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| The High and the Mighty | |
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| Directed by | William A. Wellman |
| Produced by | Robert Fellows John Wayne |
| Written by | Ernest K. Gann |
| Starring | John Wayne Claire Trevor Laraine Day Robert Stack Jan Sterling |
| Music by | Dimitri Tiomkin |
| Cinematography | Archie Stout |
| Editing by | Ralph Dawson |
| Distributed by | Warner Bros. |
| Release date(s) | July 3, 1954 |
| Running time | 147 min. |
| Language | English |
| IMDb profile | |
The High and the Mighty is a Cinemascope adventure/melodrama released in 1954 through Warner Brothers. The film was co-produced by Robert Fallows and John Wayne who also starred, directed by William A. Wellman, and the screenplay was written by Ernest K. Gann, the author of the novel on which the film was based. Dimitri Tiomkin earned the film's only Academy Award for his original score and also received a second nomination for the film's theme song.
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[edit] Background
While The High and the Mighty received only mixed reviews when it was released in July, 1954, it was a terrific success at the box office earning $8.5 Million in its original release, a very substantial sum at that time. A number of high profile stars of the day such as Joan Crawford, Ida Lupino, Barbara Stanwyck, and Ginger Rogers were approached to appear in the film but turned it down. When Spencer Tracy, who originally accepted the part of co-pilot Dan Roman, eventually pulled out, Jack Warner, the film's distributor, concerned about the lack of a marquee player in the cast John Wayne played a role "against type" while supporting actresses Claire Trevor and Jan Sterling earned 1954 Academy Awards nominations for Best Supporting Actress. The film earned additional Oscar nominations for director William Wellman and film editor Ralph Dawson, along with composer Dimitri Tiomkin and lyricist Ned Washington for the film's title song. Tiomkin received the film's only academy award, for the film's original score.[1] The popular title song by Tiomkin and Washington was included on only one print of the film so as to qualify it for an Oscar nomination. It is not heard on the prints issued for general theatrical release.
As did movies like Airport and its sequels nearly twenty years later the film focuses on the personal dramas of airline passengers and moreover is acknowledged as an inspiration for the 1980 comedy film Airplane, in which Robert Stack parodied his co-starring role. Wayne had also co-produced and starred in Island in the Sky the year before. Both films were aviation dramas and shared many of the same crew members and production staff. Along with Wayne, six actors appeared in both films: Regis Toomey, Paul Fix, Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer, Ann Doran, George Chandler and Michael Wellman. Ernest K. Gann, the author of the books on which both films were based, also wrote the two screenplays.
During the sixties and seventies The High and the Mighty was a television staple. However, with tightening broadcast schedules and royalty disputes the film's last appearances on television came in 1982 on the TBS cable channel and on Cinemax in March/April 1985 and it was subsequently unavailable for over 20 years. Its rarity gave the movie a cult following which later led to petitions for the film's release on DVD. By 2004 the Warnercolor photography of The High and the Mighty was reportedly in danger of completely desaturating but the film was restored from the original negatives. It returned to television in July 2005 and a special edition DVD was released that August.
Although The High and the Mighty is often catagorized as an adventure/drama film it is also a complex, character driven ensemble piece which explores the personal dramas and interactions of the seventeen passengers, the professional conflicts and doubts of the five crew members, and the aircraft itself, an unpressurized DC-4 flying as Trans-Orient-Pacific ("TOPAC") Flight #420 on an overnight hop from Honolulu (T.H.) to San Francisco in what soon becomes a tense, nerve-wracking and life changing ordeal for everyone. The film spends its first hour and ten minutes carefully developing the characters of each member in the large ensemble cast, through both extensive interactive dialogue and many long, expensively produced flashback sequences before a crisis begins about half way through this unusually long (2:27) feature.
