With all movies like this one, some middle ground has to be reached where extreme action and drama that is acceptable, along with never giving terrorists any new ideas. The world has enough problems with terrorist as it is, without coming up with new ideas inside of a movie.

One of the other thoughts I had while watching this movie was, why would anyone want to work as an Airline Pilot or be a Stewardess? Not only are you employed by a precarious business, most especially now because of the Pandemic but you are almost never home, always living out of a hotel, and at any time there could be a mechanical failure, horrific accident or a Terrorist attack. My guess is that you must have a calling to want to work in this industry, definitely something I would never be interested in as a career.

Overall I agree with the middle of the road, 70% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and give this film a mild recommendation, mainly because of the acting of Levitt.

You are a typical American, who like so many millions, has a job you hate and a boss who loves to make your life miserable. On top of that you are getting a divorce and unfortunately, live in one of the thousands of locations in this country, where the traffic is horrendous. This is the believable scenario that summarizes the beginning of the movie “Unhinged”, starring Russel Crowe.

Actress Caren Pistorius plays Rachel, the woman who at the start of this movie is in her car with her son, desperately trying to find her way to work despite the horrible traffic. Eventually she runs into the worse case scenario other driver played by Russel Crowe, when she herself is at her lowest. The road rage that follows is some of most effective and believable that I have seen in any movie.

When encountering “The Man” in the other car, Rachel makes the exact wrong mistake by honking her horn too loudly after he would not move after the light turned green. This is a story that should have been a very good one, reminding many people of the movie “Duel”, directed by Steven Spielberg released in 1971 and the road rage that exists on so many roads in this country.

Unfortunately too many parts of this story and mostly bad ending have what is called “Hollywood-ified” illogical action to pump up the conclusion. This ongoing practice almost never works and both the villain and the woman trying to protect her son would never do any of the very stupid things they do at the end of this story. People rush to the police to save their lives and a villain in real life will always kill any person who gets in their way immediately. There are no second chances giving the victim an opportunity to save their lives when you are dealing with a desperate and very angry mass murderer. The case of Unhinged is that it is a good thriller with a very believeable beginning that was greatly diminished by a bad ending.

For those who remember what a great actor Russel Crowe is, now some 20 years after winning an Oscar for “Gladiator” in 2000 and a nominated for “A Beautiful Mind” in 2001 – in what is arguably his greatest role, it is hard to see him in a lower quality movie like this. Movie roles like those great parts 20 years ago have not come to Crowe since, although he has had some very good acting parts over the years, including the excellent “Cinderella Man” in 2005 and most recently his role playing Roger Ailes in “The Loudest Voice” in 2019. One can only wonder why Crowe is so extremely overweight – perhaps not able to lose the weight for the Ailes role, or other reasons including the stress of his divorce and his movie career not going as well as it has in the past. His acting in this movie is very good, but I am surprised that due to his clout as a bankable star, the script was not made better with many more re-writes.

I agree with the low 47% ratings for this film on Rotten Tomatoes and unfortunately, mostly because of the bad ending, I cannot recommend it.