Liam Neeson gets together with “Unknown” director Jaume Collet-Serra again for this thriller* about an air marshal* trying to stop the bad guy who has framed* him as a hijacker* during a non-stop flight from New York to London.

    Neeson plays Bill Marks, an air marshal with a drinking problem and a picture of his daughter in his wallet.

    After secretly knocking back* a stiff drink* in the airport parking lot, he enters the crowded terminal to board a plane bound for London. Carefully observing his fellow travelers along the way, Marks ends up seated next to nervous flyer Jen (Julianne Moore), who begins to breathe easier once she’s seated near a window.

    Later, as the plane hits cruising altitude*, Marks receives a text message saying that a passenger on the flight will be killed every 20 minutes unless US$150 million is deposited* into a secure bank account.

    But the harder Marks works to find a suspect, the deeper he implicates* himself in the deadly hostage crisis* at 10,000 meters over the Atlantic Ocean.

    When it’s found out that the account for the ransom* money is in Marks’ name, the FAA* revokes* his marshal status and the media paints him as a hijacker. With the help of Jen and airline hostess Nancy (Michelle Dockery), he tries to clear his name* and protect the passengers by all means possible.

    Director Collet-Serra has improved on the pacing of his last film with Neeson, 2011’s “Unknown.” He’s also assembled quite a cast: not just Moore but Lupita Nyong’o, as a flight attendant with two or three lines to rattle off* in a cockney accent*, Corey Stoll as a NYPD officer also on the flight, and Michelle Dockery from “Downton Abbey.”

    For all the modernism of the film’s cinematography, the plot pays tribute to “Miss Marple*” and to the old Agatha Christie trick of getting all the characters together before allowing the finger of suspicion* to fall on each in turn. All said, this is still an exciting action movie.(SD-Agencies)