Panique en plein ciel

One of many made-for-television clones of the hugely successful 70s "Airport" franchise. These are supposed to be disaster movies with a little bit of melodrama, but in reality, they are sappy and sentimental soap-opera dramas with just a tad bit of disaster movie processed into them. "Mayday at 40,000ft" has a great cast full of reliable names, and they all depict troubled characters with their own stories to tell. They're all united on a plane from LA to NY, with a short stop in snowy Salt Lake City to pick up an aggressive con artist with a silly hairdo. After a long wait of approximately 2/3 of the film, the convict eventually causes the mayhem by stealing the gun of the ailing Marshall (who's far too old to the job, anyway) and firing one bullet in the leg of the pilot, and another one in the plane's hydraulic system. "Mayday at 40,000ft" is never boring, but it could have used a bit faster pacing, more action, and a lot less heart-breaking dialogue. Worth checking out, for sure, in case you - like me - have a weakness for grumpy old men, like Ray Milland or Broderick Crawford.

Robert Butler directed this TV movie that stars David Janssen as Pilot Captain Pete Douglass, who is having a bad day; his wife is having an operation while he must fly a passenger jet in a snowstorm from an airport that is also carrying a dangerous prisoner(played by Marjoe Gortner) in a jail transfer who of course escapes and proceeds to shoot his stolen gun in the cabin, causing all kinds of trouble. Past Oscar winners Ray Milland and Broderick Crawford costar. Good cast cannot save clichéd and predictable film that doesn't generate much interest or suspense. Mostly just a TV version of one of the "Airport" films that were popular in the 1970's.

Captivating story and many good and very good actors, Good: David "The Fugitive" Janssen and Christopher "The Immortal" George. Very good: Ray Milland and, in particular, Broderick Crawford, the latter being an absolutely exceptional actor in other films. A nice presence, Margaret Blye. Another nice presence, Lynda Day George. A very convincing bad guy, Marjoe Gortner, also seen in "The Food of the Gods". The director Robert Butler directed many other films that made my childhood and adolescence happy, very successful series such as: "Bonanza", "The Untouchables", "The Twilight Zone", "The Fugitive", "The Invaders", "Mission : Impossible", "Columbo", "Moonlighting", "Midnight Caller".

This film is of the typical disaster films of the 70's; aircrafts that almost crash, hijacks, engine failures, terrorist acts and so on. The amazing thing about them is the great performances by great actors; in such films, we saw actors like Charlton Heston, George Kennedy, Jack Lemmon, Alain Delon, Christopher Lee and so on...

In this film, David Janssen in a great performance (one more time), as a man in his 40's that has his own problems in his life, and apart from that, he has a rendez-vous with the bullet of a prisoner that wants to escape. The film script limits the abilities of the actor to perform; however, the film is a pleasant adventure/drama.

5 out of 10.

I can imagine the pitch at the TV execs office went something like this

" You know what everyone watches at the cinema these days ? Disaster movies , so let`s get everyone out of the cinema back into the home with a disaster movie for TV "

" Great idea . We`ll get a well known TV actor and some Oscar winning actor everyone has forgotten about . How we gonna come up with a new slant on the genre ? "

" that`s easy we set it on a plane just like in AIRPORT except , except there`s a mad psycho killer aboard the plane . We could even get that crazy guy from EARTHQUAKE to play the psycho "

" With an idea and casting like that that there`s no way we can fail with this TV movie "

I beg to differ because as someone who`s seen MAYDAY AT 40,000 FEET it is a failure because someone forgot to write an interesting script