The Worst Aviation Movie of All Time

Recently, Dallas posted:

On 28 Mar 2007 06:37:31 -0700, Jay Honeck wrote:

John Wayne. Having seen all of his aviation flicks now, it's
easy to see where John Wayne got his reputation for being
one-dimensional.


Perhaps the third worst movie would be the 1954 soap opera in the
sky, The High and the Mighty.

The high point of the movie would be John Wayne bitch slapping Robert
Stack in the cockpit. (Two thumbs up)

I use that scene as a reference to CRM... YMMV. ;-)

Neil

Die Hard 2 is a contender for worst, IMO.

1) Airplane blindly follows ILS to below runway level and crashes No
ambulances or fire trucks came, that I recall.

2) When the airport closes, all other planes circle helplessly
forever, waiting to run out of fuel, instead of diverting.

3) Airport manager runs around with E6B in hand at beginning, which
told him they were in trouble.

4) The ejection seat scene.

5) The flame following leaking fuel up into the sky scene.

Etc. Woof woof!!

My second choice would be any of the sequels to Airport, but
especially the one where the 747 goes into the ocean and survives
intact to the bottom of the sea.

Kev

In a previous article, "Kev" said:
My second choice would be any of the sequels to Airport, but
especially the one where the 747 goes into the ocean and survives
intact to the bottom of the sea.

There was a Futurama episode where their space ship sinks in the ocean,
and as the pressure builds, they ask the professor how much pressure it
can take. He says it was built for outer space, so it can take anywhere
from 0 to 1 atmosphere. I think of that Airport movie whenever I see that
scene.


--
Paul Tomblin http://blog.xcski.com/
D: is just a data disk. That's why it's called "D", for "DATA".
C: is the Windows OS disk, so it's called "C", for "CRAP".
-- David P. Murphy

On Mar 28, 8:56 am, "Kev" wrote:
Die Hard 2 is a contender for worst, IMO.

1) Airplane blindly follows ILS to below runway level and crashes
[etc]

.....OTOH, catch the wingtip vortices when the airliner flies through
the smoke!
Only time I've ever seen those things - on film or elsewhere. Yes,
they
do exist. "Caution Wake Turbulence"

- Jerry Kaidor

wrote:
On Mar 28, 8:56 am, "Kev" wrote:
Die Hard 2 is a contender for worst, IMO.

1) Airplane blindly follows ILS to below runway level and crashes
[etc]

....OTOH, catch the wingtip vortices when the airliner flies through
the smoke!
Only time I've ever seen those things - on film or elsewhere. Yes,
they
do exist. "Caution Wake Turbulence"

- Jerry Kaidor

You like seeing Wake Tubulence on film? Then you need to watch "Pushing
Tin."

wrote)
Die Hard 2 is a contender for worst, IMO.

....OTOH, catch the wingtip vortices when the airliner flies through the
smoke!
Only time I've ever seen those things - on film or elsewhere. Yes, they
do exist. "Caution Wake Turbulence"


My sister went to see Die Hard 2. At one point in the action she couldn't
take it any longer and blurted out, "For crying out loud, how long is that
runway????"

If you've seen the movie (and the fight sceen on top of the wing) you know
what I'm talking about.


Montblack

Jay Honeck wrote:
We often talk about the BEST aviation movie here, but how 'bout the
worst?

Having spent nearly a year of my life showing aviation movies every
Tuesday night in our theater at the hotel, I am in a somewhat unique
position to comment on this. I've seen over 50 aviation movies in a
row, and can lend some perspective.

Many of the early aviation movies were saddled with the stilted acting
styles that followed the introduction of "talkies" in the 1920s/30s,
so you have to take some of them with a grain of salt.

An example is Howard Hughes' "Hells Angels", which is full of nice
flying scenes and some truly terrible acting. It's like they didn't
know how to write dialogue, yet -- which was okay, cuz the actors
didn't know how to deliver it.

And the converse would be the really, really good
movie "No Highway in the Sky" with absolutely
retched special effects of the airplane.

You don't allow your audience to throw popcorn at the screen?

I'd have to put the TV movie based on Arthur Hailey's "Runway Zero Eight" as
the worst movie. It's the classic two man crew gets food poisoning, and the
hero pax saves the day by landing plane (Martin 404?) scenario.
"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
oups.com...
We often talk about the BEST aviation movie here, but how 'bout the
worst?

Having spent nearly a year of my life showing aviation movies every
Tuesday night in our theater at the hotel, I am in a somewhat unique
position to comment on this. I've seen over 50 aviation movies in a
row, and can lend some perspective.

Many of the early aviation movies were saddled with the stilted acting
styles that followed the introduction of "talkies" in the 1920s/30s,
so you have to take some of them with a grain of salt.

An example is Howard Hughes' "Hells Angels", which is full of nice
flying scenes and some truly terrible acting. It's like they didn't
know how to write dialogue, yet -- which was okay, cuz the actors
didn't know how to deliver it.

John Wayne. Having seen all of his aviation flicks now, it's easy
to see where John Wayne got his reputation for being one-dimensional.
Every aviation movie he starred in (with the notable exception of the
"Island in the Sky" -- read about it he
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0045919/
) has the same plot, and he played the same character. Many are quite
awful, although the WWII flying scenes are often quite good.

But after last night I can honestly say that the award for worst
aviation movie EVER made goes to "Iron Eagle" -- the 1986 movie that
was the Air Forces's quick answer to the success of "Top Gun".

By God, it's awful. The story line (Synopsis: A teenager and a
Colonol steal two F-16s, fly half-way around the world, destroy a
Saddam-look-alike's air force, and then LAND on the runway they just
destroyed to rescue the teenager's father from certain death), the
acting, the flying scenes, the combat scenes (astoundingly bad, with
missiles that fly at light-speed), even the credits are just
TERRIBLE.

This movie should have single-handedly ended Lou Gossetts' career, but
-- inexplicably -- they actually made a SEQUEL to this dog! I will
not see it.

We showed it last night at Movie Night, and the comments ranged from
"Thank God we didn't pay anything to *that*" to "I need another
beer." The scenes where targets on the ground -- like a water tower
on stilts -- blow up with near-nuclear force after just a few machine
gun hits were especially well derided...

Although Move Night is always just an excuse to get together and
hangar fly and fly the Kiwi flight simulator, this was so truly
terrible that it 'bout killed us.

Anyone got any other "nominations" for WORST ever?
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

In a previous article, "tom418" said:
I'd have to put the TV movie based on Arthur Hailey's "Runway Zero Eight" as
the worst movie. It's the classic two man crew gets food poisoning, and the
hero pax saves the day by landing plane (Martin 404?) scenario.

IMDB has never heard of a movie by that name. Are you sure you don't mean
"Zero Hour"? IMDB says Arthur Hailey wrote it, originally as a TV move
called "Flight Into Danger".


--
Paul Tomblin http://blog.xcski.com/
"Pilots are reminded to ensure that all surly bonds are slipped before
attempting taxi or take-off"