Airport ’77 (1977)

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Not content to merely have another mid-air collision, the producers of Airport ’77 really decided to pile it on this go-round.  NOT ONLY do we get a multi-million dollar art theft, we also get skyjackers, the Bermuda Triangle, a submerged airplane, and Dracula! (Okay, not really Dracula, but Christopher Lee, who played Dracula seven times in Hammer’s horror series.)  For all of that, it’s still the best of the Airport sequels.

Here’s the plot:  Jimmy Stewart invites a lot of guests aboard his nifty new plane, which also happens to be loaded with a LOT of priceless artwork, to come to what used to be his family home and is now going to be a museum. He’s not on the plane himself, because he’s handling the press for the museum and the plane.  It turns out that art thieves have infiltrated the flight crew, and their plan is to hijack the plane, use gas to knock everyone out, land on a deserted airstrip somewhere in the Caribbean, transfer the art to another plane, and be halfway to Brazil before the people on Jimmy’s plane wake up.  Of course, things go awry, and the plane ends up on the ocean floor, 600 miles off course, running out of oxygen and slowly filling up with water.

The rest of the film has to do with the rescue efforts of the Navy and a whole lot of other people, including George Kennedy as Joe Patroni!  Yup, he’s back again for his third go-round, showing up exactly halfway through the movie to work his patented Patroni problem-solving magic.  This time, Joe’s apparently gotten an even better promotion than the one he’d gotten in Airport 1975, but we’re left in the dark as to what it might be.  The only utterance we get in explanation is his first line of dialogue: “I like this liaison between my company and the Navy.”  That’s it.  If this were your first Airport film, you’d be pretty lost if asked to explain exactly who Joe Patroni is.  He does seem to know everybody, though.  He calls Jimmy Stewart’s character, one of the richest men in the world, by his first name and throws his arm around his shoulders as if they’ve been friends forever.  I think I’d like to buy a rubber wristband that says “WWJPD?”

The guest star list this time out is a step up from the one for Airport 1975.  We’ve got the aforementioned Stewart, Kennedy, and Lee, along with Jack Lemmon, Lee Grant, Olivia de Havilland, Joseph Cotten, Kathleen Quinlan, Brenda Vaccaro, Darren McGavin, Robert Foxworth, Gil Gerard, and the ever-annoying Tom Sullivan.  Because of the success of Airport 1975, apparently the producers felt that they needed another saccharine song that would have no chance of getting an Oscar nomination—thus Tom’s inclusion in the film.  He sings “Beauty is in the Eyes of the Beholder,” the lyrics of which I now quote:

                        Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder
                        And that’s what I want to do.
                        Hold you in my life forever,
                        And just keep on loving you.
                       
                        Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder
                        So take a special look and see,
                        And just possibly,
                        You’ll see the beauty that’s in me.

–composed and sung by Tom Sullivan                                    X

I have major problems with the lyrics of the first verse.  Exactly what is Tom referring to in the second line?  In what way does it connect to the first line?  It’s utterly incomprehensible.  As if the lyrics weren’t bad enough on their own, Tom also sings this song in a register that allows him to communicate with dolphins and bats.  And I don’t know about you, but it always creeps me out to hear blind singers singing songs about seeing, and eyes, and stuff like that.

In the final analysis, as much as I wanted it to be, Airport ’77 isn’t the miserable failure that either of the other two Airport sequels is.  It’s certainly not as bad as you’d think a movie from the director of The Bat People and The Dirt Gang would be.

I would most certainly be remiss if I didn’t include the trailer for the film, courtesy of YouTube (as always):

Airport ’75 (1974)

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You know you’re on some kind of slippery footing when you sit down to watch a movie called Airport 1975 (that’s the onscreen title) that was released in 1974.  And that’s only the beginning of the parade of goofiness that is this film.  It’s still better than anything Michael Bay has ever touched, though.

Another all-star cast is in place for this one, but only four or five real stars are in the film.  The rest of the actors came from somewhere in the middle of the celebrity list, just in front of Rodney Allen Rippy and The Defranco Family (featuring Tony Defranco!).  I mean, Erik Estrada?  Norman Fell?  LARRY STORCH?!

The plot, in a nutshell:  Dana Andrews (Curse of the Demon) has a heart attack while flying his small plane and crashes into the cockpit of a 747, killing and/or maiming the crew.  Head stewardess Karen Black (Trilogy of Terror) has to try to fly the plane via radio instructions from her pilot boyfriend, Charlton Heston (Planet of the Apes).  Ed Nelson (The Brain Eaters) attempts to transfer into the hole in the cockpit while attached to a tether from a military helicopter, but fails.  Charlton tries the same thing, but he succeeds in getting into the cockpit to try to land the plane.  Other Psychotronic cast members include Linda Blair (The Exorcist), Beverly Garland (It Conquered the World), Roy Thinnes (Journey to the Far Side of the Sun), and Austin Stoker (Abby).  Gloria Swanson (Killer Bees), making her last film appearance, plays herself, and she’s one of the most annoying and needless characters ever to be inserted into a film just for the sake of having another “name” star.  If her assistant looks familiar, it’s because she’s Linda Harrison, who co-starred along with Charlton in Planet of the Apes as Nova—only this time she’s acting under the name Augusta Summerland, which she used for about three years.  Go figure.

