What a ride! Air Force One is the summer blockbuster action thriller at its best. It's got an engaging if unlikely premise: terrorists, enraged at an unusually strong anti-terrorist speech made by the President (Harrison Ford), hijack the President's plane, Air Force One -- when the President and his wife and daughter are on board. When the terrorists threaten his family, the President is tested. Did he mean what he said when he implemented his new anti-terrorist policies, or was he just blowing hot air to look good?

Harrison Ford is fantastic as the President, appropriately subdued and bristling with firm resolve. The director is Wolfgang Petersen, who keeps this film racing with tension and adrenaline almost from the start. With its taught pacing, spectacular special effects, and Ford's remarkably human character, it's a riveting movie that'll have you too worked up in it to care about the unlikelihood of some of the stunts (which still aren't as bad as in most action films today). It's Die Hard on a plane and at least as good, perhaps better.

This one is also important to see in its widescreen format -- better yet, on the big screen -- and with an expensive sound system.