ABSURD `TURBULENCE' FAR FROM FIRST CLASS.

Byline: Amy Dawes Daily News Film Critic

'Twas the night before Christmas and the handful of passengers on the Tower Air 747 bound from New York to Los Angeles were just settling down for their in-flight naps, when suddenly, mayhem broke out.

A federal prisoner (Brendan Gleeson), shackled and guarded by U.S. marshals, manages to stab one of them on a trip to the bathroom, grab his gun and take him hostage. His fellow prisoner, an allegedly charismatic psychotic killer named Ryan Weaver (Ray Liotta), turns the chaos to his own advantage, and soon he also is free and in control of the aircraft.

It wouldn't seem like a good idea to kill the pilots and lock up the flight crew, but since Ryan is headed for Death Row anyway, he just wants to crash the jumbo jet and make the cop who nailed him (Hector Elizondo) feel real bad about it.

It's up to a single flight attendant, already distraught about her breakup with her fiance, to take the controls and save the day. Lauren Holly (``Dumb and Dumber'') gets the assignment, and it's not a pretty one.

Watching Holly grapple with her badly written character, Teri, and suffer the degradations meted out by her demented travel companion (Liotta), who wants to rip her apart and crash the airplane, you can only think back to Sandra Bullock in ``Speed.'' We don't remember anybody pummeling her, trying to rape her, or forcing her to run around in a slip covered with blood. She got to drive the bus, save the day and end up in a clinch with a buff Keanu Reeves.

But when it comes to ``Turbulence,'' you're not flying first class. Director Robert Butler, working from a script by Jonathan Brett, turns this double-decker jumbo jet into a fright house in the sky, replete with all the cliches of the low-budget horror flick.

Holly's character has to be dumb and vulnerable enough to keep getting taken in by the tactics of the smarmy con artist played by Liotta, a serial killer who specializes in raping and killing women, yet strong enough to pull herself together at the last minute. Liotta has to overpower or kill everyone on the airplane, equipped only with lame dialogue (``You're not having much luck with men lately, are you?'') and his own flickering charm.

At least there are sufficient special effects to distract us. The plane, now on automatic pilot, is flying through a major, ``level six'' storm, and as it pitches and rolls, and the lightning outside the windows flashes, fright house style, on the corpses striking gruesome poses in their seats, you can't help thinking about the theme park ride this movie could have inspired if it weren't so darn unpleasant.

It's a ride, all right, but not one people are likely to want to relive. As the characters engage in brutal hand-to-hand combat, and Weaver resorts to setting fires and smashing his way into the flight cabin with a hatchet - which makes it really hard for Teri to concentrate on the controls - the whole thing takes on such a nasty and desperate tone that not even Holly as the imperiled but spunky flight attendant can save it.

That's not to say it won't be profitable for the studio, MGM - it's easy to market worldwide and delivers the eye-popping visuals (inspired by James Cameron's ``True Lies'') of the jumbo yet shaving the tops off of airport hotels that are showcased in the commercial and trailer.

It's just not likely to fly very high. The studio was right to bump its release date from December to January - it's too much of a bummer for the holiday season. And among its count-'em-up implausibilities, the idea that one could board an uncrowded commercial flight at Christmas time seems the most far-fetched of all.

THE FACTS

The film: ``Turbulence'' (R; violence, language).

The stars: Lauren Holly, Ray Liotta, Hector Elizondo, Rachel Ticotin.

Behind the scenes: Directed by Robert Butler. Screenplay by Jonathan Brett. Produced by Martin Ransohoff. Released by MGM/UA.

Playing: Citywide

Our rating: Two Stars.

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Photo

Photo: Lauren Holly plays a flight attendant menaced by psychotic killer Ryan Weaver (Ray Liotta) in ``Turbulence.''