Burt Lancaster and the gang

I must admit to not having seen the airport series of movies before, although now that they all have been released on DVD I thought they’d be worth a look.

Right away its fairly obvious where they got most of the gag ideas for the Flying High series of movies and all those jokes that went over my head now seem to make a lot more sense.

I wasn’t expecting anything too spectacular from these films, with their cavalcade of fading actors (I was pretty much just looking forward to the Love Boat in the air); I was however delightfully surprised with a tension filled film that kept me interested right until the closing moments.

Airport is as much a melodrama about the day to day lives of the airport employees, as it is a serious drama about set in the air. The difference I think is that whilst melodramatic, it is done on such a large scale with so many actually very good actors (sorry for saying they were fading!) that the day to day becomes intensely interesting and lavish.