Concorde Affaire ’79 (1979)

This Italian-made, low-budget adventure film is such a shameless ripoff of the Airport series that the plot combines the premise of one Airport picture (a plane crashes underwater, as in Airport ’77) with that of another (a scheme to sabotage the Concorde, as in The Concorde: Airport ’79). The producers even stole the Airportseries trope of ending a title with an abbreviated reference to a year. Yet any similarities to the lavishly produced escapism of the Airport flicks end there: The execution of Concorde Affaire ’79 is inept on every level. The villain of the piece is an evil businessman named Milland (played by the impossibly bored Joseph Cotten), whose company has interests in the air-travel industry. He orders that several Concorde jets be sabotaged in order to throw the whole Concorde line out of operation, thus (in theory) eliminating his main competition. Never mind two big logic problems: 1) Every clue would point to Milland as a suspect, and 2) Wouldn’t all Concordes get grounded after the first couple of suspicious accidents? Anyway, smartass journalist Moses Brody (played by the impossibly tanned James Franciscus) gets assigned to look for a missing Concorde that went down in the Atlantic near Caracas. Yes, the story asks viewers to assume that no one else is looking for the missing airplane. What ensues is an absurd potboiler, with Milland’s agents trying to kill Brody before he learns too much. There’s also some tiresome crap involving a flight attendant (Fiamma Maglione) who survived the Atlantic crash, and a stalwart pilot (Van Johnson) who must land a Concorde that’s been rigged to explode. Suffice to say, the choppy editing ensures that none of this coheres, and the bizarre musical score—electronic disco at one moment, tense classical during the next—adds to the bewildering effect. About the only sequence that works is a very long underwater bit with scuba divers chasing after each other through coral-reef formations. However, those few almost-exciting moments are not nearly reason enough to slog through the mess of confusing storytelling (and terrible dubbing) that comprises Concorde Affaire ’79.

Concorde Affaire ’79: LAME

Hell Boats (1970)

How exciting is the World War II thriller Hell Boats? Well, let me put it this way: Watching the movie took me four different sittings, because each time I started the flick, I fell asleep. Allowing that the picture may have fallen victim to my busy schedule and corresponding fatigue, I’ll be generous and say my head-dives weren’t entirely the film’s fault—but, still, “lively” ain’t exactly the right word for Hell Boats. Part of the problem is the meandering storyline, which tracks an American-born British Naval officer’s efforts to blow up some sort of Nazi encampment near Sicily, and part of the problem is the hopelessly bland persona of leading man James Franciscus. Handsome, lean, tan beyond reason, and suitably emphatic, he sure seemslike he’s giving a performance, whether he’s quarreling with subordinates about strategy or romancing the cynical wife (Elizabeth Shepherd) of his superior officer, but every note Franciscus hits is painfully obvious. His brand of bad acting is particularly unfortunate, because he comes across as lacking not so much talent but imagination—it’s as if he can’t inhabit a moment without striking a pose he’s seen some other actor strike in another movie, so even though he always steers clear of embarrassing himself, nothing resonates. And so it goes for every other aspect of this movie, which throws together familiar elements--friction among soldiers that sorta recalls The Dirty Dozen; high-adventure military espionage in the mode of The Guns of Navarone; wartime romance reminiscent of From Here to Eternity; et cetera. Plus, the villains are interchangeable, the supporting characters are one-dimensional ciphers, and the technical execution is mediocre, with cheap-looking process shots taking the luster off otherwise adequate location photography. In sum, Hell Boats is that rare movie it’s possible to forgetduring a viewing. But, hey, we all need a nap sometime, right? (Available as part of the MGM Limited Collection on Amazon.com)

Hell Boats: LAME

Jonathan Livingston Seagull (1973)

          Quintessential early-’70s “I gotta be me” cinema, this elaborate adaptation of Richard Bach’s best-selling book is fascinatingly weird. As the title suggests, Bach’s novella—which sold more than 1 million copies—is the allegorical story of a seagull who embarks on a spiritual quest, eventually becoming such an enlightened being that he elevates other seagulls beyond the earthly concerns of their everyday existence. The parallels to then-current themes of environmentalism, naturalism, and reincarnation are absurdly obvious—when we first meet him, Jonathan belongs to a flock that lives in a garbage dump, fighting with each other for scraps from man’s refuse. Realizing there must be more to life, and wondering why his fellow birds have so little interest in using their gift for flight to explore the universe, Jonathan experiments with high-speed soaring and gets excommunicated for his rebelliousness. He then embarks on a long odyssey and dies, ascending to some kind of bird heaven where he learns about using his mind to control his body. Then he returns to the mortal plane as a feathered messiah.

          The first part of the story is actually quite sincere, but things get silly once Jonathan transforms. However, the film’s painstaking execution makes Jonathan Livingston Seagull unique and, for sympathetic viewers, interesting. Writer-producer-director Hall Bartlett doesn’t feature a single human onscreen, instead relying on footage of carefully trained birds and—for the undeniably beautiful scenes of Jonathan soaring past forests and mountains and oceans—radio-controlled gliders shaped like seagulls. Cinematographer Jack Couffer and the film’s editing team were rightly nominated for Oscars, because the film is a beguiling travelogue. Yet the film’s sounds are more problematic than its visuals. Bartlett shoots close-ups and two-shots during dialogue scenes, treating the animals like actors, and he juxtaposes these images with voice-over tracks performed by Hollywood actors who “play” the different characters. In moderation, this is helpful for clarifying story points; in excess, it’s  goofy. (Thankfully, the birds’ beaks aren’t animated to mimic human speech movements.)

          The main voice performers are James Franciscus as Jonathan—think overly whispered intensity—and Philip Ahn, of Kung Fufame, as the hero’s spiritual leader, Chang. Yes, the seagull has an Asian spiritual leader. But wait, as the saying goes, there’s more! Making the earnestness of Franscicus’ performance seem mild by comparison, Neil Diamond wrote and performed several songs that appear during montages, notably the epic ballad “Be.” Diamond’s music is potent, but his lyrics and his singing are cartoonishly overwrought—therefore, the combination of his tunes and Bartlett’s glorious pictures creates an effect, though not necessarily a goodeffect. Still, this is absolutely unique stuff, and it’s hard to imagine Bach’s book receiving any more reverential treatment. Therefore, it’s odd to discover that Bach sued the producers because he didn’t like Bartlett’s narrative tweaks. That’s a lot of fuss for a low-budget movie that not only flopped at the box office but also received some of the most vitriolic negative reviews of the era. Really, did Bach envision a bettertalking-seagull movie?

Jonathan Livingston Seagull: FREAKY