Airport (film)

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Movie
German title Airport
Original title Airport
Airport film logo.svg
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 1970
length 137 minutes
Age rating FSK 12
Rod
Director George Seaton
script George Seaton
production Ross Hunter for Universal
music Alfred Newman
camera Ernest Laszlo
cut Stuart Gilmore
occupation
chronology

Successor  →
giants in the sky

Airport is a disaster film from the 1970s film based on the novel of the same name by Arthur Hailey . The film started in German cinemas on March 25, 1970.

action

While a heavy snowstorm is raging over Lincoln International Airport near Chicago, airport director Mel Bakersfeld tries to keep operations going against all odds. A TGA Boeing 707 landing promptly misses the taxiway , gets stuck in the snow and blocks a runway with its tail unit . As a result, air traffic has to be rerouted to another runway , which, according to complaints from residents of the nearby Meadowood settlement, should remain closed at night. That's why he argues with his brother-in-law Vernon Demerest, flight captain at Trans Global Airlines (TGA), who no longer sees the safety of landing aircraft as guaranteed. At the same time he argues incessantly with his wife Cindy, who has no understanding for his job.

Meanwhile, a security guard brings an older lady, Ada Quonsett, to TGA public relations chief Tanya Livingstone. She has an affection for Mel Bakersfeld, whose marriage has long since broken up. Nevertheless, she struggles to accept a transfer to San Francisco.

Ada Quonsett is as permanent stowaway known and has managed once again to reach without a ticket into a Targa machine. Now they want to put her on a plane home to Los Angeles, but she outwits her guard and wants to run away to come to her daughter in New York. The former army explosives expert and failed building contractor DO Guerrero is meanwhile planning his suicide. He wants to climb a TGA machine with a homemade bomb so that his wife Inez can get a high life insurance policy.

Meanwhile, at the airport, Demerest learns that his lover, stewardess Gwen Meighen, is expecting a child. Both disagree on how to deal with the situation. At the same time, Bakersfeld threatens greater trouble as the residents of Meadowoon continue to protest. Meanwhile, Ada Quonsett, using one of her tricks, boards a TGA-707 to Rome , in which Vernon Demerest is also flying as check captain and Gwen as chief stewardess. Guerrero also takes this flight. Meanwhile his wife has found out that he has bought a plane ticket and rushes to the airport. There, Inez, completely disturbed, tells Mel and Tanya that she thinks her husband wants to kill himself on board.

Shortly before departure, right at the airport, he took out a high level of life insurance. Demerest and the Captain Harris he has just examined are alerted. You decide to return to Lincoln inconspicuously. Nevertheless, Demerest tries, with the help of Miss Quonsett, to take the bomb from Guerrero. After Miss Quonsett and Gwen make a dramatic scene in the cabin, Miss Quonsett manages to distract Guerrero so that Gwen can grab the suitcase. The attempt fails, however, because other passengers intervene and Guerrero escapes into a toilet where he detonates the bomb. Guerrero is dead and Gwen Meighen is badly injured. A hole is torn in the aircraft, but it is still airworthy and can continue to fly. The badly damaged machine has to fly back to Lincoln because all airports are closed because of the snow storm. Because of the serious damage, the machine can only land on the longer, blocked runway.

On the ground, meanwhile, the experienced chief technician Joe Patroni is trying to get the stuck machine off the runway in order to enable the damaged aircraft to land safely. Mel tries to push the plane off the runway with snow plows, but Patroni manages to free the plane at the last minute, and Harris and Demerest land their plane safely and without further victims.

Demerest accompanies Gwen to the hospital, which his wife observes. Ada Quonsett receives a valid ticket to New York for her help, and Mel and Tanya leave together. It is beginning to come together in the end.

Reviews

“Disaster film overloaded with private problems based on Arthur Hailey's bestseller; Sometimes exciting, but the character drawing is clichéd and without the atmospheric density of the original. "

- Lexicon of international film

"In the technically perfect film, the top-class cast skilfully covered up a few sentimental slacks and made" Airport "a hit in 1969."

- Cinema

“A large-scale film in the Hollywood style that has frozen into a routine, which also suffers from excess length. The permanent background music is almost unbearable, the stars seem colorless and mostly like puppets, it is hardly possible to describe the airfield atmosphere in a comprehensible way, only the importance of telephone communication becomes clear thanks to the varied use. In the second half it even gets exciting at times - but somehow the advantages of the routine have to show up. "

- Protestant film observer

Others

This article or the following section is not adequately provided with supporting documents ( e.g. individual evidence ). Information without sufficient evidence could be removed soon. Please help Wikipedia by researching the information and including good evidence.
  • The exterior shots were taken at Minneapolis-St. Paul . Some of them were filmed by Henry Hathaway .
  • For the shooting, a Boeing 707 of the US charter airline Flying Tiger Line was chartered, which was repainted to the colors of the fictional TGA.
  • Even if there have been disaster films before, Airport is considered to be a style-defining factor for the genre .
  • Characteristic of the disaster films of the 1970s is a large number of well-known actors, a feature of the genre that was established with this film.
  • The film is very true to the original - only two plot lines have been removed: on the one hand, the more intense depiction of the Meadowood problem (noisy starts over residential buildings near the airport), and on the other hand, the planned suicide of Mel Bakersfeld's brother Keith. The air traffic controller feels guilty about a plane crash that happened months earlier. He wants to kill himself in a hotel after his shift, but after safely bringing down the bomb-damaged machine, he wants to try another job.

Sequels

The 1980 comedy The Incredible Journey in a Crazy Airplane (original title Airplane!) Parodied the airport films. In 1983 the film Starflight One was released , which is not a sequel to the airport films, but is very similar to them.

Awards

Helen Hayes won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1971. Airport was also nominated in nine other categories: Best Film , Best Supporting Actress ( Maureen Stapleton ), Best Production Design , Camera , Best Costume Design , Best Editing , Best Film Music , Best Sound and Best Adapted Screenplay . The film received nominations for Best Drama, Best Music, and Best Supporting Actor ( George Kennedy ) at the Golden Globe Awards . Only Maureen Stapleton won a Golden Globe for best supporting actress.

DVD release

  • Airport . Universal 2002

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Release certificate for the airport . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , April 2009 (PDF; test number: 41 998 DVD).
  2. ↑ Airport. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used 
  3. ↑ cinema.de: film review
  4. ↑ Evangelischer Presseverband München, Review No. 136/1970
  5. ↑ imdb.com: filming locations