The 15:17 to Paris Parent Guide

Heroic events deserve to make the news but that doesn’t necessarily mean they will be the makings of a good movie. Sadly, that’s the situation with Clint Eastwood’s The 15:17 to Paris, a retelling of the quick spirited actions of three American men (Spencer Stone, Alek Skarlatos and Anthony Sadler) after an armed terrorist began shooting on a French train in 2015.

The first problem with creating a film about an actual conflict, that is barely five minutes long, is finding something to fill the other hour and a half of runtime. Ideally, you’d come up with some compelling backstory ideas. Eastwood’s solution is the classic psychiatric question: “Tell me about your childhood.”

The script begins with our three heroes making their way through middle school. Spencer and Alek (William Jennings and Bryce Gheisar) first meet Anthony (Paul-Mikél Williams) while waiting in line at the principal’s office. Becoming best friends, the trio’s favorite subject is history and their best pastimes are tardiness, mouthing off to educators, toilet papering a neighbor’s house and re-enacting war scenarios with toy guns in the woods near their Sacramento homes.

An edit later and they are young adults. (Now Spenser, Alek and Anthony are playing themselves.) Alek enlists in the military and Spencer, after a few rejections at higher level service positions, finds a place within the forces as well. Anthony makes college his first priority.

When Spencer and Alek are both stationed in Europe, the three guys come together for a sightseeing vacation that eventually ends up in Amsterdam. While recovering from a night of clubbing, the hungover pals decide to board a train for Paris. Minutes after leaving the station “the moment"arrives when the passengers are confronted by Ayoub El Khazzani, (played by Ray Corasani), a terrorist who emerges from the restroom with a rifle.

Perhaps it was wrong to feel a sense of “finally” when the pivotal action begins. But, at last, there’s a story to tell (albeit a short one) and Eastwood directs the bloody sequence with finesse. Spenser leads the charge to subdue the attacker and ends up with slashes across his neck and face. Alek and Anthony follow as backup. Moments later Spenser attends to another passenger, (Mark Moogalian also playing himself) who is shot in the neck, and uses his military medical knowledge to save the injured man’s life.

One has a sense that Clint Eastwood is doing his best to avoid using too much artistic license. Yet the truth of the matter is, these are three fairly ordinary guys who did an extraordinary thing. And perhaps that’s where I’m missing the point: Maybe Eastwood intended to bore us with the drivel of middle school antics and traipsing around Europe so that when the pivotal incident arrived we would clearly see that within all “ordinary” people is the potential to rise to exceptional circumstances.

Whether Eastwood is an artistic genius or a rushed director who didn’t anticipate that his movie would feel like a pilot for a reality TV series, is beside the point. The final destination of The 15:17 To Paris illustrates to teen and adult audiences that you don’t have to be someone special to do something that can make a powerful difference.

About author

Rod Gustafson

Rod Gustafson has worked in various media industries since 1977. He founded Parent Previews in 1993, and today continues to write and broadcast the reviews in newspapers, on radio and (of course) on the Internet. His efforts also include writing and researching media in all its forms and observing how it effects society and culture. He and his wife Donna have four children.