This One is Just "Murder!"

It's true I've been a bit out of commission lately. I had to have two more minor, outpatient surgeries in March, so there was a fair amount of down time. (And you'll be glad to know that, while I watched a lot of things on TV, I didn't go through a bunch of nutso projects such as the ones I wrote about at length in November and December of last year!) Nothing that I viewed was worthy of a post here (and some of the things were actually of reasonable quality versus the drek I favor! Ha ha!) So I have opened my rusty footlocker and pulled out a howler that is long overdue for some attention around here. This project is so emblematic of the cheesy, tacky, star-filled, disaster-ish claptrap that has held our attention all these years. So with no further ado, I give you the 1975 TV-movie Murder on Flight 502.

The 1970s were ALL ABOUT airliners in peril and I've featured several of these here at Poseidon's Underworld. (They include: Lost Flight, SST Death Flight and The Horror at 37,000 Feet.) Murder was quite the ratings hit, landing in the top ten programs for its week, which only fed the dragon when it came to cranking out more telefilms with a jetliner in trauma.

Movies of this sort seem to all begin the same way, with a variety of passengers checking in prior to boarding. The fictional airline shown here is TOA (I guess DOA would've come off as too morbid?)

Shown here is one-time leading man Walter Pidgeon, playing a kindly if a bit feeble older man. Pidgeon had previously appeared in Skyjacked (1972) as well as The Neptune Factor (1973) and later Two-Minute Warning (1976), making him a bona fide member of The Disaster Movie Club.

Also heading to the plane is on Molly Picon. Sporting a heavy Yiddish accent, she's a meddlesome, controlling "Jewish mother" type. Something the actress had perfected long before and which had been featured in 1971's Fiddler on the Roof, where she played the village matchmaker.

Next up is Sonny Bono (freshly divorced in real life from Cher.) He plays, wait for this incredible stretch, a once-hot music star who's fallen on hard times and is striving for a comeback!

Also on hand is The Partridge Family's Danny Bonaduce, playing the spoiled kid of a wealthy executive. He enters the first class lounge with this large wrapped box. His hair matches the drapes in the room and we'll see more color-coordination of that type as we roll along. A sort of denim blue and burnt orange are dominant colors in the film, even taking into consideration the degrading of the film quality over the generations. 

Also found in the lounge is troubled married couple Dane Clark and Larraine Day. Day cannot break through Clark's barely-concealed detached rage over something. These two performers were leading players of the 1940s. Day was no stranger to airliners in peril, having experienced a crash in Foreign Correspondent (1941) and the potential for one in the landmark drama The High and the Mighty (1954.) (See here for vintage cinema disasters, including both of these!)

Bonaduce had just seen the end of The Partridge Family and with costar Susan Dey having landed a role in Skyjacked, perhaps he felt it was his turn to hit the unfriendly skies. While waiting in the lounge, he tangles briefly with a new arrival...

It's mystery author Polly Bergen, whose fear of flying causes her to drink to excess. Snarky from the get-go, she looks at her young ginger acquaintance and snaps, "I bite," to which he replies, "I've had my shots..."

Then there's Theodore Bikel (the Broadway Captain Von Trapp if you're interested.) He's stricken immediately when he overhears that a certain passenger will also be on board the flight...

That passenger is Ralph Bellamy, a prominent physician.

And just before we reach (or actually pass!) the threshold for how many familiar faces we can cram into this movie, we find elegant fashion buyer Fernando Lamas.

Both Bellamy and Lamas got the memo requesting that their clothing must compliment the decor! (And this isn't even a Ross Hunter production, though it probably would like to be.)

Each of these arrivals is greeted by a glacially attractive agent who is given flattering close-up after flattering close-up while the stars have to make do with quick flashes of their faces, not always at the best angles. And why? Because she's Rosemary Stack...

...And her husband Robert Stack is the star of this thing. He plays the stalwart captain of the airplane, which is headed from New York to London. You might think that we've met all of the name brand personalities contained in this movie, but you would be incorrect. For the stewardess he's chatting with here is... 

