In Airport ’77, the third in the Airport series, a private Boeing 747 is transporting the art collection and friend of multimillionaire Philip Stevens (James Stewart, Vertigo) to the opening of his new museum. Says Stevens to a throng of reporters, “It’s going to be a real wingding.”
Based on that jet alone, the old man ain’t joking! Under the control of Capt. Gallagher (Jack Lemmon, Glengarry Glen Ross), the aircraft boasts three luxurious levels that include bedrooms, office space, tabletop Pong, copies of Ebony magazine and even a blind lounge singer/pianist (motivational speaker Tom Sullivan) whose dark glasses look specially designed for Elton John to wear for an hour after getting his eyes dilated. Unbeknownst to Stevens, Gallagher or Gallagher’s mustache, the night flight also hosts a cadre of art thieves who gas the crew and passengers asleep so they can take over and make off with the priceless paintings. But art thieves do not double as ace pilots; a clipped wing sends the Boeing to the bottom of the ocean, square in the Bermuda Triangle — for no reason other than Trianglesploitation was a trend at the time.
With the submerged plane taking in water, Airport ’77 appears to be cribbing from The Poseidon Adventure of five years earlier. No stranger to the disaster genre, director Jerry Jameson (Raise the Titanic!) spends ’77’s second hour detailing and depicting the rescue efforts of Gallagher on the inside and the combined might of the U.S. Navy and Coast Guard on the outside. However, this removes focus from the most fun part of these exercises in cinematic calamity: the all-star cast. This TV-looking sequel is as overstuffed as the rest, with faded idols (Olivia de Havilland, Joseph Cotten), up-and-comers (Kathleen Quinlan, M. Emmet Walsh) and then-current leading ladies (Brenda Vaccaro, Lee Grant — the latter cutting the largest slice of the overacting pie). Returning as Joe Patroni, George Kennedy shows up just long enough to allow ’77 a direct connection to the previous two pictures.
Many of the actors’ clothes sport gaudy, checkered prints that create moiré patterns on your TV screen. Those have more life than poor Stewart, so folksy and noncommittal that one half-expects him to recite that poem about his dead dog. Haven’t heard it? Oh, it’s a real wingding. —Rod Lott
True or false: The movie 
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