Cast Away

Cast Away

Cast Away is a 2000 film by 20th Century Fox and DreamWorks about a FedEx employee who is stranded on an uninhabited island after his plane goes down over the South Pacific. Tom Hanks was nominated for Best Actor at the Academy Awards for his performance.

Plot

Chuck Noland (Tom Hanks) is a time-obsessed FedEx systems analyst. He is in a relationship with Kelly Frears (Helen Hunt). Both want to get married, but Chuck's busy schedule is always an obstacle. At home in Memphis, Tennessee for Christmas after returning from a trip to Moscow, Russia, Chuck is called away for work while at a holiday gathering with relatives. As he is about to get on the plane, he gives Kelly a box containing an engagement ring and tells her not to open it until New Year's Eve. Kelly gives Chuck a pocket watch containing a picture of herself. While flying through a violent thunderstorm somewhere over the southern Pacific Ocean, the FedEx jet crashes into the ocean in flames. Saved by an inflatable life-raft, Chuck floats helplessly on the ocean until he is washed up on a deserted island, the lone survivor.

Within a few days, Chuck ascertains that the island is uninhabited and sets out to do what he can to survive. When the body of one of the flight crew washes up on the island, along with several FedEx packages, Chuck buries the pilot and neatly piles away all of the washed up packages. He eventually opens all of the packages (with the single exception of a package adorned with a pair of wings) and tries to find a practical use for whatever is inside. One contains a Wilson volleyball. After receiving a deep wound on his hand, Chuck angrily grabs and throws the volleyball, leaving a bloody hand print on it. Naming the ball "Wilson" after the manufacturer (as well as rubbing out a face on it), he starts to develop a deep-friendship-like dependency to help him cope with the loneliness. Four years later, a dramatically thinner, bearded Chuck is seen expertly tossing a spear into the water, killing a fish. One morning, a large chunk of plastic from a portable toilet washes up on the island. Upon seeing how the wind blew the plastic down after standing it up in the sand, Chuck decides to build a raft, using the plastic as a sail, so that he can escape from the island. Setting out to sea with Wilson, he becomes visibly emotional for managing to leave the island from overcoming the waves which had denied him on previous occasions. Spending days drifting out into the open sea, Wilson falls into the water as Chuck is sleeping and he is unable to save him. All alone on the raft, he is rescued by a passing New Zealand cargo ship.

On returning home, Chuck must come to terms with the fact that everyone he was close to has given him up for dead long ago and moved on with their lives. Kelly has married and had a child with another man, Dr. Jerry Lovett (Chris Noth). Chuck reunites with Kelly and they profess their love for each other, but they both know that Kelly has responsibilities to Jerry and her daughter and say goodbye to each other. He then sets out to deliver the one package he never opened on the island - the one with the angels' wings.

No one is home, so he leaves the package at the front door with an attached note. Stopping at a remote crossroads, a woman in a truck drives up and tries to help him explaining where all the roads from the intersection lead to. As she drives away, noticing the painted angel's wings on the back of her truck, Chuck is seen smiling in the direction of the truck.

Cast

• Tom Hanks - Chuck Noland
• Helen Hunt - Kelly Frears
• Semion Sudarikov - Nicolai
• Geoffrey Blake - Maynard Graham
• Jenifer Lewis - Becca Twig
• Chris Noth - Jerry Lovett
• Nick Searcy - Stan
• Lari White - Bettina Peterson
• Vince Martin - Albert "Al" Miller