...none other than Miss Farrah Fawcett-Majors! A burgeoning actress for several years, she would very soon burst onto the worldwide scene as one of the original Charlie's Angels.

But wait, there's more! A police detective shows up, too, played by none other than Hugh O'Brian!

It seems that O'Brian is heading to London in order to take part in an exchange program with Scotland Yard. Stack, however, doesn't want anyone - even a cop - to be carrying a gun on board, so he takes the officer's weapon for safekeeping during the flight.

With that, we're ready to take our seats and blow this joint. This is the first class cabin. There are allegedly more than 200 other passengers in "tourist" but we never, ever see them. They are just occasionally referred to.

I've flown. I actually have flown across the Atlantic several times. I may be utterly wrong, but I've NEVER seen a setup like this, with the chairs angled in a "V" with all sorts of space in the aisle and lined up to look at... nothing. A paneled storage closet? It just seems patently bizarre to me, but perhaps that's the way it was.

Speaking of the way it was, these flight attendant uniforms were authentic. They'd actually been the uniform worn by TWA stewardesses a few years before this movie! You know, the number of notable faces continues on here. Recognize the brunette?

Fawcett's coworker is Brooke Adams! The actress had been puttering around for a number of years, first as a child actress, then as an adult. Soon enough, she would break out as a cinematic leading lady in movies such as Days of Heaven, Invasion of the Body Snatchers (both 1978) and Cuba (1979), opposite Sean Connery. (Coincidentally, she'd been in consideration to be one of Charlie's Angels herself, but decided against it!)

The passengers take their seats and Bergen just has to down another drink, lest her anxiety about flying becomes too overwhelming. The more she drinks, the more audacious her remarks become.

Bono finds himself seated next to a young lady. I mean, what are the chances? Bergen is placed next to Mr "You Look Mahvelous" and the two old coots, Picon and Pidgeon, are paired up, then we have a fading rock star next to a nubile fan. No wonder people complain about cliches...

You might feel like you know this young woman, but you most likely do not. Making her on screen debut, the actress would show up occasionally on TV from the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s.

It's Elizabeth Stack, daughter of Robert and the aforementioned Rosemary Stack. Rosemary had been a model prior to wedding the actor. Robert reportedly took a role in this epic so that he could work alongside his wife and daughter though their interaction ranges from limited to none at all.

Anyway, as Bono continues trying to get to know Stack, a seething Clark stares a hole through him.

Already filled with tension, this couple faces a greater hurdle now as Day realizes that her husband booked this particular flight on purpose because he wants to confront (or more!) Bono over a past incident.

Meanwhile, back at the first class lounge, the gift box that Bonaduce left behind starts smoking!

The lounge is evacuated and a specialist is brought in to diffuse the "bomb," but it turns out to be nothing more than a practical joke. You thought we were finished introducing television leading men who appear in this movie, but we weren't!

Here we meet airport security chief George Maharis, previously the star of the hit show Route 66. Appearing on the scene because of the bomb scare, he is handed a letter left for him that he wasn't intended to see until the next day. But... because he's getting said letter a day early, he discovers that someone (or two) on flight 502 is to be murdered before the plane reaches London!

He (suffering from a persistent toothache in a textural subplot) gets on the phone to the pilot in order to inform him that an unknown killer has boarded the plane (in first class) and may be striking out at their intended victim in the near future!

That's not exactly a lot to go on, but Stack receives the info and decides he will have to have the first class passengers actively watched. 

First, he takes Bonaduce into the upstairs lounge (which, like, no one ever wants to use except for confrontations! They'd rather sit, strapped to their orange seats, facing that piece of paneling in front of them...!) He's able to determine that even though the prankster was responsible for the smoking package, he's not a killer in waiting. He then, and I'm not making this up, invites Bonaduce to visit the cockpit in a little while and winks at him...! I have to assume the Zucker brothers were tuned into this program the night it aired.

In a nod to the casting acumen of Aaron Spelling (and partner Leonard Goldberg), the copilot is played by Vincent Baggetta. A bit player from the mid-1960s and a soap actor, he would continue to win TV parts, eventually headlining his own brief series, The Eddie Capra Mysteries. He later turned up as a police detective on Spelling's Dynasty spin-off The Colbys.

