The grandaddy of all disaster flicks, Airport established the modern-day template that spawned many a towering inferno and Poseidon adventures, not to mention three of its own sequels. While time has granted it a thick layer of kitsch unintended by its makers, the movie still soars high as an all-star hoot.

Based on the 1968 novel by Arthur Hailey — who also wrote Zero Hour!, which Airplane! spoofed as mercilessly as this — the dramatic thriller is as sprawling as its cast. It’s so jam-packed and jumbo-sized that no true lead emerges, but Burt Lancaster (The Osterman Weekend) ostensibly is as Mel Bakersfeld, whose marriage is fraught with as many problems as the Chicago airport he manages. For one, the noise from passing jets rattles nearby homes; for another, the worst storm in six years has him and his co-workers gobsmacked with stress.

The biggest problem is that the Boeing 707 piloted by Capt. Demerest (Dean Martin, hic!) has among its passengers a mad bomber (Van Heflin, Shane) and, perhaps more annoying, a perennial stowaway in a manipulative li’l old lady (Helen Hayes, whose Oscar win for this qualifies as an all-time AMPAS joke). Crowding the running time are George Kennedy, Jacqueline Bisset, Jean Seberg, Maureen Stapleton, Barry Nelson, Gary Collins and seemingly everyone except you and me.

Director George Seaton (Miracle on 34th Street) has so much on his plate that the terrorism angle doesn’t really shift into gear until the second hour, meaning that the first is all setup — perhaps even an info dump, introducing character after character, subplot after subplot, and sometimes even cramming several into the screen at once with multiple splits. That he keeps this soap opera of the skies from crash-landing — until the script calls for it, of course — is quite an admirable feat. Airport should not be as much fun as it is. —Rod Lott

Buy it at Amazon.