Starring
Jack Lemmon, Lee Grant, Brenda Vaccaro, George Kennedy, Joseph
Cotten, Olivia de Havilland, James Stewart, Darren McGavin,
Christopher Lee, Robert Foxworth, Robert Hooks, Kathleen Quinlan, Gil
Gerard, Monte Markham, M. Emmet Walsh. Directed by Jerry Jameson.
(1977/113 min).
Essay
by D.M. ANDERSON
Friends,
we're gathered here today to honor a Hollywood icon...one that
thrilled us with her exploits on the the silver screen for nearly 50 years. While we mourn
her passing, let us also celebrate an illustrious career, both on
and off the screen.
Portland
International Airport (PDX) is only three or four miles from where I teach.
Looking out my classroom window a few years ago, I saw a Boeing 747
coming in for a landing, her 18 wheels emerging from her belly like
extended talons. Massive against the backdrop of the blue
afternoon sky, she hardly seemed to be moving, as if telling the
world, "I'm Queen of the Skies...I'll get there when I'm
damn well ready."
Air
traffic comes and goes with such regularity that I seldom give it
more than an passing glance. This time, I halted my lesson on sentence combining, strolled to the window and watched
this gleaming diva's graceful approach until distant trees blocked
the rest of her landing.
She
was beautiful.
747s
are a rare sight these days. Some of my students even stopped to gawk
along with me, the way one might do when spotting a freakishly large
garden slug in the yard. The few 747s that bother to arrive &
depart at PDX are always cargo planes (as this one was). In fact, I
don't recall the last time I saw one arrive carrying anything
other than Fedex packages.
Not
long afterwards, I learned the sad news that the few remaining 747 passenger
planes in-service were being grounded (in this country,
anyway), having outlived their usefulness among newer, sleeker, more
technologically-advanced planes. The last one - Delta Air Lines
Flight 9771 - touched-down for good on January 3, 2018, its final
resting place an airplane graveyard in Arizona. It was the end
of an era that began five decades earlier, when
Pan-American Airlines started carrying jet-setters around the world in
space-age luxury. Affectionately dubbed
the Queen of the Skies, the 747's unique shape and sheer size made her
instantly iconic.
With
such a striking appearance, it wasn't long before Hollywood came calling. She was a natural, of course, appearing in a wide variety
of movies. Even in the smallest roles, she displayed epic grace on
the big screen and became the go-to aircraft whenever a film's story
required international travel. It was obvious the 747 was
destined to be a big star.
 |
| A true Hollywood diva. |
She found a niche in grand-scale action movies. One of her first
starring roles was that of a crippled airliner in Airport 1975,
sharing top billing with another icon once renowned for
larger-than-life performances, Charlton Heston. The film itself was
no great shakes and the rest of the all-star cast obviously showed up
to collect paychecks, but the 747 was magnificent, stealing every
scene. Even today, the tension-filled scenes where she's flying at
dangerously-low altitudes through the Rocky Mountains are impressive.
Not only did she do her own stunts, these sequences just wouldn't have
had the same visual impact with a puny old 707.
Dozens
of similar roles followed over the years: Executive Decision,
Turbulence, Die Hard 2, Final Destination, Drop Zone, Megashark vs.
Giant Octopus, Air Force One, Snakes on a Plane, just
to name a few. A lot of them were variations of the disaster
movie genre and she died on-screen more often than Sean Bean, but being a
consummate pro, she never complained about typecasting.
Of
all the films in her career, perhaps Airport '77
most-effectively showcased her
talents. Not that it's her best film, but she gets plenty of
screen time to strut her stuff. Airport '77 is her second
appearance in the franchise that began in 1970 with the original
Airport. That sappy, sudsy
film - starring her less-sexy older sister, the Boeing 707 - kicked
the disaster movie genre into high gear (which The Concorde -
Airport '79 ironically brought to a screeching halt a decade
later). Of all four films in the series, Airport '77 is arguably the best
one, meaning it's the least goofy. Though still pretty silly, at
least it boasts a stronger cast, better performances and a more
engaging story than the other Airport movies.
 |
| "Truth-be-told, George, it's not such a wonderful life." |
Billionaire
Philip Stevens (James Stewart) is the proud owner of an all-new,
state-of-the-art 747. Touted as a technological miracle,
the plane boasts a piano bar, bedrooms, sofas, office space, poker
tables and a full kitchen. There's also a table-top version of
Pong - a huge deal at the time - and one of the very first
laserdisc players. In real life, the latter was so new and pricey
that the producers actually borrowed Universal exec Lew Wasserman's
player for a single scene.
Stevens
invites all his rich friends on the plane's inaugural flight, flown by Capt.
