No Highway (1951)

Director:

Henry Koster

Writers:

Nevil Shute (novel)
R.C. Sherriff (writer) ...

Release Date:

21 September 1951 (USA)

Genre:

Drama | Thriller

Tagline:

EXCITEMENT and SUSPENSE 18,000 Feet Over the Atlantic!

Plot:

An aeronautical engineer predicts that a new model of plane will fail catastrophically and in a novel manner after a specific number flying hours.

Plot Keywords:

Metal Fatigue | Beautiful Woman | Actor | Airplane | Aviation

Cast

James Stewart	...	Theodore Honey
Marlene Dietrich	...	Monica Teasdale
Glynis Johns	...	Marjorie Corder
Jack Hawkins	...	Dennis Scott
Janette Scott	...	Elspeth Honey
Elizabeth Allan	...	Shirley Scott
Ronald Squire	...	Sir John, Director
Jill Clifford	...	Peggy, Stewardess

Also Known As:

No Highway in the Sky (USA)

Runtime:

USA:98 min

Country:

UK | USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Recording)

Certification:

UK:U (original rating) | Finland:S | Sweden:Btl | USA:Approved (PCA #14864)

Filming Locations:

Denham Studios, Denham, Buckinghamshire, England, UK

Company:

Twentieth Century-Fox Productions

Trivia:

The concept of an airliner suffering catastrophic failure due to metal fatigue after a certain number of flight cycles, as outlined in the 1948 novel and this 1951 film, came true with the failures of the de Havilland Comet in 1954. There are a number of eerie parallels between the fictional account and the later actual events.

Quotes:

Theodore Honey: You're talking about me because of what I did in Gander, and this isn't personal, I didn't invent the mathematics that made me believe what I did and I still believe in my work, test or no test. And when you believe in something, that's what you've got to do isn't it...

Movie Connections:

Featured in Boom! Hollywood's Greatest Disaster Movies (2000) (V)

An Underated Inteligent Thriller

This movie is one of the few films about airplane disasters that really goes into the fundementals of design and construction problems. For it deals with metal fatigue, and how it causes an apparently marvelous airplane to become a death trap. The film is well written and acted by Jimmy Steward, Glynis Johns, Marlene Dietrich, and Jack Hawkins. There is nothing to say about that. I only feel that it is interesting to think of the author of the screenplay, Nevil Shute.

His real name was Nevil Shute Norway. He is remembered for his writing, in particular the novels A TOWN NAMED ALICE and ON THE BEACH. But he was also an aviation engineer. Working for Vickers, he helped design all types of aircraft. In particular, he helped in the building of the zeppelin R-100 which Vickers designed in a contest between private industry and the government. A Labor government in office was trying to demonstrate the superiority of government sponsored projects over private industry. The R-100 proved a perfectly adequate zeppelin, that did a maiden trip to and from Canada safely. The government sponsored R-101 crashed on its first voyage in France, and killed 44 out of 48 men on board, including the Secretary of State for Air, Lord Thomson (who had pushed the project) and most of the government's aviation experts. Shute wrote a very good account of his career as an engineer, and of the R-101 Tragedy, entitled SLIDE-RULE. I recommend reading it if you ever get a chance. It helps explain the experience he brought to the writing of NO HIGHWAY.