The script is awful, with some of the worst lines reserved for Gloria Swanson and Helen Reddy, who plays a singing nun.  Her scene with Linda Blair was parodied mercilessly in Airplane!  She co-wrote the awful song she sings as well.  Here’re some of the insipid lyrics:

                        That’s why I am a best friend to myself,
                        And I take me out whenever I feel low,
                        And I make my life as happy as a best friend would,
                        I’m as nice to me as anyone I know.

–from “Best Friend,” music and lyrics by Helen Reddy and R. Burton

Here’s a clip from the film featuring the song, and here’s a clip of it being skewered in Airplane!

I’m sure that you, like me, are wondering how the Academy overlooked “Best Friend” when it came time for picking the Best Song nominees for that year.

The best line in the film comes courtesy of Charlton Heston.  After he’s made it into the cockpit, he sends Karen Black back to her stewardessing duties, telling her to “Go do your thing, baby.”  I’m going to try to use that line at least once a day on somebody.

Here’s the trailer from YouTube:

 

Psychotronica Redux: Links ‘r’ Us!  Now go do your thing, baby!

Airport (1970)

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They just don’t make ‘em like this anymore.  Airport is an incredibly entertaining film (in a soap opera-ish kind of way) about twelve hours in the life of a Chicago airport.  If you’re watching it just for the airplane disaster part, you’ll have to wait until the movie’s half over before the plane gets into the air.  From that point on, though, it’s pretty much a slow, non-stop ratcheting-up of suspense.

The cast is awesome as well:  Burt Lancaster is the airport manager who’s having marital problems with his wife, Dana Wynter, and is just skirting having an affair with another of the airport’s employees, Jean Seberg.  His sister, Barbara Hale, is married to pilot Dean Martin, who’s having an affair with stewardess Jacqueline Bisset.  Helen Hayes is a little old lady stowaway, Maureen Stapleton is married to demolitions expert Van Heflin (who carries a bomb on board the plane), who gave Lloyd Nolan as a customs agent bad vibes, and George Kennedy is Joe Patrioni, who is the king of the ground crews.   There’s a lot more going on, but I don’t want to spoil anything for you.

Based on the bestseller by Arthur Hailey, Airport was a big hit for Universal in 1970—so big that it eventually spawned three sequels of varying competence.  Give Airport a shot if you’ve never seen it—it’s a working definition of a popcorn movie.

Here’s the trailer from YouTube:

Airplane! (1980)

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Some movies are just simply above criticism.  This is one of them.  I’d love to say that I’ve got great new insights into what makes the movie funny or that I talked with the Zucker brothers and have some great behind-the-scenes stories to tell, but I don’t.  Instead, I’ll offer a Top Ten list of reasons why I love Airplane!:

1.   It 180ed Leslie Nielson’s career path, making him a MUCH  more interesting actor.
2.   Ethel Merman has a cameo.  Any movie is vastly improved by a little bit of Ethel.
3.   “Don’t call me Shirley.”
4.   The singing stewardess scene.  (Say THAT three times fast.)  It’s a dead-on lampoon  of the singing nun scene in Airport ’75, which I now cannot watch without laughing.
5.   Shep, the dog.
6.   The writer/directors had the good sense to walk away from the sequel.
7.   The jiggling Jello™ / jiggling breasts shot.
8.   The look on the kid with the coffee’s face.
9.   The copyright warning during the end credits.
10.   Two words:  Robert Stack.

Now, in case you have no idea what I’m talking about for ANY of the above-listed reasons, it’s time for you to watch Airplane! again.

Although you can find the entire movie for watching online via several less-than-reputable websites, Airplane! is a movie best watched with lots of friends.  So, to tide you over until you can get your friends over to watch it, here’s the trailer from YouTube:

Agent for H.A.R.M. (1966)

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Ah, the life of a secret agent—women throwing themselves at you nonstop, cool gadgets that beep a lot, offices with sliding wooden panels that reveal world maps emblazoned with flashing lights, crazy acronyms, and, of course, a demeanor that veritably defines cool.  Man, what I wouldn’t have given to have been a secret agent…but the Cold War ended and it’s just not as glamorous a gig as it used to be.  But, oh, in the mid-1960s…

Agent for H.A.R.M. was released in 1966, during the heyday of all things secret-agenty.  The James Bond franchise had been around since 1962, but it didn’t really reach critical mass until Goldfinger in 1964, thus starting a worldwide love affair with anything having to do with secret agents.  Television wasn’t immune from this sickness, either—The Man from U.N.C.L.E. debuted in 1964, and Get Smart! showed up in 1965, among many other secret-agent type shows.