Don Gallagher (Jack Lemmon), to transport his art collection to a new
museum. His friends include the usual batch of past-their-prime
stars, character actors, young up 'n' comers, a
couple of annoying children and, of course, George Kennedy as Joe Patroni.
Unfortunately, the plane is hijacked by a crew of art thieves led by
Gallagher's co-pilot, Chambers (Robert Foxworth...and no, he's not
the guy who played Mike Brady). After gassing the passengers and
crew, they descend below the radar and disappear into the Bermuda
Triangle.
 |
| "You're Mike Brady and you know it." |
Back
in the 70s, the Bermuda Triangle was one of those mysterious places
that terrified people who believed everything they read. Supposedly
a paranormal region of the Atlantic Ocean, many planes and ships
"disappeared" there over the years, never to be seen again.
It even inspired a bestselling book by Charles Berlitz, who made a
career out of convincing the more intellectually-challenged of our
species that Atlantis was real, the Navy had invisible ships and the
world would end in 1999. If Berlitz were alive today, he'd probably
find gainful employment as Fox News' scientific advisor. But like
Area 51, the Amityville House and Sasquatch, the Bermuda Triangle was
mostly great tabloid and movie fodder. Indeed, this
angle was hyped-to-the-hilt in Airport '77's ad campaign,
though the region's supernatural reputation never figures into the
plot.
Instead,
the plane's wing clips an oil derrick and splashes into the ocean, trapping
the passengers 100 feet underwater. Their importance to the plot now
served, most of the bad guys are conveniently killed in the crash,
save for Chambers, who ruefully informs Gallagher he changed course
to avoid detection. This means nobody tracking the plane on radar knows
where they went down. One would think a few oil workers might have
noticed a massive jumbo jet striking their platform and consider phoning it in, but never mind.
Before
the water pressure crushes the plane "like an empty beer can,"
Gallagher hatches a plan to open one of the cargo doors and swim to
the surface with an emergency signal buoy. The remainder of the film
is a race against time as the Navy rushes to the scene to try and
raise the plane before it floods and everyone drowns.
Airport
'77 is the most FX-driven film in the franchise, making ample use
of miniatures to depict the crash, sinking and most of the flight
scenes. Though Star Wars would come along just a few months
later to render the whole thing absolutely archaic, the effects are
more-or-less convincing enough to serve the story. The crash scene
itself - a combination of miniatures and some dubious rear projection
- is rendered more ominous due to the performance of our dear lady,
the Boeing 747, who dominates the screen. Airline disaster
films simply look and feel more epic when the Queen of the Skies is
in distress.
 |
| The stealthy 747 sneaks up on unsuspecting swimmers. |
Of
course, no disaster movie is complete without its sillier elements.
Those in Airport '77 are mostly regulated to pre-catastrophe festivities, such as Monte Markham as one of
the baddies who inexplicably changes disguises three times
before he even steps on the plane, or Olivia de Havilland hamming it
up as a southern belle who "humorously" turns out to be a
card shark. And just who's idea was it to cast the
magnificently menacing Christopher Lee as the biggest pussy in the
entire movie (playing Lee Grant's henpecked husband)? Why the hell
isn't he masterminding the damn heist???
My
favorite moment, however, features blind singer/songwriter Tom
Sullivan, who passionately mewls "Beauty is in the Eyes of the
Beholder," the sappiest Oscar-baiting song interlude in disaster
movie history, making Helen Reddy's goofy musical moment in Airport
1975 sound like she's belting-out "Balls to the Wall." Sullivan warbles with
such high-pitched sincerity that young Kathleen Quinlan can't help
but fall instantly in-love with him.
Airport
'77 would be the 747's last appearance in the series.
She wisely passed on The Concorde - Airport '79, but still
found plenty of employment with choice roles in many other action
epics. Eventually, though, like so many other fading stars throughout
Hollywood history, her popularity began to wane and the offers dried
up. She still retained her sleek beauty, though, hardly aging at all
in 50 years.
When
the last of the great Boeing passenger jets was permanently grounded,
it was the end of an era. The 747 is now just
another relic of the past, no longer
relevant in Hollywood or anywhere else. We won't see the likes of her on the big screen again. Sure, she still finds work as
a freighter, but that's like seeing Meryl Streep
appearing in a Life-Alert commercial.
So
let's not forget to appreciate the grand old bird's contributions to
cinema and pop culture. Whether splashing into the Atlantic,
exploding in mid-air or being attacked by a megalodon, the 747 will
always be the Queen of the Skies.
Rest
in peace, old girl. I only wish I'd had the opportunity to ride
you just one time.
