Gimme That Ol' Time Disaster...

If you're any sort of regular visitor here, you know that the 1970-1980 period of disaster movies is my all-time favorite topic of conversation. The movies (and the stars who were in them) are embedded in my psyche and practically all of them have been written about here on some level. While the '70s are known for a series of box-office disaster blockbusters, though, the concepts for them were hardly new. Catastrophe has been a part of the cinema almost from the beginning. The only real innovation (apart from some effects) was that, in many cases, the disaster itself was the thrust of the movie. Prior to that, the disaster tended to come at a climactic point in the overall story. The collectors' edition of Cracked magazine shown here was one of my prized possessions as a young'n. I did myself in the year after I got it because it was in a folder of school papers I was hiding from my mother (bad grades and chiding remarks from teachers written on them!) One day I threw the folder away to get rid of the "evidence" and left the magazine in there!! Karma's a bitch... Anyway, today's post will shine a light on some movies long before the era I mention. You may be surprised at some of the people who aren't named Charlton Heston and George Kennedy who were put through their disastrous paces in the cinema! 

There was a 5-minute short in 1901 called Fire!, which depicted firemen fighting a blazing house and rescuing a victim and that is likely the very first example of a "disaster movie." Soon enough, there were more elaborate examples. Take the one above, a half-hour silent German film called In Night and Ice, depicting part of the then-fresh Titanic tragedy! For its time, this was a remarkable accomplishment. The wire operator in the lower pic is standing in rising water.

Denmark weighed in in 1916 with The End of the World, all about a comet headed for Earth which threatens to level the place.

As these films were silent, they could be shown worldwide and only have the title cards adjusted in order to get their entertainment value across.

Though the poster for Noah's Ark (1928) focuses on The Great Flood of the Bible, the movie itself told parallel stories; one concerning the flood and another taking place during WWI. Though touted as a Vitaphone release, dialogue was limited as movies began to transition from silent to sound. There was music, though, sound effects. 

With or without sound, the spectacle of the movie (directed by the famous Michael Curtiz!) thrilled audiences.

The flood scenes were eye-popping then and remain so now. Unfortunately, there were really no rules in places regarding stunts and safety and three extras drowned for real during the onslaught of water!

One thing these early disaster efforts had, which few 1970s ones did, is a level of beefcake! Noah's Ark featured the glorious George O'Brien in abbreviated period clothing. You can see and read much more about Ark (and its actors) right here!

On the subject of floods, there is also 1933's Deluge.

In it, a tsunami blasts its way into New York City! Again, for its time, this was highly arresting imagery for a moviegoer.

Peggy Shannon and Sidney Blackmer are among a few folks who are able to make their way to higher ground during the event. Blackmer is a name who pops up more than anticipated along the way during this post. If you're newer to this place than 2012, you'll want to read about the 1973 version of this tale!

Hollywood turned to ancient Italian history and the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius for The Last Days of Pompeii (1935.)

The spectacle encompasses the crucifixion of Jesus Christ (with Basil Rathbone as Pontius Pilate) along with gladiatorial games before capping off with a shattering volcanic eruption.

The gladiator events take place in the shadow of a massive, naked statue!

Husky Preston Foster is the put-upon protagonist. The same material was done in a star-filled 1984 miniseries by the same name with gorgeous Nicholas Clay among the cast.

1936 brought a truly classic example to the screen. Clark "The King" Gable, Jeannette MacDonald and Spencer Tracy headlined San Francisco.

Gable played a troubled saloon keeper in love with an opera singer (MacDonald) who's slumming as a night club performer. Priest Tracy tries to steer things in the right direction.

The personal drama of the leads provides most of the movie's run time, but everything comes to a personal head right when the famed 1906 earthquake rattles the city to its core. Tracy's screen time didn't even amount to 15 minutes, yet he was nominated for a Best Actor Oscar...!

Even now the sequences of buildings and walls collapsing as people scramble for their lives is captivating to behold.

The considerable success of MGM's San Francisco inspired 20th century Fox to put their hat in the ring with a different historical calamity. In Old Chicago (1937) had its participants embroiled in a variety of personal complications, culminating in the great Chicago fire of 1871.

Early on, Fox wanted to borrow Clark Gable and Jean Harlow for the film, but Harlow fell ill and died, with Alice Faye inheriting the part. The director Henry King pulled for Tyrone Power to take over the role Gable had been sought for. Don Ameche rounded out the love triangle of the story.

Power and Ameche played brothers, both of who were sons of one Mrs. O'Leary, who (untrue) legend had it was the cause of the fire when her cow kicked over a lantern, sparking the blaze. Cosmopolitan comic actress Alice Brady did a 180-turn in the drama and took home an Oscar for her trouble.

The eye-filling spectacle depicting one of America's most famous catastrophes was the most expensive motion picture made up to that time.

Also in 1937 was John Ford's The Hurricane. Passion and turmoil on a South Sea island culminate in one incredible effects sequence at near the end.

As I mentioned earlier, some of these early disaster films provided a level of handsome beefcake not often found in the later ones. Jon Hall made a splash. Thomas Mitchell, seen at left, continued the trend of these sort of movies being noticed at awards season. He was nominated as Best Supporting Actor for The Hurricane.

Top-billed was young Dorothy Lamour, Paramount's "Sarong Girl," on loan to Samuel Goldwyn for this movie.

Goldwyn's "gift" wasn't just for women, I'm sure! Hall had actually been kicking around under different names for a few years in quite a few movies until this film put him on the map.

By now there was a winning formula with these types of movies. Toss some stars together with romantic entanglements and various dramatic situations, all brought to a head by Mother Nature. The Rains Came (1939) was a perfect example of this.

