SHENANDOAH (1965)

Farmer Jimmy Stewart along with his six sons (including Patrick Wayne), one daughter and one daughter-in-law run a 500 acre farm in Virginia.  The Civil War is happening all around them, but pigheaded Stewart refuses to get involved and tries to ignore it.  Finally some events happen and he doesn't have any choice but to get involved.

I was kinda torn with SHENANDOAH.  The acting is very good, but the story is off.  In one of the opening scenes, Jimmy's teenage son finds a Rebel hat and starts wearing it.  Right then and there the viewer knows that no good can come of this, but even with the war raging all around them, Stewart allows the boy to wear the hat.  Naturally something really horrible happens because of the stupid hat.  Another thing that irked me and it's irked me with a number of films from this period is the blind happiness in going to church.  I know that if my entire life and the lives of my family were destroyed and turned upside down because of my foolishness I damn sure wouldn't be sittin' around in church praisin' the Lord and crying.

Quick pace, lots of action, tons of familiar faces, unwise life choices, great acting, clips of battle scenes from RAINTREE COUNTY, bending bayonets, multiple actors from "The Dukes of Hazzard" and "Little House on the Prairie".  Enjoyable beginning and middle that's tarnished by a weak ending.  Too bad that Stewart and Anthony Mann had already had their falling out in real life because this film could have used Mann in charge.

 

 I'll never look at Dr. Baker the same ever again.

THE CONCORDE... AIRPORT '79 (1979)

I'd never seen an AIRPORT movie before starting these series a few days ago.  I knew the first few films were wildly successful and kick-started the whole disaster boom of the 70's, so I was kinda curious as to why they only made four films and just didn't continue the series indefinitely since it looks to be an endless goldmine.  I still think the AIRPORT series could have gone on, but after seeing Part 4 I can understand why they ended it when they did.  First off, the star power is completely gone, but even more importantly (and maybe why there wasn't any star power to begin with) is the story is complete rubbish.

You got a Concorde flying from Washington D. C. to Moscow.  On board is the reporter girlfriend of a aerospace big shot.  She has evidence that's he's been illegally selling arms to enemies of the US.  So naturally the only thing he can do is launch a high tech missile at the airplane, but oh, that's just the beginning because he also has a fighter jet attack the plane and then has a maintenance guy sabotage one of the doors to open in mid flight!!!  I can't get much further into the story without giving it all away, but, trust me, it's just fucking insane the shit that goes on in this movie.  Even worse is it's all very badly written, yet somehow screenwriter Eric Roth went on to write the adapted script for FORREST GUMP!  So let that be a lesson to you: my Mama always said you've got to put the past behind you before you can move on.  

The only reason I can think of to watch this long-winded disaster is to laugh at it.  The story is junk, the special effects are horrible and the acting is garbage.  Skip it.  And that's all I have to say about that.

Part 1 - Airport - (1970)
Part 2 - Airport 1975 (1974)
Part 3 - Airport '77 (1977)

AIRPORT '77 (1977)

After falling off a little bit with Part 2, the third AIRPORT movie kicks it back into gear with an improved all-star cast and a mile a minute story of a rich dude (Jimmy Stewart) who is flying a group of family and friends (along with a cargo bay full of priceless paintings) down to Miami on his private plane piloted by Jack Lemmon and Robert Foxworth.

While the rich people (Olivia de Havilland, Joseph Cotten, Christopher Lee, Buck Rogers, Darren McGavin, Kathleen Quinlan, M. Emmet Walsh, etc.) are schmoozing it up, some hijackers put knockout gas in the air system and take over the plane.  Then they go under the radar and off course in order to land it on an island and steal the paintings, but in doing so they accidentally clip an oil rig hidden in the fog and the plane goes down, down, down underneath the waves, mermaids wavin', wavin' to mermen, wavin' sea fans, sea horses sailin', dolphins wailin', red snappers snappin', clam shells clappin', muscles flexin', flippers flippin', boys in bikinis, girls on surfboards, everybody's rockin', everybody's fruggin', twistin' round the fire, havin' fun, but they're not having fun cause the plane comes to rest on the edge of a giant underwater cliff.  Now...not only do rescuers have to locate the plane they have to get them out before the plane falls into the abyss.

AIRPORT '77 is pretty low on the Believability Scale, but it's still fun.  I especially like the scenes with Jack Lemmon being a action star.  It was pretty cool seeing him running around, tumbling, swimming and barking orders at people.  And, of course, Olivia de Havilland, Joseph Cotten, Jimmy Stewart, M. Emmet Walsh and Christopher Lee are always great.  George Kennedy returns, but he really doesn't do very much.

Word around the campfire is there was a much longer version shown of television back in the day.  I've never seen it, but I'd love to check it.

[Updated 10/17/2023: Word around the campfire is I fianlly saw the 182-minute "long version". Added some screenshots. Also, two newspaper snippets mentioning the TNT broadcast of the long version on June 15, 1997. Oh yeah, the added scenes are definitely cool to see, but I can understand why they were edited out. The only scene with dialogue that I think should have stayed is the brief scene with Jimmy Stewart and Robert Hooks.]

Part 1 - Airport - (1970)
Part 2 - Airport 1975 (1974)
Part 4 - Concorde...Airport '79 (1979)

Look at the size of that laserdisc player!!!

Inspiration for the cake scene in the "November Rain" video?

Screenshots from the "long version" television broadcast: