Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be covering a made-for-television movie from 1973. That movie is "The Horror At 37,000 Feet".
I'm gonna tell you, guys, the main reason why I wanted to cover this movie in the first place is mainly due to the casting. Before I get more into that, however, I first should let you guys know about the plot to this thing real quick. The plot, from what I've skimmed on the back of the DVD case, is about a group of passengers that have boarded a jet from London to Los Angeles, and they apparently face some kind of horrifying elements from one of the artifacts that, I believe, is cursed. I'm not entirely certain about the whole thing at this time, but I'll find out once I start watching this thing.
Now, again, the main reason why this movie peaked my curiosity is it's casting. Specifically, there's 3 cast members that I recognize immediately. The first one is Chuck Connors, who was the star of a popular Western TV series from the mid to late 50's called "The Rifleman". A show that I watched quite a bit of, and my Mom watches it almost religiously on MeTV everyday. The second cast member is Buddy Ebsen, who was mostly known for playing Jed Clampett from "The Beverly Hillbillies". Again, it was a show that I loved as a child, so I'm kinda interested to see what he'll do here in this film.
And the last cast member I recognize by name is Captain James T. Kirk himself William Shatner. Now I'll admit freely that I didn't really watch a whole lot of the original "Star Trek" series. My Dad was more into it than I was. I was more familiar with it's 2nd series of "Star Trek: The Next Generation", and to a lesser extent with "Deep Space 9" and "Voyager". But still, I have grown to appreciate the original series over time and it's cast of characters.
However, I'm getting a little bit off track here. Point is, those 3 cast members sold me on this movie so I'm hoping for it to be good. I don't know if it will be, but I do also know that the film is short. It's only 73 minutes long, so if it somehow ends up sucking, my pain will be short and sweet. But I'm still hoping for it to be good. The only way I'm gonna know for sure, though, is if I shut up and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "The Horror At 37,000 Feet".
6 minutes later
OK, I have a question here. Now, I've only been on a plane 3 times before, so my experience on this is gonna be limited. So, as the opening credits are going on, I'm getting to see more of the inside of the jet itself, and it looks to be fucking huge! I mean, there are so many seats on this plane, and the strange thing is, not counting the 2 stewardesses, there's only 9 people that are chartering this flight. Do you really need this big of a plane for only 9 people? My only guess as to why they need a plane this size is to carry this cursed artifact, but still, I'm not sure if it's necessary to use this sort of plane for *only* that purpose. And also only for 9 people as well. Again, I understand that my experience with being on a plane is very little, but I just felt like I needed to point that out is all.
10 minutes later
OK, that noise is seriously starting to get to me. You guys thankfully can't hear it for obvious reasons, but it's starting to aggravate me and I have a feeling that it's not going to stop anytime soon.
8 minutes later
All right, I have another question here. So, the jet is currently caught in some sort of wind stream. Meaning that they're stuck and the plane's not going anywhere, despite it still flying. And they know that they're already on limited fuel the longer that they're in the air. At what point do you announce something to the passengers that there's some sort of problem with what's going on? I get that you don't want them to go into a panic, but there's gonna come a time sooner or later where you *have* to say something. Just thought I'd point that out.
5 minutes later
Wait, so this stewardess heard the dog growling inside the cargo hold. We, the viewer, already know what's going on inside of the cargo hold, and she doesn't. But instead of checking the cargo hold to see what's agitating the dog, she decides to go back to her business the moment the dog stops growling. How stupid is this bitch?! If I was one of them, I would at least open the door a little bit to check what's going on *before* I went back to my duties! I'm sorry, guys, but that is just stupid on a whole host of levels.
8 minutes later
Well, guys, I think it's safe to say that, whatever's in that cargo hold, it has the power to freeze people and dogs in it's tracks. So how exactly anyone's gonna combat against this is anyone's guess, really. I will say, though, it does leave me curious enough to keep watching, so at least it's something.
9 minutes later
What the fuck...? So.....part of the carpeting has come off and there's smoke coming from it, too. And then it just fades to black, before cutting back from a non-existent commercial. I'm gonna be honest with you, guys, I have no idea what's going on right now. This is kinda weird and confusing, really.
7 minutes later
So they're really gonna go all out on dressing up this child's doll as Sheryl by giving her some of Sheryl's hair, some of her fingernails, and putting makeup on for it to become a replacement sacrifice for the real Sheryl. That, to me, guys, just seems kinda stupid and yet, I wouldn't be surprised if it actually works. Just saying.
The Review
Well, guys, that was "The Horror At 37,000 Feet". Let me go ahead and shut the movie off now...OK. Well, first, I have to make a correction on something. A little while ago, I sorta snarked at the idea that the doll replacement for Sheryl's potential sacrifice, while stupid, would somehow still work. Well, slight spoiler here, it doesn't. So that was a mistake on my part. But anyway, as for the rest of the movie, well...it was OK, I guess. I mean, it wasn't really horrible, but it's not exactly good either. It's somewhat of an average movie at best.
So, let's go ahead and dive right into this by first talking about the writing. Now, strangely enough, I've seen this sort of plot where people are trapped on an airplane in which haunting things are suppose to happen. One of those instances I saw was in a segment of the "Twilight Zone" movie I reviewed last year, which was also a remake from one of the episodes of the old black and white TV show. I really liked it then, so I was curious to see how well they would try it here with an all star cast such as this. And well, like I already said, it's not exactly great, and part of the reason, which I'll get to in a second, has to do with it's characters.