Although Myrna Loy (on loan from MGM) was top-billed, the film was tailored for 20th Century Fox's new superstar Tyrone Power. He played an Indian doctor whose future is threatened by his love for a married socialite.

Loy was alluring as said socialite and gave a great performance in the film. She and George Brent were among the many who struggle to survive in the wake of torrential rains and an earthquake, followed by a flood and then a resultant cholera epidemic!

The movie's terrific special effects (not wholly demonstrated by this soggy lobby card) won the first ever Oscar given for them. A color remake came forth in 1955 called The Rains of Ranchipur, which you may read all about right here!

While not a "disaster film" by any means, 1940's Foreign Correspondent included a thrilling mid-ocean airplane crash among its set pieces.

Joel McCrea, as the title character, and Larraine Day find themselves involved in all sorts of intrigue.

 

Eventually they find themselves aboard an airplane that has been shot down and begins heading for the ocean!

The often-innovative director Alfred Hitchcock had his effects people rig up a startling  moment in which the plane's windshield was destroyed by the impact of the water. (In actuality, increasingly close shots of the ocean were projected onto rice paper, which was then blasted with water from jets at the correct time.)

The survivors have to scramble out onto the top of the plane to await rescue as punishing waves beat against the ravaged vessel.

As the ability to create more and more elaborate special effects increased, movies continued to feature pulse-pounding sequences which placed the stars in danger. Green Dolphin Street (1947) had a memorable earthquake segment along with a flash flood, earning an Oscar for its effects.

An atypically brunette Lana Turner was near her most beguiling in the lengthy, but captivating, movie. I wrote about this one in-depth about a decade ago right here.

Another real-life disaster was dramatized when 1953 brought Titanic to the screen again, this time in full-length, star-encrusted splendor.

I can recall watching this one on TV as a tyke and being enthralled (as well as stunned by some of the goings on at the end, including who did and did not make it off the ship before it sank.)

I had to share this hooty promotional pic of the stars Clifton Webb and Barbara Stanwyck. Nothing like this moment occurs in the finished film. Stanwyck was in night clothes with her hair down with the trouble began!

A few years later, a more docudrama-like approach to the same calamity came courtesy of

A Night to Remember (1958.) Relying less on star personalities and with an eye towards greater accuracy, it has retained a strong reputation (though all such films make changes for dramatic purposes.)

Tucker McGuire, an American actress living in England, portrayed the famous Molly Brown. (The director claimed that she was the only cast member in the thing who gave him any trouble! Maybe she wound up taking her role's rebellious streak to heart.)

Despite its strong reputation, the movie was under-rewarded with accolades at the time. The screenplay earned a sole BAFTA nomination, though it did win a Golden Globe for Best English-Speaking Foreign Film.

The artwork for this poster is quite tacky. Was a young Anita Ekberg on the Titanic?!

In-between the Titanic movies came 1954's The High and the Mighty, an airplane in distress yarn that was a massive hit and resulted in many award nominations. Rights issues kept this one out of the public eye for quite some time until it finally resurfaced in 2005 after an extensive restoration.

Having cut my teeth on all those delirious Airport movies of the 1970s, I can recall being hideously disappointed in Mighty when I finally got to see it after all those years in dry dock. It's really just an in-flight drama with the "threat" of disaster. Here, an agitated Sidney Blackmer holds several people at bay.

Watching it again, years later, with much lowered expectations, I found I could enjoy it as a well-crafted drama with some interesting performances (as well as some annoying ones!) This poster is so bizarre, though. So many of the people look like contortionists!

Among the many distraught passengers are John Smith and Karen Sharpe. They play newlyweds whose terror drives them into each other's clutching arms. This was later parodied in Airplane! (1980) which ramped it up with a frightened couple getting it on in their seats...!

Airliner-in-distress films became a staple of the cinema with Zero Hour! (1957), Crash Landing (1958) and The Crowded Sky (1960) being only a few examples, each of them given tribute here. This poster is from Jet Over the Atlantic (1958.)

In it, George Raft is transporting an extradited prisoner who steals his gun in a hijack attempt. Meanwhile, toxic gas escapes from another troubled passenger's case and disables the flight crew, causing panic and the need for an emergency landing.

Even handsome Guy Madison found himself (along with squeeze Virginia Mayo) in the "will they or won't they land" genre. He plays the prisoner in the film, who claims to be innocent of the crime in question.

Finally, I give you The Devil at 4 O'Clock (1961), which starred Frank Sinatra and San Francisco's Spencer Tracy. The disparate collection of people are forced to flee when a volcano erupts.

The film had Sinatra playing one of three convicts who find themselves pressed into work on a French Polynesian island. Anyone recognize the black gentleman in the middle of this lobby card? He later was part of a hit 1970s police show.

Tracy had long ago declined to work any more with Clark Gable due to issues with billing and even now in 1961, the only way Sinatra could get him to costar with him was if Tracy received top-billing...

Handsome Kerwin Matthews was also on board as a fellow priest of Tracy's.

At one point, a group of stragglers has to cross a crumbling, dilapidated bridge under which a searing hot flow of lava is traveling... This scenario was later repeated in one of the last 1970's disaster movies made, the woeful When Time Ran Out... (1980.) There are few original ideas in Hollywood. The volcano movie Krakatoa, East of Java (1969) was a dress rehearsal for what would wind up being a decade of many movies focusing on catastrophe.

And lest I forget, the man with Sinatra in that earlier lobby card was Bernie Hamilton, who later costarred on Starsky and Hutch as the no-nonsense Captain Dobey. In his younger days, he was a very fit performer, portraying athletes and even serenading Ann Blyth in 1955's Kismet.

A nightclub owner and music producer/performer, he turned most of his attention in that direction once Starsky was canceled.  With that, we'll close until next time!