[edit] The Characters
[edit] Passengers
May Holst (Claire Trevor): a loquacious, overly dressed, self-described "broken-down old broad" who seems to always be on the lookout for a man
Ken Childs (David Brian): an avuncular, middle aged, silver-haired playboy and TOPAC investor/board member who soon receives the attentions of May Holst
Humphrey Agnew (Sidney Blackmer): an unctious Honolulu "snake oil" manufacturer ("Agnew's Aides") and insanely jealous husband who is convinced Childs is having an affair with his wife Martha and brings a revolver (there was no TSA then) on the plane to "discuss" it with him
Sally McKee (Jan Sterling): a platinum blond, overly made up, self-doubting mail-order bride going to meet her as yet sight-unseen future husband
Prof. Donald Falherty (Paul Kelly): an alcoholic amateur painter and Atomic Energy Commission scientist who has become conscience-stricken about his work on nuclear missiles
Lydia Rice (Laraine Day): a rich, shrewish, aloof social climber from New York City who is not at all happy with and wants to divorce her husband...
Howard Rice (John Howard): who has infuriated Lydia because he wants to sell the New York advertising agency she bought for him ("as a new toy") and use the money to leave New York and buy "a broken down old mine in Canada"
Gustave Pardee (Robert Newton): a philandering, self centered, English accented (although New York-born) theatrical producer who is terrified of flying ("the original Frightened Freddie") and just about anything else he can't control
Lillian Pardee (Julie Bishop): Gustave's placating, much younger wife who despite all her husband's faults still loves him
Ed Joseph (Phil Harris): an exuberant, overweight, loud mouthed tourist from New Jersey who is returning home from a nothing-went-right "vacation from hell" with...
Clara Joseph (Ann Doran): his overly emotional Utah-born wife
Nell & Milo Buck (Karen Sharpe and John Smith): a misty eyed young couple returning from their honeymoon
Frank Briscoe (Paul Fix): an ailing, wheelchair bound grandfatherly gentleman who, although apparently down on his luck, is still gracious and generous to a fault
Dorothy Chen (Joy Kim): a soft spoken, self effacing young Korean refugee looking to start a new life in America
José Lacota (John Qualen): a heavily accented, soft spoken, harmonica playing commercial fisherman who is flying for the first time in his life
Toby Field (played by the director's son, Michael Wellman): a cap pistol toting seven-year old who, returning to his mother from a visit to his father, sleeps through all the excitement
[edit] Crew
Captain John Sullivan (Robert Stack): although an experienced, sober, and no nonsense pilot, nevertheless "his nerves are getting rusty"
First Officer "Whistling" Dan Roman (John Wayne): a troubled 20,000+ hour veteran flyer ("I've been flying since 1917") who a few years earlier was the captain and only survivor of a DC-3 crash on take-off in Colombia which killed his wife and young son
Second Officer Hobie Wheeler (William Campbell): the flight's smart aleck young relief pilot
Lenny Wilby (Wally Brown): the rumpled, often logorrheic navigator upon whose skills all will soon depend for their survival
"Miss Spaulding" (Doe Avedon): a young, rookie flight attendant ("I've only been with the company for four months") and the plane's only cabin crew member.
[edit] Plot
Soon after departing Honolulu for a 2,393 statute mile trip over the empty Pacific Ocean to San Francisco an intermittent, at first almost imperceptible minor shudder alerts co-pilot Dan Roman to a potential problem with the plane. The other aircrew and passengers don't seem to notice, except for stewardess Spaulding who is alarmed by a shake in a flight deck mirror. A short time later, while resting in the crew bunk, Capt. Sullivan senses that the prop "on either #1 or #3" is slipping out of sync but the cause can't be found.
After passing the point of no return at an altitude of 9,000 feet on a trip anticipated to last 12-hours and 16-minutes ("exactly") the left outboard engine (#1) seizes, causing its three-bladed prop to separate, followed by a serious engine fire. Although the fire is quickly put out, the engine has become badly twisted in its mounts which greatly increases drag and the plane loses 4,000 feet of altitude ("and still sinking") before the crew regains full control. Worse, the separating prop has breached the left outboard wing fuel tank (#1) and caused the loss of 200 gallons of fuel (from less than 1,300 gallons remaining of the 3,050 gallons the plane took off with). For the next six hours it is unknown whether the crew can nurse the crippled plane to a safe landing in San Francisco or be forced to ditch at night in the storm tossed Pacific. Each of the plane's seventeen passengers and five crew members react differently to the stress.
