Jet Storm (1961)

A waste of 90 minutes of my life

Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.

The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

Jet Storm is directed and written by C. Raker Endfield. The film stars Richard Attenborough, Stanley Baker, Paul Eddington, Diane Cilento, Harry Secombe and Hermoine Baddeley.I have mixed feelings about this one. Excellent lead performance by Richard Attenborough and solid support from Stanley Baker. Nice to see Paul Eddington and Harry Secombe.The rest of the film isn't as good though. Most of the passengers seem way too calm and unconcerned with the terrifying situation they find themselves in (that couple who play cards and joke throughout the whole thing among others). I found the lack of reaction quite laughable to be honest; I know we have the stiff upper lip here in Britain, but these passengers are all taking it to a whole other level.Ernest Tilley(Richard Attenborough) is a bereaved father, who puts a bomb on a passenger plane. He plans to detonate it to kill another passenger who killed his daughter. The pilot(Stanley Baker)has to discover where the bomb is and find a way to talk the man out of his plan.Also, I was left wondering as to how Attenborough's character knew that the man he was after would be on that particular flight, on that particular day? There are some tense moments. Attenborough gives a very good performance, the scene between him and the boy near the end was quite moving. There is a very impressive and dramatic scene(you will know it when you see it) that was really the only highlight of the film.I had been looking forward to seeing this for a while, but was left quite disappointed. It has its moments, but they are few and far between. A mixed bag, but well worth a look for the performances of Attenborough and Baker.

You know you're in trouble right at the start when the credits roll up the screen and when the title appears Marty Wilde starts warbling "Jet Stream" rather than "Jet Storm". A breakdown in communication between songwriter and producer? Nope. The lyrics were written by Cy Endfield who is, of course, the same as C. Raker Endfield, the director. Presumably the title of the movie was changed at the last minute (maybe TWA objected, they were still flying their piston engined Lockheed Starliners across the Atlantic and hopefully promoting them as "Jetstreams" in competition with Pan Am's and BOAC's real jets). Others have described the cast as "all star" which is pushing the definition a bit. Many of them achieved some fame in future years, but not necessarily as film stars (as opposed to character actors). The economics of this airline are questionable as there are only 32 passengers on board and the seat pitch seems to be about 5 feet. The passengers are the usual stereotypes and none generate any sympathy with the audience so we don't particularly care what happens to them. Stanley Baker's turn as the Captain is so wooden that he might have been replaced with a plank. The decision to use stock footage of the Soviet Tupolev Tu-104 is bizarre, particularly as the feeble model bears only a cursory resemblance. Presumably they didn't use the Boeing 707 or DH Comet as at the time only two airlines were using them transatlantic and they did not want the association with potential disaster. To add to the confusion the scenes of the passengers boarding shows them embarking on a BEA Vickers Viscount, the registration of which is clearly visible on the fin. The most laughable aspect of the whole thing, of course, is the bomb attached to the underside of the wing by "suction pads". Wow, they must have been incredible to survive a 500mph jetstream......, which is where we came in.

It's not easy to catch up with this marvelous little film, but DO NOT pass up any chance you get. It's a real little gem, which manages to live up to some very high aspirations.A quick plot synopsis makes it sound very much like Airport, or The High and the Mighty, but Jet Storm is a very different type of film. It's not an adventure, or a soaper, or a suspenser. Although it does include a diverse group of passengers and a hidden bomb, it's not actually about whether the plane will be saved, or how. It's about how these people react to danger. And about how all of us SHOULD react to danger.The cast of familiar British actors does a superb job. Richard Attenborough shines in his portrayal of a weak, confused man, who's slipped over the brink of bitterness, depression and madness. Harry Secombe adds a contrastingly jovial note. And a young Paul Eddington (best known from the much later Yes, Minister series) is interesting as a not-very-admirable husband.We learn a lot about these various characters, but the real meat of the film is in how each of them reacts when faced with imminent danger and probable death. The film asks us not to worry so much about whether these people will die, but to consider how they choose to live. Do they meet fear and uncertainty with fortitude? Resourcefulness? Humor? Resignation? Or even indifference?The film shows us that some of these responses are clearly better than others. It demonstrates that the fear of disaster is far worse than the disaster itself. This message makes Jet Storm more relevant today than when it was made. We can see how much wiser things were in the 1950s. A psychopath would have been able to walk up and easily place a bomb on an airliner... but we didn't allow that remote possibility to dominate our lives.Jet Storm reminds us that risk is a part of life, but when we focus on that risk to the exclusion of everything else, we stop living. So while terrorism (of any sort) is sad, and crazy and reprehensible, giving in to terror is far more shameful.

Following the success of 'The League of Gentlemen', Dickie Attenborough began mobilising his own films and appeared in other films to raise the money to continue making his own (in the same way that Laurence Olivier was acting in films in order to finance his own stage productions at the National Theatre). This film is one of them.