Airport 1975


Airport 1975 is a 1974 American air disaster film and the first sequel to the successful 1970 film Airport. Airport 1975 was directed by Jack Smight, produced by William Frye and Jennings Lang and has a screenplay by Don Ingalls. The film stars Charlton Heston, Karen Black and George Kennedy, as well as Gloria Swanson in her final screen appearance.
The plot concerns the dramatic events aboard an airborne Boeing 747 when a small aircraft crashes into the cockpit causing the fatalities of senior crew and the blinding of the pilot with no one aboard qualified to take the controls. Airport 1975 was the seventh highest-grossing movie of 1974 at the US and Canada box office.

Plot

Columbia Air Lines Flight 409 is a Boeing 747-100 on a red-eye route from Washington Dulles International Airport to Los Angeles International Airport. Scott Freeman, meanwhile, is a businessman flying his private Beechcraft Baron to an urgent sales meeting in Boise, Idaho. However, an occluded front has the entire West Coast of the United States socked in, with Los Angeles reporting zero visibility. Columbia 409 and Freeman's Beechcraft are diverted to Salt Lake City International Airport.
Salt Lake air traffic control assigns Columbia 409 to land ahead of Freeman's Beechcraft. As Columbia 409 is about to start its descent, First Officer Urias unlocks himself from his seat to check out a vibration. Just then, Freeman suffers a heart attack and unknowingly descends into the approach of Columbia 409. The Beechcraft slams into Columbia 409 just above the co-pilot seat, blowing Urias out of the plane to his death, destroying most of the Flight Engineer's panel and fatally injuring Flight Engineer Julio. Captain Stacy is struck in the face by debris and is blinded. Nancy Pryor, the First Stewardess, rushes to the flight deck, to find Flight Engineer Julio dead, First Officer Urias gone and Captain Stacy injured. Although severely injured and blinded, he is still alive. Using the last of his strength, Captain Stacy is able to engage the autopilot and the altitude hold switch before losing consciousness.
Pryor informs the Salt Lake control tower that the crew is dead or badly injured and that there is no one to fly the plane. She gives an assessment of the damage as a large hole on the right side of the flight deck that destroyed most of the instrument gauges over the engineer station. Joe Patroni, Columbia's Vice President of Operations, is apprised of Columbia 409's situation. He seeks the advice of Captain Al Murdock, Columbia's chief flight instructor, who also happens to be Nancy Pryor's boyfriend, even though their relationship was "on the rocks" at that time.
Patroni and Murdock take the airline's executive jet to Salt Lake. En route, they communicate with Pryor, learning that the autopilot is keeping the aircraft in level flight, but it is inoperable for turns. The jet is heading into the Wasatch Mountains, so Murdock starts to guide Pryor by radio on how to perform the turn when radio communications are interrupted and the Salt Lake tower is unable to restore contact.
Unable to turn, leaking fuel and dodging the peaks of the Wasatch Mountains, an air-to-air rescue attempt is undertaken from a HH-53 helicopter flown by the US Air Force Aerospace Rescue and Recovery Service. While a replacement pilot is preparing to be released on a tether from the helicopter to Columbia 409, Captain Stacy is able to give a cryptic clue regarding the decrease in airspeed during a climb in altitude. Pryor realizes that she must accelerate to be able to climb over the mountain and successfully does so. After Columbia 409 has leveled off, the replacement pilot is released towards the stricken airliner. Just as Pryor is helping him in, the release cord from his harness becomes caught in the jagged metal surrounding the hole in the cockpit. As he climbs in, his harness is released from the tether and he falls from the aircraft.
The only other person on the helicopter who can land a 747 is Captain Murdock. He is tethered to the helicopter, lowered to the jet and successfully enters it through the hole in the cockpit. He then lands the plane safely at Salt Lake City Airport. However, when he does land he is forced to taxi the plane around the airport as it does not stop right away. The flight attendants successfully conduct an emergency evacuation of the passengers via the inflatable slides as Pryor and Murdock reconcile.

Cast

Airport 1975 used a Boeing 747-123, rented from American Airlines when it was temporarily taken out of passenger service at the start of American's restructuring away from the fleet of Boeing jumbo jets in mid-1974. The aircraft was leased to Trans Mediterranean Airways briefly in 1976, before returning and being converted into an "American Freighter" variant. In 1984, the aircraft was sold to UPS, where it continued to serve as a freighter for over 20 years before being retired to desert storage in 2005.
The film was shot on location in the Salt Lake International Airport. Aerials shots over Heber City, Utah and the Wasatch Mountains are included.
As Sister Ruth, Helen Reddy performs a solo acoustic version of her song "Best Friend" to an ailing Linda Blair. The song was written by Reddy and Ray Burton, who also co-wrote her hit single "I Am Woman".

Reception

Box office

Airport 1975 was a massive commercial success. With a budget of $3 million, the film grossed over $47 million in the United States and Canada at the box office, making it the seventh highest-grossing film of 1974 and the year's third highest-grossing disaster film, behind The Towering Inferno and Earthquake. The gross generated a theatrical rental to Universal of $25 million and worldwide, it earned rentals of $50 million.

Critical reception

Critical reception was mainly unfavorable with The New Yorker magazine's film critic Pauline Kael calling the picture "cut-rate swill", "produced on a TV-movie budget by mercenary businessmen". Kael also thought the audio problems gave Karen Black's voice a metallic sound that was grating and that the main character, a stewardess, was constantly being patronized by men. Roger Ebert was less condemnatory, awarding two-and-a-half stars out of four and describing it as "corny escapism", although he made a similar observation about Black's character - that she is made to seem incompetent simply because she is a woman. Gene Siskel also gave the film two-and-a-half stars out of four, calling the collision scene "both a surprise and well executed," but the scenes afterward "both implausible and dull." Vincent Canby of The New York Times called the film "silly" and suffering from "a total lack of awareness of how comic it is when it's attempting to be most serious." Kevin Thomas of the Los Angeles Times wrote "Whatever its flaws, 'Airport' generated plenty of suspense and was lots of fun; 'Airport 1975' is too much a rehash to seem anything but mechanical and finally silly in its predictability." Gary Arnold of The Washington Post stated "It may get by at the box-office, but it's a hasty, superfluous job of formula moviemaking." David McGillivray of The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote that "despite a sterling performance from Karen Black, convincingly petrified as the stewardess expected to negotiate the plane through the mountains, the tension never coalesces." Airport 1975 currently holds a 25% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 16 reviews.
Airport 1975 was included in the book The Fifty Worst Films of All Time published in 1978. The film is listed in Golden Raspberry Award founder John J.B. Wilson's book The Official Razzie Movie Guide as one of The 100 Most Enjoyably Bad Movies Ever Made.

Legacy

This is one among many of a class of disaster films that became a popular craze during the 1970s. Its plot devices and characterizations, including a singing nun, a former glamorous star, an alcoholic, a child in need of an organ transplant and a chatterbox were parodied in 1980's Airplane! and on The Carol Burnett Show as "Disaster '75".

Award nomination

AwardCategoryRecipientResult
Golden Globe AwardsMost Promising Newcomer - FemaleHelen Reddy