Plot

A cropdusting plane with a fear of heights lives his dream of competing in a famous around-the-world aerial race.

Dusty Crophopper is a little cropduster plane with a fear of heights and a crazy dream of being a racer. While his friends need convincing, Dusty gets the training he needs from Skipper, a veteran fighter, and qualifies for the Wings Across the World race. In the event, Dusty finds competitors who soon learn that there is something special about this underdog as he is tested to his physical and emotional limits. In doing so, Dusty soon finds enemies, and more importantly friends, who are inspired by his dream. In the face of all obstacles, the winner of this air race will be anyone's guess.—Kenneth Chisholm (kchishol@rogers.com)

Cars gets a high-flying spin-off with this Disney Toon Studios film about a humble crop duster who dreams of becoming a great air racer. Dusty (voice of Dane Cook) spends most of his days flying low, but his eyes are always turned up toward the clouds. Sadly, Dusty's modest engine and intense fear of heights make a career in racing a long shot at best. Things begin to look up for Dusty, however, when a veteran aviator helps him qualify for a race against the reigning circuit champ. Now if Dusty can just learn to let go of his fears, his checkered-flag dreams may finally come true..

The big dreamer and hard-working crop-dusting plane, Dusty Crophopper, has the fervent desire to become a famous racing plane at the prestigious Wings Around the Globe annual international air race. However, to achieve such a noble aspiration, Dusty's only chance of winning lies in the experienced flaps of the battle-scarred U.S. Navy Corsair, Skipper, who, along with a group of true friends, will help him with all they've got. But, has the underdog from the farm what it takes to defeat the arrogant and unscrupulous world champion, Ripslinger?—Nick Riganas

Dusty Crophopper (Dane Cook) is a crop-duster plane who works at a cornfield and practices aerobatic maneuvers in his spare time, dreaming of becoming a racer and competing with fighter planes equipped with Jet engines. His dreams are scorned by his boss, Leadbottom (Cedric the Entertainer) and his forklift mechanic friend, Dottie (Teri Hatcher), yet supported by his fuel truck friend, Chug (Brad Garrett). Dusty believes he can race as he has a tight turn radius and a high power to weight ratio. Dottie says that Dusty was not built to race, and was built to fly low and slow, like a crop duster. If Dusty pushes too far, he will get wing flutter, metal fatigue and turbine failure.

Dusty and Chug train for qualifiers for the upcoming Wings Across the World race. The night before the qualifiers, Dusty asks an elderly and reclusive navy war plane named Skipper Riley (Stacy Keach) to teach him how to fly well but Skipper refuses. Chug's friend Sparky had told him that Skipper was a legendary flight instructor in the Navy, whose squadron (the Jolly Wrenches) shot down 50 enemy planes.

Dusty enters the qualifiers (under the nickname Sturt Jetstream), and although the audience mocks him for being a crop duster, he manages to wow them by his well-practiced flight maneuvers but comes in 6th place and does not qualify. A few days later, a representative from the qualifier (Roper (Sinbad)) visits his town looking for Dusty and announces to him that he now placed 5th. This is due to the qualifier ahead of Dusty using an illegal fuel enhancement, getting him disqualified and Dusty replacing him.

Later in the morning, Skipper visits Dusty and tries to talk him out of racing, but Dusty explains he wants to prove he's more than just a crop duster. Skipper, with the help of his forklift assistant Sparky (Danny Mann), decides to mentor Dusty on his speed and agility. While in the middle of his training, Dusty admits that he has a fear of heights and has never flown over 1000 feet. Skipper says that the height of the atmosphere contains jet streams that provide tail winds to the planes on long journeys and can make a significant difference to the time taken to complete the distance. Dottie works on Dusty's engine to increase power and removes his external attachments to reduce his weight. Dusty's speed improves from 217 MPH to 317 MPH during the course of the training.

When the training is complete, Dusty heads off to the meeting of the race at John F. Kennedy Airport where he finds a friend in an eccentric but loyal Mexican race-plane named El Chupacabra (Carlos Alazraqui) who soon falls in love with a beautiful French-Canadian racer named Rochelle (Julia Louis-Dreyfus), who shows little interest in him. Only Dusty knew that El Chupacabra is the indoor racing champion of Mexico. Dusty then makes a rival of the arrogant and villainous 3-time winner plane Ripslinger (Roger Craig Smith) (nicknamed the Green Tornado), who rudely dismisses him as being only a crop duster. Dusty also falls in love with a racer plane named Ishani (Priyanka Chopra) who is the Pan Asian champion and the Mumbai cup holder. There are 21 planes in the race and for the first time a crop duster is competing in the race. The race has 7 legs and covers over 31,000 Kms.