In the cabin several personal crises are brewing among the passengers. Agnew has brought a chrome plated revolver on board, with which to confront Childs whom he suspects of having an affair with his wife Martha, who once worked for Childs. As Agnew makes his move, engine #1 seizes, beginning hours of terror for all on board and the launching of an air-sea-rescue effort by the United States Coast Guard in case the plane is forced to ditch.
The passengers and crew face this impending doom by reevaluating their lives.
Navigator Wilby at first believes the plane can make it to land but then finds an error in his calculations and realizes they will run out of fuel "eleven minutes short" of the airport unless the winds change. Sullivan prepares to ditch the plane despite the risks until Roman rebels against his orders. The far more experienced first officer literally "slaps some sense" into Sullivan and convinces him to try making the airport, even though they must cross a hill standing in the way.
The plane makes it to SFO and a check of the tanks ("just 30 gallons left") reveals how close a call it was. After the passengers depart, the film ends with Roman walking off alone into the darkness, whistling as airline operations manager Tim Garfield (Regis Toomey) says, "So long, you ancient pelican."
[edit] The aircraft (N4726V)
The DC-4 aircraft used to film the tarmac, passenger boarding (Gate 4), take-off, and external daylight flying sequences, was a C-54A-10-DC (c/n 10315) built in 1942 at Long Beach, California, by the Douglas Aircraft Company under military contract (USAAF s/n 42-72210).[2] When its sequences in the film were shot in mid November, 1953, the aircraft (N4726V; ex-N66694, ex-LV-ABR) was being operated by Oakland, California, based non-scheduled carrier Transocean Airlines (1946-62), the largest civil aviation operator of recycled C-54 aircraft in the 1950s. Novel and screenplay author Ernest K. Gann wrote the original book when he was flying C-54s for Transocean over the Hawaii-California routes. Named “The Argentine Queen,” the plane had once been the personal aircraft of Juan Perón (the controversial three-time President of Argentina) before it was acquired by Transocean in 1953. The film's fictional airline's name ("TOPAC") was incorporated in Transocean's red, white, and yellow color scheme for filming.[3]
A second Transocean C-54/DC-4 (equipped with a large "double door"[4] used to accommodate the loading of freight on pallets) was used to film the scenes of the damaged plane on the ground at the end of the film, while the external night and damaged "in-flight" sequences were filmed in a studio using a large miniature. The scenes inside the passenger cabin and on the flight deck were also all filmed on sets built on a sound stage.
[edit] True life end of N4726V
At 8:47 PM (HST) on March 27, 1964 N4726V took off on a charter flight from Honolulu to Los Angeles with a crew of three and six passengers onboard. A little before 6AM (PST), about eight hours into the anticipated 11 hour, 40 minute flight, a Mayday call was heard from the pilot, who reported his position as about 700 miles west of San Francisco with a serious fire in engine #2 (left inboard) adding, "...we may have to put it in" (ditching the aircraft in the ocean might be necessary). No further transmissions were heard from the plane. The Coast Guard searched for five days but no traces of the aircraft or its occupants were ever found. Later investigation showed that engine #2 had a recurring oil leak in its propeller governor assembly, but the fire's cause remained unknown.[5] Many writers have commented on the ironic similarities between the plane's role in the film and its tragic end over the Pacific.
[edit] Awards
[edit] Academy Award
[edit] Nominations
- Best Actress in a Supporting Role - Jan Sterling
- Best Actress in a Supporting Role - Claire Trevor
- Best Director - William A. Wellman
- Best Film Editing - Ralph Dawson
- Best Music, Original Song - Dimitri Tiomkin & Ned Washington ("The High and the Mighty")
![[3]](http://www.1000aircraftphotos.com/Transports/1218L.jpg){kind=link}