Paul Newman, Steve McQueen, Faye Dunaway, William Holden, Fred Astaire, OJ Simpson. Dir. John Guillerman, 1974, Fox/WB
7 lbs. of Movies #1I love The Towering Inferno. Close to uncritically. That ought to be said upfront. It is an artifact from my childhood, an object of fascination for me, a blockbuster hit movie, #1 US box office in '74, at the dawn of my movie mania. A year later, Jaws, a movie of which I was very much aware, as was every American in the summer of '75, it seemed, would be #1 for the year. Towering Inferno was everywhere as I moved from first to second grade. Mad Magazine did a parody, we talked about it on the playground, and I think it just fascinated me. Disaster movies, which are basically wrath-of-God pictures in a less obviously biblical context, have always exerted a hold on me. Always young for my age, I held onto some basic idea of God as the Punisher-Judger well into adulthood, and I can't say I've entirely escaped that kind of thinking even now. I remember seeing TV spots for it and making a connection between this blazing skyscraper and Hell, a place which has long exerted an unhealthy fascination in my life.
All of which may explain one of my main reasons for enjoying both Towering Inferno and producer Irwin Allen's previous The Poseidon Adventure so much. Both movies use natural disasters' impact on mankind to deliver Old Testament-level moral judgments on our culture. The followers of the passive God all drown. In Towering Inferno, the first two bodies to catch fire and plummet into the abyss - both captured in gorgeous, loving slo-mo by Allen, himself - belong to the oily PR Man, played by Robert Wagner, who's conducting an illicit, probably adulterous, affair with his secretary. He runs into a blazing room to rescue her and turns into human bbq, putting himself out with the winds of a 120-story plunge, while she shatters a window for fresh air, blithely oblivious to the principle of drafts and gets torched as an added bonus whilst being sucked into the night. They're the first, most gruesome deaths of the picture, and the moral could not be more clear. The movie basically offs all the corrupt and sinful cast members and spares the do-gooders, principally architect Paul Newman and SFFD Chief Steve McQueen. The corrupt electrical engineer who shorted the wiring which causes the fire, played as a glotiously upperclass sleazeball by Richard Chamberlain? Oh yeah, he's going out a window.
I don't particularly agree with a fair amount of Allen's moralizing. It's easy enough to condemn a corrupt electrical engineer, want him to pay, but in real life I don't think he ought to plummet to his death from the blazing monument to his own vanity. I particularly disagree with the sexual moralizing. On the other hand, Allen also kills off Jennifer Jones, whose only sin is firgiving Fred Astaire for being an inept con man. Unless Allen's saying Jones dies because only God firgives, I have to think Allen also kills off popular and sympathetic chaeacters, because good stories of this kind always do. One could say it remains true to the Old Testament idea in that the Bible says God's hands are red with the blood of sacrifice, which works out as true here. Jennifer Jones dies, but the kids she shepherded through the inferno, including Brady Bunch's Mike Lookinland. She saves Bobby Brady - she had done her bit for the planet!
All of which may explain one of my main reasons for enjoying both Towering Inferno and producer Irwin Allen's previous The Poseidon Adventure so much. Both movies use natural disasters' impact on mankind to deliver Old Testament-level moral judgments on our culture. The followers of the passive God all drown. In Towering Inferno, the first two bodies to catch fire and plummet into the abyss - both captured in gorgeous, loving slo-mo by Allen, himself - belong to the oily PR Man, played by Robert Wagner, who's conducting an illicit, probably adulterous, affair with his secretary. He runs into a blazing room to rescue her and turns into human bbq, putting himself out with the winds of a 120-story plunge, while she shatters a window for fresh air, blithely oblivious to the principle of drafts and gets torched as an added bonus whilst being sucked into the night. They're the first, most gruesome deaths of the picture, and the moral could not be more clear. The movie basically offs all the corrupt and sinful cast members and spares the do-gooders, principally architect Paul Newman and SFFD Chief Steve McQueen. The corrupt electrical engineer who shorted the wiring which causes the fire, played as a glotiously upperclass sleazeball by Richard Chamberlain? Oh yeah, he's going out a window.
I don't particularly agree with a fair amount of Allen's moralizing. It's easy enough to condemn a corrupt electrical engineer, want him to pay, but in real life I don't think he ought to plummet to his death from the blazing monument to his own vanity. I particularly disagree with the sexual moralizing. On the other hand, Allen also kills off Jennifer Jones, whose only sin is firgiving Fred Astaire for being an inept con man. Unless Allen's saying Jones dies because only God firgives, I have to think Allen also kills off popular and sympathetic chaeacters, because good stories of this kind always do. One could say it remains true to the Old Testament idea in that the Bible says God's hands are red with the blood of sacrifice, which works out as true here. Jennifer Jones dies, but the kids she shepherded through the inferno, including Brady Bunch's Mike Lookinland. She saves Bobby Brady - she had done her bit for the planet!
I love Allen's movies and I chortle along with their obvious morals, their relentless faith in cause&effect, I think because Allen does it with such confidence and conviction. This, he says, is the moral universe of my movies. Accept that or see other movies. I admire the way he judges harshly - if unpleasant it feels truthful from him. Even in the 1970s, his pictures must have seemed so charming in their simplistic clarity.
