Customer Reviews

Airport '79: Concorde [VHS]

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

The reviews here are mostly for Concorde: Airport 79 rather than this documentary about Concorde. I have no idea why Amazon is so asleep on this one! Anyhow the documentary is for anyone who ever flew, or wanted to fly, on Concorde. The most beautiful and iconic commercial jet ever to fly, she arrived just as fuel prices started to soar. Talk about bad luck!

Concorde the movie was rubbish. This film traces the history and last flight of the ultimate speedbird.

this is a good Dvd Of the supersonic jetliner the concorde and its final flight

After seeing my Favorite Airplane! movies it's kind of hard not to ruin the Airport series of movies, and while this movie has been often criticized I liked it, *Spoiler*The Villain Ironically was to become a villain in real life and some say get away with it. (Wagner along with Walken and Natalie Woods, Who Did it?) The effects look compared to now outdated but don't let take away from an otherwise serious and yet good movie.

this show has nothing to do with the Airport series.
everyone is wrong.
this is just a 60 min. show about the first men to fly the Concorde.

For the first 20 minutes of this endless film, I thought this would be a good movie. Then the problems started. Basically, the plot revolves around a female reporter who stumbles upon some illegal arms selling done by an American company to terrorists. Documents in hand implicating the wrongdoers, she hops aboard the Concorde on its flight to Paris and then to Moscow for the 1980 Olympics (which the Americans boycotted, but oh well).

One problem with this is the "Love Boat" casting for the plane. There's Jimmie Walker! He gets high in the bathroom! There's Charo, on screen for 1 minute! There's Emanuelle from those soft-core porno films! There's Martha Raye! There's Cicely Tyson! Her son needs a heart transplant, and she's taking the Concorde, along with the heart, to deliver it to him. Shades of Airport 1975 much (with the kidney transplant)? There's an old lady who has to go to the bathroom when she gets nervous! Isn't that funny? There's Patroni (George Kennedy) who has appeared in every Airport film. He's the pilot of this one, along with Alain Delon. "You pilots are such men!" snips the stewardess. "Honey, that's why they call it the cockpit!" Patroni zings. Score one for the male chauvinists!

There's also a missile or something that's trying to shoot down the Concorde, but the Concorde evades it and lands in Paris but the movie STILL ISN'T OVER. There's another hour and another flight and another dangerous crash landing to get to. The movie doesn't know what it wants to be - glossy international drama? Comedy? Disaster film? It turns into an unintentional comedy, especially with the incredibly fake scenes of a toy model of an airplane flying against a blue screened in shot of a sky.

High camp comedy? Yes! Exciting film? No. I suggest watching this with a bunch of friends and proving your own running commentary over it trashing the film.

While Airplane! is noted for it's vicious parody of the Airport (and similar) line of disaster films, The reward for the best "Airport" parody has to be Airport 79, The Concorde:

The fact that this movie is played seriously makes it even more effective.

Most disaster films are satisfied with One disaster. In Airport, it was a bomb, in Airport 75, a mid-air collision, in Airport 77, a water crash landing and sinking.

Not to be outdone, Airport 79 has no fewer than 6 life and death situations to be played out over it's roubhly 90 minutes of playing time.

The poor Concorde crew and passengers on a single flight deal with:
1. Near Collision with "Greenpeace style" hot-air baloon full of protesters.
2. A rougue Cruise Missile targeted (nefariously) at the Concorde during a Missle test
3. A Mercenary F-4 phantom pilot who tries to shoot down the plane. (thwarted by the timely use of a flare gun and an open cockpit window (don't ask)
4. A "No Brakes" landing in Paris which nearly leads to a runway overshoot despite the help of numerous "safety nets"
5. A "device" planted in the luggage compartment which opens the luggage compartment door at altitude and results in nearly ripping the plane apart
6. An Emergency Crash landing at a Ski Resort in the Alps.

Though this film rarely takes itself to seriously, (i.e. Martha Raye trapped in the Lavatory during the missile attack) it is serious enough to realize that this was intended to be a drama. Which makes it that much more hilarious.

This movie is a worthy purchase simply for the pure cheese of it. It serves as an appropriate bookend with the Original Airport to show how the franchise went from riviting to rediculous in four short films....

Viewed: 8/08
Rate: 4

8/08: The Concorde...Airport '79 isn't as bad as people say. The movie is sometimes good and sometimes not good. A few laughs here and there, several nice performances among the low-quality cast, and a couple of good moments are found throughout The Concorde...Airport '79. George Kennedy gets the most screen time in this fourth part out of the entire Airport series and makes the best out of it. Alain Delon did a great job complementing his co-star. One of the better parts of the film is the clear display of American Sign Language by the Russian wrestler. Susan Blakely gave a very wooden performance as Maggie Whelan and looked like that she was saying "whatever" much of the time. Maybe I was amiss about Robert Wagner not getting the respect he deserves as a villain because he could have yelled, "Dammit, I am Robert Wagner!" Meanwhile, I enjoyed the disaster parts and thought they were exciting at times. After what had happened the first time with the Concorde, I was surprised the plane was allowed back in air the next day after such a quick inspection. Even more surprising is the lack of fear among the passengers as they were perfectly fine returning back to the same plane for another trip, going from Paris to Moscow. Realistically speaking, the number would be five percent of that group. To my puzzlement, people thought that The Concorde...Airport '79 is a laugh riot. Sorry I don't see it that way as I felt the film was just fine but could have been better. I know the plot is stupid...but still. All in all, The Concorde...Airport '79 is not as great as the original and the third part but certainly much better than the second part.

Take a hyper-masculine George Kennedy, add a flawlessly coiffed John Davidson, mix in a bit of pot-smoking Jimmie Walker, and finish off with a complete lack of drama or suspense and you have one of the finest guilty pleasures ever released. While the first two "Airport" films will always stand as the best, the final entry in the series manages enough unintentional laughs, groans, and awful attempts at special effects to keep fans satisfied.

This film was one of the worst disaster films that I have ever seen. The completely implausible plot revolves around industrialist Wagner (playing the evil twin of his Hart to Hart character)trying to kill his reporter mistress because she has discovered his illegal operations. He attempts this by trying to blow up the Concorde, not once, but twice. (You think they would have learned the first time not to get back on the plane). Both the writing and the acting was horrible. I found myself begging for the characters to die, just to put them out of their misery. Not even Wagner's charm could save this film from crashing.

After seeing my Favorite Airplane! movies it's kind of hard not to ruin the Airport series of movies, and while this movie has been often criticized I liked it, *Spoiler*The Villain Ironically was to become a villain in real life and some say get away with it. (Wagner along with Walken and Natalie Woods, Who Did it?) The effects look compared to now outdated but don't let take away from an otherwise serious and yet good movie.