Murder on Flight 502

This is well worth watching for its all star cast. It's like "Airport" and other 70s disaster films but on a tight budget. Aaron Spelling was one of the executive producers, and he once again proved that he knew how to give the public what it wanted. No one will confuse this film with art, but it's good for what it is - an entertaining, fun TV movie.

Back in the 70's all the major networks would put out these made-for-TV movies, usually featuring a collection of unknowns and a good number of well known actors and actresses and for the most part they were always enjoyable, even though they were't as sophisticated or as big budget as a major motion picture. This movie was no exception. I stumbled across it on a DVD and for $2 figured it was worth a look see. I can't remember if I ever watched in on TV in the 70's, but it brought back memories of enjoyable enough nights in the living room watching the set.

This is probably most notable for a pre-Charlie's Angels performance from a very lovely Farrah Fawcett as a stewardess on a flight from New York to London that has a murderer on board. In some ways it's rather preposterous. There are far too many coincidences - far too many people in the First Class section who just happened to know each other and have grievances with each other. The intent was obviously to give a large stable of possible suspects to keep the viewer guessing. In some ways it didn't work. I had the murderer figured out pretty early, and if you didn't figure it out well before it was revealed then you missed something pretty obvious. Mind you, the same could be said for the plot twist involving Fawcett's character at the end, and that took me off guard. I also couldn't figure out why the man who tried to kill singer Jack Marshall (played by Sonny Bono) is never restrained, but ends up back in First Class with his wife as if nothing had happened - he just tried to kill a guy with a knife!

This was clearly made by Aaron Spelling as lightly entertaining TV mystery to keep people occupied for a couple of hours in front of their TV screens. With folks like Robert Stack, Walter Pidgeon, Danny Bonaduce, etc., it's pretty good fun. 6/10

When watching this movie, don't watch it for suspense, or character development, or even for the mystery. This is a "make your own fun" movie. You can watch it in the Mystery Science Theater 3000 style, making fun of it as you go. You can watch it to spot all of the stars (at the time). Or you could watch it to find out what Airplane! was making fun of so much; this movie seems to have provided most of it. The pure dated-ness of this film makes it so easy to make fun of. Can you remember a time when a smoking box in an airport lounge was treated fairly lightly?

But don't hate this movie because it's, well, bad; praise it for its badness. This is one of those movies that is good to watch because it's horribly done. The acting is horrible, the script is horrible, the story is horrible. The only thing that was done right was the casting, but, as we're seeing so much these days, a good cast can't save a movie. But a good sense of humor can. Which is why I give this movie a fairly high grade: if you enjoy pretending to be a sillouette in front of a giant movie screen, you'll like this movie.

If you've seen Airplane!, enjoyed Airplane! and perhaps wondered where Airplane! got some of its inspiration from, check out Murder on Flight 502. My brother found it for the astounding price of one dollar American, and for that single bill you get Robert Stack, Farrah Fawcett, Sonny Bono, and...Danny Bonaduce? Oh, but yes. And there's more.

As the film tepidly moves along, begging you to find the murderer among the passengers before anyone is actually murdered, you'll be treated to outrageous mid-70's fashion (brown is IN!), bizarre character backgrounds, and the hottest burgeoning romance this side of Harold and Maude, an elderly Jewish woman and an elderly Methodist known only as Uncle Charlie. "Ah...I know half the story already!" says the elderly woman slyly after Uncle Charlie introduces himself, and believe me, you will know every sundry detail of Uncle Charlie's hard knock life, even though it's probably better that you didn't.

You will see Sonny Bono sing, and you will realize why Cher was much better on her own. Robert Stack will make Bruce Willis in Die Hard look bad with his endless barrage of hard-boiled, sarcastic one-liners. But most of all, you will figure out who the murderer is, and you will be satisfied when they get their comeuppance.

No, there is no singing stewardess, no jive-talkers, no inflatable auto-pilot, no Leslie Neilsen. But unless you are unable to mock the earnest, but futile work of many to make a taut murder mystery shot almost entirely on a plane full of large, orange seats, you will like Murder on Flight 502. I promise.

What a cast that has been assembled as only Aaron Spelling can do! the dialogue is so corny and played so seriously, you'll be howling. The best exchanges are between a drunk Polly Bergen and a very sober Fernando Lamas. The sets are really almost "Plan 9 From Outer Space" level. The "VIP lounge" at the airport was probably a baggage office at LAX and the plane, well, the budget was only enough to show the first class section, so all you see are big blankets/curtains covering the entrances to the rest of the plane and several references by Captain Stack to the "hundreds of people back there."

The upstairs lounge of the plane is decorated in what appears to be outdoor patio furniture and during the course of the film, the scariest looking cheese and crackers fester along the back of the wall uneaten by these high-falutin' jet-setters who spout inane dialogue as the viewer tries to wade through the red herrings and Farrah's cocktail service.

The whodunnit wraps up quickly, of course. Suprises? No. Laughs? Yes!

The $5.00 DVD I got of this in the Best Buy junk pile is covered in Farrah's photos and the DVD even includes a "Farrah Quiz" at the end that even your mother could not flunk. Thanks to Barry Diller and Spelling/Goldberg for making these tacky ABC "Movies of the Week" in the 70's and for someone actually mastering these DVD coasters that provide some of us with a hilarious flashback to our youth.