Big building catches fire, bad people all die badly. Boom. It's simplistic, it's rigid, it's silly. It's also economical, and it sells.
It sells because it works. Like the forthcoming Star Wars, like Jaws, the visual and other effects were complex, but the story, the premise, and its execution are dead simple and straight ahead linear storytelling. Group A trapped here. Fire there. Get Group A from here away from there and away from fire. Fire is now here. Here also is corrupt developer. Burn developer, fire. Burn, burn. It's that simplistic. In a sense, it's pablum. But it works.
It works because it's an artifact, and something of an icon, of its time. In a number of significant ways. It's Hollywood firing on all cylinders to make a nearly perfect popcorn picture with an A-list cast, a name crew, and Oscar aspirations. It's also a last gasp of the Old Hollywood blockbuster.
It sells because it works. Like the forthcoming Star Wars, like Jaws, the visual and other effects were complex, but the story, the premise, and its execution are dead simple and straight ahead linear storytelling. Group A trapped here. Fire there. Get Group A from here away from there and away from fire. Fire is now here. Here also is corrupt developer. Burn developer, fire. Burn, burn. It's that simplistic. In a sense, it's pablum. But it works.
It works because it's an artifact, and something of an icon, of its time. In a number of significant ways. It's Hollywood firing on all cylinders to make a nearly perfect popcorn picture with an A-list cast, a name crew, and Oscar aspirations. It's also a last gasp of the Old Hollywood blockbuster.
It also works by finding a way to develop the bone-simplicity of the premise into an ensemble drama telling a number of character-driven stories. In the Heat of the Night writer Sterling Silliphant's screenplay is a modern marvel, allowing character development, always occurring between pairs of actors, to tell the story rather than declamatory and expository dialogue. At 165 minutes, Allen allows Silliphant's screenplay time and space to tell the story by telling many characters' stories, so unlike what we call action movies today.
By 1975, big studios financed only a handful of projects themselves, mainly distributing independent producers like Roger Corman's Concord & New World Pictures, or working through stars' production companies, like Clint Eastwood's Malpaso at Warner Bros. Those few movies tended to be A-pictures, the stuff they hoped to see on the red carpet on Oscar Night, or that simply screamed can't-miss-mega-hit, or both, in the case of high-end actioners like Towering Inferno.
Inerno gives a clinic on how Hollywood used to make blockbusters. A-list cast, veteran director, flamboyant producer, great effects and set pieces, longer running time, big ass budgets. A year later, the #1 US picture, Jaws, cost no more, used a lesser-wattage ensemble cast, and changed the look and sensibility of the major-studio blockbuster almost overnight. A year after Jaws, 1976, the #1 movie, Rocky, cost barely $1M, and starred virtual unknown Sylvester Stallone. Though Hollywood financed more Allen pictures, and Euro-stuff like A Bridge Too Far, the established style takes a bow here, in what surely qualifies as Allen's magnum opus.
It's apt that Inferno embodies an end, or close to it, of that tradition, as Irwin Allen's reputation in Hollywood was for being the last of the old-time mega-producers like Cecil B. DeMille, who specialized in uniting all the elements of filmmaking in epic projects which seem to exist as an act of the will. Allen had scored with The Poseidon Adventure, but had also been known as a TV producer of Lost in Space, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, and Land of the Giants in the '60s. Starting at Poseidon Adventure, he became known as "Master of Disaster" for producing Earthquake and the Airport franchise in addition to Poseidon and Inferno. He never succeeded quite as he did on The Towering Inferno.
By 1975, big studios financed only a handful of projects themselves, mainly distributing independent producers like Roger Corman's Concord & New World Pictures, or working through stars' production companies, like Clint Eastwood's Malpaso at Warner Bros. Those few movies tended to be A-pictures, the stuff they hoped to see on the red carpet on Oscar Night, or that simply screamed can't-miss-mega-hit, or both, in the case of high-end actioners like Towering Inferno.
Inerno gives a clinic on how Hollywood used to make blockbusters. A-list cast, veteran director, flamboyant producer, great effects and set pieces, longer running time, big ass budgets. A year later, the #1 US picture, Jaws, cost no more, used a lesser-wattage ensemble cast, and changed the look and sensibility of the major-studio blockbuster almost overnight. A year after Jaws, 1976, the #1 movie, Rocky, cost barely $1M, and starred virtual unknown Sylvester Stallone. Though Hollywood financed more Allen pictures, and Euro-stuff like A Bridge Too Far, the established style takes a bow here, in what surely qualifies as Allen's magnum opus.
It's apt that Inferno embodies an end, or close to it, of that tradition, as Irwin Allen's reputation in Hollywood was for being the last of the old-time mega-producers like Cecil B. DeMille, who specialized in uniting all the elements of filmmaking in epic projects which seem to exist as an act of the will. Allen had scored with The Poseidon Adventure, but had also been known as a TV producer of Lost in Space, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, and Land of the Giants in the '60s. Starting at Poseidon Adventure, he became known as "Master of Disaster" for producing Earthquake and the Airport franchise in addition to Poseidon and Inferno. He never succeeded quite as he did on The Towering Inferno.