Other than having a potential killer on board, the flight continues on its way to London...! The exterior shots of the plane resemble a model.

And whaddaya know...! In Maharis' office is a model of said plane! It may very well be the one used to film this opus.

Naturally, Stack ultimately turns to the police detective on board for help. He gives O'Brian back his gun for protection.

O'Brian decides to settle into a seat in the last row of first class so that he can clearly observe the passengers coming and going. Next to him is a rather nondescript priest.

Busybody Picon begins to try to get to know her seatmate better. This type of caricature characterization was a staple of so many plays and projects. It's the sort of thing Estelle Getty was successful at later (and why she was disappointed when producers of The Golden Girls decided to make her Sophia an Italian Catholic instead of the stereotypical Jewish mama.)

Since virtually everyone in first class on this flight is either connected or recognizes someone else, Lamas realizes that he's sitting next to a successful crime writer.

Likewise, she's able to spot him as one of a group of men who were involved in a successful bank robbery. But one of them got away. (She also drops a hilarious bombshell that one of her previous husbands was "ladylike enough for both of us.")

As the flight reaches a point wherein there's only another hour and a half in the air, Stack and his crew are given piecemeal bits of info about this passenger or that from Maharis. But there's nothing concrete that they can go on in order to nab whoever it is who's planning a murder or two.

A contemplative Stack begins to wonder if the potential killer may not be after a passenger, but one of the crew instead!

Contrivances and coincidences continue to abound. Bikel is unexpectedly aboard the same flight as doctor Bellamy. He blames Bellamy for the death of his wife because he didn't drop what he was going and come quickly enough to the hospital when she was in the midst of a medical emergency.

Pidgeon reveals that though he's a lifelong bachelor, he's spent his entire life caring for all his siblings and their children after the death of his parents when he was 13.

During their discussion, she notices that Stack keeps coming down from the flight deck and walking back and forth (in that lunatic first class setup with nowhere to really go...) 

Suddenly, Bikel bursts into a heart attack (you can see the concern etched on Bonaduce's face.)

Adams gets him some oxygen while O'Brian and Bellamy do their best to aid him.

Now comes the irony that the only person who might have the ability to save Bikel is the doctor Bikel not only hates, but has been pestering with threatening phone calls.

Stack, by now suspicious of everyone, wonders if Bellamy might deliberately kill Bikel instead of saving him! (I don't know if this is a wig on Stack - who seemed always to have a huge head of hair - or not, but either way the '70s was a time of horrible non-grooming. Look at the wiry fuzz on the sides of his head.)

That crisis averted, Bergen asks Fawcett if she could meet privately with the captain.

Tipsy as she is, she hasn't lost her sense of observation. She informs Stack that she's spotted an imposter on board.

After Bergen has returned to her seat and Stack to the cockpit, Bono takes his teenage friend up to the lounge and decides to compose a little ditty in her honor, accompanied by his guitar.

She goes to embrace him as a steaming Clark watches from behind a partition.

What follows is a vicious and deadly assault with - wait for it - a roast beef serving fork!! My God, the staggering violence...

Bono manages to survive being forked to death and hurls himself into a chair to catch his breath.

In a little while, he listens as Day appears and explains why her husband despises him so much. Their young daughter died at one of the parties in his home, so this new romance with (Ms) Stack triggered the delicately held-together Clark to so after him. 

As suspects who will actually be committing a premeditated murder begin to dwindle, O'Brian quizzes Stack over his crew, in case one of them might be either a suspect or an intended victim. Stack then gets word from Maharis on the ground that one of the passengers is traveling with a stolen passport.

O'Brien goes looking for the culprit only to find a vacant seat! He instructs Fawcett to go search tourist to see if the person has headed back there.

This little mystery is solved eventually as a body is discovered within the plane's elevator to the storage hold below!! Hysterically, after O'Brian has Bellamy ensure that the victim is truly deceased, he just sends the elevator, with the body, back downstairs rather than take it out and lay it someplace!

