Here I am again at another airport waiting to board my second delayed flight of the day (what luck!) and I am thinking about how airports and commercial aviation has appeared in movies over the years. Of course the most famous movies have to be the Airport series of disaster flicks that started back in 1970 and even featured a Concorde version in Airport '79. The movies may look very dated now and the dramatic themes antiquated but the original 1970 film had some pretty big names including Burt Lancaster and Dean Martin.On the (much!) lighter side of aviation movies there are the classic Airplane movies with the 1980 original introducing us to Ted Striker, a hilarious turn by Lloyd Bridges and of course everyone being called Shirley! There was no Airplane 3 as suggested by a teaser clip at the end of the 1982 sequel and maybe it was a good idea to stop before the magic wore off.
Many other flicks have classic aviation and airport moments including the McCallister family running for their flight (filmed here in O'Hare) and leaving Macauley Culkin Home Alone in 1990. Let's not forget the very average Die Hard 2 where Bruce Willis battles terrorists from Washington Dulles Airport ably assisted by NYPD Blue's Andy Sipowicz himself ... Dennis Franz (who didn't love Sippers!). Finally there are some clangers set in airports and the worst of a bad bunch has to be 2006's Unaccompanied Minors, a movie so terrible Daddy Daycare was probably better ... I haven't see either nor will I! What was Lewis Black thinking when he took that job?!
The fascination with aviation in movies will likely never end but with the way the industry is going these days it is less and less about the glamor of travel!
0 comments:
Post a Comment