The first leg of the race is from New York to Iceland. Dusty's refusal to fly high causes him to finish in last place. Dusty's wings were frozen solid, and he almost crashed into a 10-floor high iceberg. The second leg of the race is to Germany. Dusty shows good sportsmanship by saving another racer, Bulldog (John Cleese), from crashing when his eyes get squirted with oil from his propellers, winning Bulldog's respect but finishing last again. Dusty stays with Bulldog the entire time, prevents him from crashing into castles and other obstacles and helps him land at the designated airstrip. Bulldog is astounded that a crop duster saved his life. Dusty has a fan in the form of Franz aka Von Fliegenhosen (Oliver Kalkofe) a German Aerocar, with a split personality disorder. Franz thanks Dusty for representing all the little cars in the race and suggests that Dusty can drop his crop-dusting pipes and tanks and fly even faster.

The third leg is to an air base at Agra in India (where the fliers have to fly under a hard ceiling of 1000 feet, which allows Dusty to gain some lost ground) while the fourth leg is over Nepal. Dusty gains the attention of the media and becomes a favorite underdog story of the race. Ripslinger decides to show Dusty his place. Back home, Dusty's courageous progress encourages Skipper to also get to the runway and to take flight. But he stops after starting his engines and returns to the hanger.

In India Ishani gives Dusty advice on how to fly low through the Himalayas by following some railroad tracks. However, he is forced to fly through a tunnel and narrowly avoids a head-on collision with a steam train, but miraculously finishes first in Nepal. Dusty realizes Ishani deliberately gave him bad advice to get a new propeller from Ripslinger and he shuns her.

The fifth leg is over the Hump (the mountains between northeast India and south China) to Shanghai, where Dusty gets into first place again. There, Dusty manages to help El Chupacabra win over Rochelle with a romantic song, which works a little too well.

The sixth leg is across the Pacific Ocean to Mexico. Ripslinger's henchmen, Ned and Zed (Gabriel Iglesias), destroy Dusty's navigation antenna. Lost and low on fuel and unable to find Hawaii, Dusty is found by two Super Hornets (Val Kilmer and Anthony Edwards) who escort him to the USS "Flysinhower" (a reference to the real-life aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN-69)) which allows him to land and refuel and be repaired. While on the carrier, Dusty sees a hall of fame set up for Skipper's squadron, but discovers that Skipper only flew one mission, which contradicts his previous reputation as a veteran of many battles. He then has to take off to try and beat an oncoming storm. The carrier launches Dusty with a catapult.

The storm becomes very violent with enormous waves. Dusty gets distracted from flying due to his thoughts about Skipper and ends up crashing into the ocean but is rescued. He is flown to Mexico to his friends, but he is severely damaged and may never fly again. Skipper confesses to Dusty that he did indeed fly only one mission in the Pacific theatre where his entire squad of trainees was killed in an attack on the Japanese Navy. Skipper was the only survivor, but torn by his guilt, he never trained another plane or flew again. Demoralized and heartbroken, Dusty begins to consider dropping out of the race, but is encouraged by his friends, racers and many of his newfound fans to continue and they all donate parts to have Dusty repaired. Ishani donates her own propeller that she got from Ripslinger, so Dusty can compete against him on equal terms. Chug reviews the videos of Ripslinger's past victories and notices something that he communicates to Dusty. Dusty realizes that Ripslinger is actually afraid of losing the race to a crop duster.

The seventh leg is back to New York. With a change of heart and morale restored, Dusty becomes determined to win the race, but Ripslinger still won't give up and plots to sabotage his chances of winning. He and his goons ambush Dusty when the race is in the middle of the desert and out of camera range, but are thwarted by Skipper, who overcame his guilt and came to help Dusty. Dusty manages to trick Ned and Zed, but Ripslinger takes out Skipper's tail. Dusty helps to stabilize Skipper and loses ground to Ripslinger. When trying to catch up with Ripslinger, Dusty conquers his fear of heights when his engine starts losing power, forcing him to ride the Jetstream when he recognizes from clouds that a Jetstream is overhead.

Both he and Ripslinger make it to the finish line in New York and when it looks like Ripslinger will win, his ego gets the best of him and slows down to have his picture taken. Dusty seizes the opportunity and wins the race while Ripslinger crashes into some portable toilets. Dusty is congratulated by his friends and fans and Skipper thanks him for giving him the confidence to fly again. Skipper rejoins the navy on the Flysinhower with Dusty as his partner and they take flight together.

At the end of the credits, a message appears saying Dusty Crophopper will return in Planes: Fire & Rescue.