But as for the writing itself, it's something very similar in which there's some remains of an abbey that haunts the jet in which holds our 9 passengers, and it's revealed later that one of them says that there's a sacred druids jewel that somehow ties one of the passengers onto a plane, in which their ancestor was sacrificed to some God, and that they're back again on some set time period to try and seek another sacrifice for her, that being Sheryl, of course. Now since I mentioned the doll didn't actually work, what actually works involves another theory of mine that I thought up of way early on in the movie, though I didn't say anything about it at the time, because there was a possibility that I could've been wrong. Well, it turns out that it was actually correct. I won't spoil it for you guys on the off chance you want to go see this movie for yourself, but it actually makes a lot more sense now the moment that shit starts to go wrong for our passengers.
Speaking of which, I think now is a perfectly opportunity to talk about the characters. Most of them aren't exactly well developed. The ones who I can think of at the top of my mind are the cowboy star, the little girl, Paul's wife, and Buddy Ebsen. What's interesting about Buddy Ebsen in this movie is that he's basically playing as Jed Clampett, only in this film, he's not a hillbilly and he has much less money than the Clampett family has. He's still a millionaire, but like I said, he doesn't have much money as he did when he was on "The Beverly Hillbillies". But anyway, his character in this movie really doesn't have much to work with, other than the fact that he's just a millionaire. Chuck Connors is playing the heroic flight captain, which I'm totally OK with, even if he really doesn't do a whole lot here either.
The one character who does stand out the most is Paul Kovalik, who is played by William Shatner. Paul is essentially a former priest, and the way he comes off in this movie is rather cynical, but strangely enough, he still has enough charm to where he comes across as being likable. When compared to someone like Sheila, who somehow has the knowledge of the abbey and it's secrets, and is also kinda creepy at times too, Paul easily comes off as the most likable of the cast. That, and the doctor, who's played by Paul Winfield. But again, I'll get to that when I cover acting. The only other character I can mention is Alan, who is the guy responsible for transporting the cursed artifact on the plane in the first place. I would say that it instantly makes him the most dis-likable character in the entire movie, though admittedly, his character is also really kinda bland, so make of that what you will, I suppose.
But anyway, guys, the writing in this movie isn't all that great. Now I will say that the pacing here is really good. But then again, considering the movie's only 73 minutes long, I kinda expected the pacing to be as such. So with that said, what about the acting? Well, I will say that the acting here is actually pretty good. The one who stands out the most, again, is William Shatner. And that's mainly because Shatner is doing what he does best, which is hamming it up as much as he can. And when you let him do that, he makes your movie look that much better. Granted, the movie is still average, but average is still a positive. And that's better than nothing if you ask me. But anyway, the acting from the rest of the cast is, like I said, also pretty good too. Not just from the cast members I mentioned earlier, but also Paul Winfield, as he also turns in a great showing. I would say the weakest actor is easily the little girl, but then again, you can only expect so much from child actors, and she only has a few lines of dialogue in this movie to begin with anyways. So yeah, acting in general here is pretty good.
Special effects are...kinda shit. Now being that this is both a low budget movie, and made for TV, we're not exactly shooting for the stars here. That said, the effects in this movie aren't really good. They're very minimal, but still. There's one particular effect that I want to talk about, and that involves the scene I mentioned about the carpet on the floor opening itself up. Now the first time you see this, it actually looks kinda cool and a little bit creepy. However, what sorta ruins it a bit is the second near the end of the movie where the carpeting opens up even more. Because on the second time, you can actually see a couple of the wires that are attached to the carpeting pulling it apart. Now on the first time from way early on, you don't see it because the scene was mostly shot in the dark, which gave the illusion of the carpeting opening itself up magically. But on the second time, you can physically see the wires that are pulling the carpet apart. Now while the effect for it is indeed crap, I'm also gonna put part of the blame on the lighting for that scene because they didn't bother to try and hide the wiring at all. And because of that, it makes the effect look really cheap, even for the standards of 1973.
But setting that aside, the camerawork here is good. The lighting, minus the one shot I already talked about a second ago, is mostly decent. Sound-mixing here is fine. The score here is really kinda forgettable. There's nothing about the music that makes it stand out in anyway, so I'll just chalk that up to being really forgettable.
So ultimately, guys, when everything is said and done, can I recommend "The Horror At 37,000 Feet"? Kinda, sorta yes. Like I said, it's not a great film, and it's one that I'm probably not gonna get around to watching second time, but if you are curious, the movie should be up on YouTube. So before you decide on whether or not you should buy this movie on DVD, it's best to check it out on YouTube first, if it's still available anyways. And if you like it enough, go for a physical copy of it. It certainly is an interesting movie, and I would say that it's worth watching once. Though whether or not you want to watch it again and again is something I can't say. As for myself, well, like I said, I don't believe it's worth watching a second time, but the movie's still average. And like I said, average is still a positive, and that's far more credit than I've given a lot of movies I've seen for this series. So anyway, I'm gonna go and watch something else. And I think I'm gonna go and rewatch my copy of "Christine". I haven't seen that one in a little while, so I'll go and do that next when I get done with this one.
Anyway, guys, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.
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