Stack finally comes clean to the passengers that there has indeed been a murder on board their flight. I'm sure Bellamy, an Oscar nominee for 1937's The Awful Truth with Cary Grant and Irene Dunne, was just so honored to now be acting next to Danny Partridge! (Just to keep things ship-shape, he lost the Oscar to Joseph Schildkraut in The Life of Emile Zola, though he was eventually granted an honorary one in 1987.)

Now the phrase is "Coffee, tea or it could be ME next!"

This becomes even more of an issue when we see the killer (or somebody) rifling through the flight attendants' carry-on luggage (and finding money in one!)

And not long after, there's another killing...

The passengers have a variety of reactions to finding out that someone has been killing people on their flight.

Lamas is finally driven into a state of panic by the blase, boozy Bergen and heads to the back for a talk with O'Brian. In a real lapse of movie-making expertise, O'Brian's glasses are heavily reflective the entire time instead of someone making an adjustment!

As the movie comes in for its eventual landing, there's a scuffle, with oxygen masks falling from the lounge ceiling...

...followed by a fiery conflagration!

There's even a little twist with the ending that many viewers may not have seen coming. This TV-movie can be found on YouTube or (in a 720p upload) here. As this has been released many times on super-cheap DVDs, the quality varies a lot from link to link. I provided the best one that I'm aware of.

The release (and staggering success) of 1970's Airport led to a huge proliferation of plane-in-distress features and telefilms. This promo with a dozen stars along with the director and producer emphasized how many names could be found in the large cast. (Do note, though, that Dana Wynter and George Kennedy were not actually present!!! Those are cut-outs that were pasted in later!)

The inspiration for this Murder cast photo is more than obvious. In this case, though, all performers were on hand for the pic. I'm not going to do my customary bios for each of these people, but I do have some shots from the set that are reasonably rare and I'll supply some commentary for those.

Though Ms Adams' career as a leading lady peaked in the late-'70s, she's also known for costarring in the rather infamous miniseries Lace and Lace II ("Which one of you bitches is my mother?") She still continued to act, but in a less publicized manner, and is the wife of busy actor Tony Shalhoub.

The younger, female Stack was also featured in The Initiation of Sarah, which we roasted here a while back. Her last time on screen was a 1984 episode of Airwolf.

Sonny seemed to be having a good time on set during this! As many folks know, he became disillusioned with acting (mostly on things like The Love Boat and Fantasy Island) and ultimately turned to politics with a surprising level of success, though he was killed in a skiing accident in 1998 at age 62 while serving in Congress.

Whenever I see Clark in anything, I can never quite get past his very obvious toupee. But his era was a time when virtually no one went bald who wasn't named Yul or Telly.

Though their marriage was only for about a dozen years, Day's union with noted baseball manager Leo Durocher led to her being known as "First Lady of Baseball." As a devout Mormon, she never swore, smoked or drank (even coffee or tea.)

As you may have surmised, Picon is not one of "my" people. I am not a fan of the sort of mugging she tended to provide. She and Pidgeon sure made for a widely disparate couple height-wise!

Bergen and Lamas look like a couple that goes together though, as far as I can tell, this was their only acting collaboration. (They do have another thing in common. Both liked to go "commando." Bergen revealed this in her hooty beauty book and Lamas' penchant for it was described in his widow Esther Williams' auto-bio!)

And our last couple... I'm kidding. These two have practically nothing to do with one another at all in the movie. They were apparently just shoved together for a photo op.

I've seen a LOT of Hugh O'Brian movies and TV programs and this is the only time I can recall him ever wearing glasses. I guess this was meant to be a signal that he was "acting!"

I much prefer my Hugh THIS way, as he was a decade prior in Love Has Many Faces (1965.)

I am now, and always have been, a sucker for all-star casts in movies and TV offerings. The 1970s seemed to be the greatest era for this, be in mysteries like Murder on the Orient Express or disaster epics like The Towering Inferno (both 1974.) Even when the array is perhaps a bit beyond its shelf-life, I'm still all in. I hope you liked this little flight of fancy. Till next time!