The Concorde… Airport ‘79 (1979) - 1/10

I’ve made it to the end of the Airport franchise. It’s not been easy. From the high bar set by the original, each film since has been steadily worse. Which doesn’t bode well from the fourth instalment and clumsily titled The Concorde… Airport ‘79. I suppose adding Concorde was more of a pull than just Airport ‘79, it’s the star name this time, but it’s a surprise that they let the fanciest plane in the sky be tarnished by this terrible film. As we’re introduced to a cast of paper thin, convoluted characters, it’s already beginning to feel like hard work. There’s shifty weapons tycoon Dr Harrison (Robert Wagner) and his reporter girlfriend Maggie (Susan Blakey), Olympic gymnast Isabelle (Sylvia Kristel), pilot Paul Metrand (Alain Delon) all twisted around a clunky plot about going to the Olympic Games in Moscow (I hate how Americans mispronounce Moscow). Someone’s missing? Oh yeah, George Kennedy who returns as Joe, finally getting to fly the plane from Dallas via Paris, obviously they’ll not make it to Moscow. We’ve had bombs, mid-air crashes and hijackers in previous outings. What will it be this time… missiles and fighter jets!! You see Harrison’s dodgy arms dealing is about to be exposed by Maggie who’s onboard, so he tries to blow them all out of the sky. Sounds ridiculous doesn’t it. It is. It’s also crap. Honestly it’d be better if the missiles did their job and put us all out of our misery. I can’t think of one redeeming feature. Maybe the cute dog being snuck aboard by a Parisian fashionista, I love dogs. I hated this. 1 point for being the clear catalyst and inspiration for Airplane! released just one year later. 

1/10