The jet Efrem Zimbalist Jr.
character is flying is marked with the bright orange nose and tail markings.
Aircraft marked in this way are test aircraft and usually controlled by NASA.
When Mike picks up the phone in Kitty's apartment to make a call, the phone has no cord.
A mother lode of clichés mined by Jim Abrahams and the Zucker brothers for their 1980 classic, "Airplane," "The Crowded Sky" is entertaining in its own right. A shameless pastiche of flashbacks erupts when two planes find themselves on a collision course in the skies over the American heartland.
A decent cast, most likely under contract who couldn't say no, slogs through some wonderfully awful dialogue. Only a few of them even try to breathe life into their paper thin characters.
"The Crowded Sky" is an odd airplane disaster film. On one hand, I know darn well that the film has many flaws.
The mid-air collision is nothing compared to the personal dramas of the crew and passengers: terminal illness, unwanted pregnancy, unrequited love, infidelity, mental illness, nymphomania. This movie has it all, trashy soap,opera, a cast of has beens and even an Edsel.
Parts of this movie was really interesting and I was looking forward to seeing what happens next,then the scene shifts and moves on to something really lame and a bit stupid... The acting was the same way,you have some really good actors and then the scene shifts into some terrible acting.
Drama , emotion and tension in a hazardous voyage on a trans-airline flight . Disaster and nail-biting movie about a Navy jet and a commercial airliner heading for a mid air catastrophe , as passengers fasten your belts to a strong disaster .
"The Crowded Sky" joins "Zero Hour," "The High and the Mighty," and others as pre-"Airport" films. Like weddings and road trips, commercial flights make for stories that involve different subplots and characters, so this type of film is done fairly often.
To solve all your problems (or almost all of them) :feeling at peace with yourself (and with your son) ,making a declaration of love when you are shy and not very handsome,learning how to play a part your future career in Hollywood depends on,marrying the air hostess you're in love with,etc ,there is nothing like a good disaster!A crowded sky indeed!
I'm a film professor, and this is one that had me in knots because I appreciate it as an artifact but also cringe at its awkward elements. I'll say this much: after good old Ben Mankiewicz on TCM told us at the start that the two planes in the film are flying on a collision course toward each other, I could not turn it off without seeing where all its hokey characters ended up.