If Towering Inferno signals the end of an era, it also seeded the successive generation in some ways. Murray Hamilton's craven Mayor Vaughn in Jaws directly echoes Bill Holden as builder James Duncan, who downplays the fire's danger. That character, the corporate/public-official whose denials/myopia precipitate the human calamity, became a standard trope for all disaster-type movies. Premeiring six months after Inferno, Jaws was distinguished in no small part by John Williams' score. Few mention Inferno's score, but it's also an effective Williams composition.
Allen, who seldom if ever directed his disaster movies, did direct the action sequences in his pictures, employing separate cinematographers for action and narrative scenes. Sterling Silliphant married two separate novels concerning skyscraper fires into one cohesive whole by telling the story as a series of smaller stories, each involving two main characters. Newman & McQueen, Newman & Holden, Holden & Chamberlain, Chamberlain & Susan Blakely, Astaire and Jennifer Jones. In Hollywood lore, a picture with two DPs, two directors, and two different sets of source material is six steps closer to confused flop. Allen, however, ably reconciles all the film's dualities into one fast-paced, affecting actioner.
In this he's ably abetted by John Guillermin, a British director best known for war classics The Blue Max and The Bridge at Remagen. Guillermin directs in a classical style, his frames always composed such that character placement and body position in a scene reinforce its dramatic tone, always using extras moving in deep background to suggest the scale of a setting (a preferred technique of Howard Hawks.) Guillermin here follows up on Silliphant's pairs-structure by composing this epic story as almost a series of two-shots. Shot against a large canvas, Inferno feels like a remarkably intimate disaster epic. Guillermin had a reputation Joss Whedon is battling at the moment, as a dominating, tyrannical, wildly insecure and abrasive director. Indeed, I've always wondered if the film director in Exorcist's film-within-a-film, the drunken Nazi-baiter, weren't inspired by Guillermin, who even resembles the actor in The Exorcist. After 1976's King Kong, however, Guillermin's pictures fared poorly at the box office abd he and his personal style were shown the door in Hollywood. He finished his career doing low budget TV and features work. Towering Inferno marks his career high point, and it's a real achievement. Not many filmmakers get to say their picture was #1 for the year. If Allen's name and rep outshines Guillermin, it's the latter who assembled Allen's sequences with his narrative scenes to create a workable whole. Towering Inferno argues this is not a directorial skill to downplay.
Fred Astaire received his only Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his turn as an inept conman running the grift on wealthy widow Jennifer Jones. It's a lovely performance, filled with interesting and even self-referential choices. Seeing the star known for being a rail-thin hoofer regard himself sidelong in the mirror, checking his belly, and the way Astaire uses movement and body position to define a character make again-unexpected bits of business for an action movie.
At the time I fell in love with this film, I didn't know Old Hollywood well enough to recognize Jennifer Jones as the Best Actress winner for The Song of Bernadette or for her legendary western, Duel in the Sun. I've still not seen those, but I've caught some of her early leads and supporting roles so it was another Golden Age connection to appreciate this time around. Allen's unsympathetic end for her character sounds the film's harshest note, though Astaire's character, given her survivibg cat at the end, may only be redeemed by her death. It depends on how a viewer feels about Astaire as to whether her sacrifice is worth it.
I'm in danger of turning this writeup into a series of one-graf blurbs on each cast member. That sounds boring. It cannot stop me from declaring that Faye Dunaway represents Allen's one real misstep, in that the part, as Newman's career-minded fiancee, is never particularly developed and could have been played as well by a number of lesser talents. I savor every second she's onscreen even as I bewail how little she gets to say/do. Inferno didn't hurt her career, but it's not a highlight role, regardless of the film's success.
Many movies fail their hype. Many more movies fail to be the spectacle, the transcendant experience, into which the child-me built certain films. Towering Inferno is a big one of those, a huge hit just on the dawn of my fandom. Towering Inferno, unlike many of those titles, not only stands up over time, it's a richer experience for what I bring to it.
The first time I saw it I couldn't have been older than 12. It ran as a Saturday Movie, on NBC, I think, and Mom&Dad adjudged my brother and I old enough to stay up until it ended, a big deal. By that time I was already a sophisticated enough viewer to know some movies that looked awesome in trailers fell somewhat short of awesome as whole movies. Towering Inferno lived up to, indeed exceeded, all the mythos I piled up around it. That made it not only great, but special.
My second viewing is key, for I found myself more impressed. I caught it on cable in the mid-'90s, made it the focal point of my night, and it delivered again. By '95 I had seen more of Newman and McQueen's work, understood who Fred Astaire was, had a better sense of its place in '70s filmmaking, and thought it an easy film to admire. It stood up. Because it worked. Still does.
I keep an eye out for all sorts of pictures, for all sorts of reasons, and Towering Inferno is one I've sought especially in the last few years. I have an affinity for these movies that were a Thing right before I understood things sometimes were also Things. Towering Inferno earns its Thingness.
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