Murder on Flight 502 (1975)

Such a frustrating disappointment

Overrated and overhyped

hyped garbage

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

When you watch this movie, you wonder if the guy who wrote the script has ever taken a flight in his whole life, if he knows what are flying regulations for take of and landing; what happens for passengers after a shock of this magnitude when arriving at a national or international airport.How can any sensible producer accept to finance such a stupid, unbelievable story and how can a director accept to have his name attached to such a nonsense of a production.Even a debutant in the film industry would be ashamed of committing himself in such a project.Yes the only thing you should do is to cancel your booking on this flight!

When watching this movie, don't watch it for suspense, or character development, or even for the mystery. This is a "make your own fun" movie. You can watch it in the Mystery Science Theater 3000 style, making fun of it as you go. You can watch it to spot all of the stars (at the time). Or you could watch it to find out what Airplane! was making fun of so much; this movie seems to have provided most of it. The pure dated-ness of this film makes it so easy to make fun of. Can you remember a time when a smoking box in an airport lounge was treated fairly lightly?But don't hate this movie because it's, well, bad; praise it for its badness. This is one of those movies that is good to watch because it's horribly done. The acting is horrible, the script is horrible, the story is horrible. The only thing that was done right was the casting, but, as we're seeing so much these days, a good cast can't save a movie. But a good sense of humor can. Which is why I give this movie a fairly high grade: if you enjoy pretending to be a sillouette in front of a giant movie screen, you'll like this movie.

Even by TV movie standards this is poor. One of the main problems is that Robert Stack and Hugh O' Brian are so wooden in their leading roles. Honestly, planks of wood could have acted better.The movie has a cheap look and the flight is full of all the usual stereotypes. The denouement, such as it is,is almost laughable.This is very typical of TV movies of the time. I suppose there are worse ways you could spend 90 minutes,like scrubbing out your kitchen perhaps. Total routine fare.

I am a Sergeant in the Army and had to go to a school called BNCOC at Fort Jackson, South Carolina recently and I found this tape in the base px, it was only $3. Robert Stack wrote in his autobiography Straight Shooting that this picture was a rather poor copy of The High And The Mighty. He said the only reason he took it was to work with his wife and daughter. This is one of those movies of the week they used to make back in the 1970s featuring old time stars in the fading twilight of their careers. Aaron Spelling used them on shows like Murder She Wrote, Fantasy Island, The Love Boat and Hotel. Ralph Bellamy and Walter Pidgeon are both on board and its always nice seeing them (Bellamy was probably the greatest FDR ever in Sunrise At Campbello). This was also one of Farrah Fawcett's first films and even Sonny Bono has a part in it. I have to admit the sets look cheap. There are supposed to be 200 people on the plane but you only see a few. The dialogue is really funny because they deadpan it. The funniest part is where Robert Stack lectures Danny Bonaduce on playing practical jokes. I always love airplane pictures and this one is fine, just not great. SPOILER ALERT!!!I will tell you one thing about the ending when Hugh O'Brien flips out and reveals he is the real killer and he shoots into those oxygen tanks in the lounge and starts a fire. There wouldn't just be a fire there would have been a massive explosion! Oh well like they say its only a movie. By the way, the night after I watched this film I heard on the news where Robert Stack had died at the age of 84. He was a great actor who made Unsolved Mysteries such a wonderful show. He was also a true gentleman, someone of whom you can say they don't make em like that anymore. I was lucky enough recently to obtain a rare copy of The High And The Mighty with him and John Wayne. It is an awesome film and I feel like I have a treasure in my barracks apartment.