Boxoffice-August.20.1979

Dr.
18 BOXOFFICE/AUGUST 20, 1979
J
THE CONCORDE—AIRPORT '79
CAST
Meirand
Alain Delon
Maggie
Susan Blakely
Ke i in Harrison Robert Wagner
Isabelle
Sylvia Knstel
Patroni
George Kennedv
Eli
Eddie Albert
Producer
Director
Screenplay
Story
A I
CREDITS
Jennings Lang
David Lowell Rich
Eric Roth
Jennings Lang
mwTNjI release, rated PC*. Suspense Drama.
123 inin.. mm in release. Aspect ratio. 1.85.
[echnicolor. Release #7915.
DIGEST RATING: POOR
Evidently, producer Jennings Lang was
out of the country when all the jokes were
circulating about the last two '"Airport" sequels,
"Airport 75" and "Airport 77."
That's the only plausible excuse for Lang
allowing the same laughable elements in
the previous "Airports" to be in "The Con
corde—Airport 79," too.
Now he and director David Lowell Rich
have brought back to the screen all the
hilarious antics that have turned disaster
epics into classic comedies. It's as though
Lang and Rich studied the idiotic moments
of typical disaster movies and then made
certain that each and every dumb scene
from previous "Airport" sequels was in
eluded. On that note, the filmmaking team
has done a good job. Everything you laugh
ed at before is here again—only more of it.
From the title alone, audiences can probably
detect that there's going to be
something not so hot about this picture.
After all. what more can they do with
airplanes They've been blown up. hit by
small planes, run into the ocean, navigated
by cross-eyed stewardesss and had the likes
of singing nuns and patients needing
kidney transplants on board.
THE WANDERERS
Richie
Joey
Nina
Despie Galasso
Turkey
Buddy
Perry
Peenee
CAST
CREDITS
Ken Wahl
John Friedrich
Karen Allen
Toni Kalem
Alan Rosenberg
Jim Youngs
Tony Ganios
Linda Manz
Executive Producer Richard St. Johns
Producer
Martin Ransohoff
Director
Philip Kaufman
Screenplay Philip Kaufman. Rose Kaufman
Based on the novel by
Richard Price
An Orion-Warner Bros, release, rated R. Youth
( omedv -Drama. 113 min.. now in release. Aspect
ratio, 1.75. I echnicolor. Release #79807.
DIGEST RATING: FAIR
Here is a film that has too much violence to
be another "American Graffiti" and too much
sentimentality to be another "The Warriors "
"The Wanderers" is aiming for the audiences
In the Bronx of 1963. The Wanderers is just
one of many fraternal gangs. The Fordham
Bald it's shave their huge heads and harass peo
pie for the fun of it. The Ducky Boys is an
Irish gang that takes its beatings so seriously
"Airport 79" tries to combine all these
disasters into one movie and features
reasonable facsimiles of the strange.
trouble making or sickly passengers who
had boarding passes to the previous se
quels.
The result Utter hilarity that rivals only
"Beyond the Poseidon Adventure" for
entertainment value. Like the "Poseidon"
sequel "Airport 79" is so silly it's actually
entertaining.
The very complicated plot centers on
millionaire Robert Wagner trying to save
his reputation from being destroyed by a
former lover, played by Susan Blakely
Blakely. a TV reporter, vows to make
public some papers given to her that prove
Wagner's business has been selling arms to
foreign dictatorships. And she's going to
make those documents public knowledge
just as soon as she gets off that ol' Con
corde. But Wagner has different ideas.
Hell try liwicel on the Washington to
Paris flight to blast those papers out of her
hand by blowing up the Concorde with one
of his company's guided missiles.
He fails at both attempts, thanks to Joe
Patroni's (George Kennedy's) expert serial
maneuvers which toss screaming
passengers about the plane like inordinate
debris. This flight, which Kennedy and
Delon seem to think is all in a day's work,
also features Kennedy opening a window,
in flight, to shoot a flare gun at one of the
guided missies. Not once, but twice pilot
Kennedy pulls open the Concorde windshield
and sticks his head out, all while
traveling at 1400 miles an hour Amazing.
Still another disaster lurks on the Pans
to-Moscow flight. Before the flight.
Wagner is shown all alone with Blakely.
with plenty of time to kill her, but he
doesn't. Instead, he makes plans to get her
on the Moscow flight, which is sabotaged
by terrorists. In the meantime, there's time
for such interesting events as Kennedy and
Alain Delon each taking his turn at a one
night affair. Blakelj doing a poor imitation
that the members use sticks and lead pipes.
There is a black gang called The Rays, and
then there is the Wongs, an Oriental group
specializing in Iwhat else ) kung fu.
Wanderers Ken Wahl (who in his first film
resembles John Travolta and Elvis Presley I,
John Fnedrich, Jim Youngs, Alan Rosenberg
and Tony Ganios are seniors in high school.
Unknown to them, they are poised between an
era of innocence and an era of violence Their
home lives are in an upheaval. For example.
Ganios' mother is an alcoholic widow who has
a secret affair with Friednch's mean, muscle
bound father Wahl gets girlfiend Tom Kalem
in trouble and is forced to marry into a family
of goons almost as sadistic as the Duckies.
At his bachelor party. Wahl celebrates with
a great deal of reserve and confusion. Through
a window, he sees Karen Allen, a girl he apparently
still loves, and follows her into a folk
club where in the shadows stands a guitarist
who is supposed to be Boh Dylan He sings
lagain. what else) "The Times They Are
aChangin'
What is Wahl thinking as he watches Allen
and "Dylan"' 1 Should I go in° Are times really
changing'' Why am I marrying someone I
don't love' The fact that he could be thinking
all this and much more raises questions about
director Philip Kaufman's motives. He inserts
of these two films, however, and will probably extraneous events— the "Dylan" scene and.
draw generous segments of each. But only if earlier, the assassination of President John F
moviegoers don't mind Philip and Rose Kauf
man's rehashing of the theme of buddies cop
Kennedy —to lend to the film a poignance that
the script and his direction lack on their own.
ing with adulthood in an urban environment. For these reasons. "The Wanderers" is a
crowd