From what I can gather, Agent for H.A.R.M. was shot as the pilot for a proposed TV series that didn’t sell, but Universal decided that they could maybe make a few bucks off of it if they released it theatrically.

The plot has to do with bad guys who want to spray American crops with a spore that, when introduced into the human body, causes the tissues to turn to fungus.  And it’s up to H.A.R.M. to stop them.  Mark Richman, who has guest-starred on just about every television series ever produced in America, plays secret agent Adam Chance.  He’s sporting this rather bizarre, Pepe Le Pew kind of white stripe in his hair which I guess is supposed to be attractive, but I just find it distracting.  The ever-inebriated Wendell Corey plays his boss, and Martin Kosleck, best known (at least in cult film circles) for his role in The Flesh Eaters, is the head bad guy.  Robert Quarry (Count Yorga, Vampire), Donna Michelle (Beach Blanket Bingo), and Barbara Bouchet (72% of all European horror films made in the 1970s) are also on board.

It seems that this film is almost universally despised, with a lot of that hatred stemming from the mere fact that it was fodder for the MST3K gang, so it MUST be awful and mocked derisively, right?  Well…wrong.  I find Agent for H.A.R.M. to be actually quite entertaining.  It’s low-budget, sure, but high production values do not make a good movie—see the films of Michael Bay for any number of examples.

Oh, by the way, H.A.R.M. stands for “Human Aetiological Relations Machine,” just in case anyone asks.  And, no, I have no idea what that means.

Here’s the awesome trailer, courtesy of our pals at YouTube:

African Treasure (1952)

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Hoo boy!  Two Africa movies in a row, with neither actually having been shot there!  Our film today is part of the Bomba, the Jungle Boy series of films that starred Johnny Sheffield, better known as “Boy” in the Johnny Weismuller Tarzan films.  (Weismuller, meanwhile, was busy starring in the Jungle Jim series that had started in 1948 at Columbia.)  (Jungle Jim should not be confused with “Jungle Gym,” which, if said confusion were to occur, might cause some inappropriate mental images.)

The Bomba series was based on a batch o’ juvenile adventure books written in the 1920s by Roy Rockwood, which is now my new favorite adult film actor name.  I actually own one of the books, although my copy was published in the 1950s.  Here’s what mine looks like (please excuse the sloppy edges on the photo–it had a really busy background that I had to remove):

The Bomba film series started in 1949 with Bomba, the Jungle Boy and lasted for 12 films, of which African Treasure falls pretty much smack in the middle.  When the series stopped production in 1955, Sheffield went on to shoot a TV pilot called “Bantu the Zebra Boy,” milking the jungle cow for all it was worth.  Unfortunately, the cow was dry, and Bantu never swung across TV screens.

So, here are the quick details about this particular entry into the 1952 jungle movie sweepstakes: diamonds, crater, Laurette Luez (hubba!), monkeys, kidnapping, vines, underground river, bad guys, umgawa.  That about sums it up.

Oh, and pay close attention to Bomba when he talks.  He’s got some kind of split personality in which he’ll utter two or three perfectly good sentences in English, such as “We’ll have to try looking on the other side of the mountain for a hidden opening,’ then he’ll follow up that with “We go now.”  Lazy writing or bipolar savant?  You be the judge!

YouTube has let me down.  No clips from this particular Bomba “adventure.”

Africa Screams (1949)

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Guess who’s back?  Bud and Lou!  Just when you thought you’d seen the last of ‘em, they pop up again, this time in Africa (or a rather unconvincing facsimile thereof).  This time out, the boys play Buzz and Stanley.  Stanley’s last name is Livington—get it?  Oh, never mind.  They’re off to Africa in search of a) wild animals for lion-tamer Clyde Beatty to use in his show; b) an “Orangutan Gargantua,” or in plain English, a 20-foot ape; and c) diamonds.  Of course, the usual hijinks occur (or should that be lowjinks?).  (Have you noticed my fondness for parentheses yet?)  (Have you?)  (Huh?)

Sporadically amusing film was made independently, and has now fallen into the public domain. For some unexplained reason, I’ve got three copies of this film on DVD.  YOU can pick this one up in almost any store that sells DVDs, usually for a buck or two.  Buck?  Did I mention that Frank Buck is in the film as well?  There’s also a stooge (Shemp Howard) and a future stooge (Joe Besser) in it, along with lots of lions (both real and fake), lots of crocodiles (some real but most fake), and the aforementioned 20-foot ape (I’m pretty sure that it’s fake).  Add to that a whole bunch of native tribesmen who want to eat Lou for dinner, and you’ve pretty much got an idea of what’s going on.

If you’ve watched every film that I’ve discussed so far (and you HAVE, haven’t you?), you’ll know whether or not you’re an Abbott and Costello fan.  So anything I say about this film will either be preaching to the choir or will fall on deaf ears.  However, if you HAVEN’T been watching all these films, and you’re relatively undecided about whether you like Abbott and Costello or not, you can make up your mind right now—

Here’s the entire film, courtesy of YouTube.com!  Enjoy!