Concorde Affaire '79 (1979)

A reporter tries to stop the crash of an aircraft after uncovering an airline's plot to save their business by sabotaging Concorde flights and have them decommissioned.

Director:

Ruggero Deodato (as Roger Deodato)

Writers:

Alberto Fioretti (story), Renzo Genta (adaptation)

Stars:

James Franciscus, Mimsy Farmer, Venantino Venantini

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
James Franciscus	...	Moses Brody
Mimsy Farmer	...	Jean Beneyton
Venantino Venantini	...	Forsythe
Fiamma Maglione	...	Nicole Brody (as Mag Fleming)
Edmund Purdom	...	Danker
Francisco Charles	...	George (as 'Francisco' Charles)
Francesco Carnelutti	...	Co-Pilot - 2nd Concorde
Ottaviano Dell'Acqua	...	John - Forsythe's Henchman
Aldo Barberito	...	Priest - 2nd Concorde
Roberto Santi	...	Navigator - Second Concorde
Maria D'Incoronato	...	Woman Passenger with Bearded Father - 2nd Concorde
Renzo Marignano	...	Martinez - Milland's Advisor
Renato Cortesi	...	Journalist
Giovanni Battista Felici
Maria D'Alessandro	...	Hostess

Storyline

Reporter Moses Brody receives a phone-call from his ex-wife, a fellow reporter, who says he has a big story in the Antilles. When he arrives, she has been killed. While investigating her death, he comes across the case she was working on: a crashed Concorde airliner, sabotaged by an airline company whose South American business is jeopardized by the new Concorde airplanes. He digs deeper and finds that the stewardess survived the crash into the ocean, but she is being held by criminals who are blackmailing the company responsible for the crash. The crash site is kept hidden, however, and the authorities don't believe his story without the proper evidence. On his own, Brody attempts to rescue the stewardess from her captors, and while doing so, he discovers that another Concorde flight out of London has been sabotaged to crash in the same way. The two race against the clock to get the information to London and prevent the crash.

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Plot Keywords:

terrorism | concorde | reporter | airplane | scuba diver | 

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Genres:

Action | Crime | Thriller

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Details

Country:

Italy

Language:

Italian

Release Date:

23 March 1979 (Italy)

Also Known As:

The Concorde Affair

Filming Locations:

New York City, New York, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Dania Film, National Cinematografica

Technical Specs

Runtime:

96 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color (Eastmancolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Two years later, following this ripoff of Concorde: Airport '79, James Franciscus would star in the infamous Jaws ripoff, The Last Shark: both were Italian productions, and the Jaws and Airport films were both franchises.

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Quotes

Danker: Operation? The flight from Rio will have 100 persons on board. And you call this an operation? Why don't you call it by its real name?
Milland: You wanna hear its real name? Okay, Danker, I'll spell it for you: W-A-R, war.
Milland: Since time immemorial, nations have been sacrificing hundreds of millions of human lives to protect their "interests". Well, we too, are a nation; a multi-national state. Our citizens? Our workers, employees, technicians and shareholders. The shareholders, gentlemen! And it is our ...
[...]

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Connections

Referenced in The Dark Side of Porn: Debbie Does Dallas Uncovered (2005)

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Soundtracks

Nydia
Written by Charles Denis Frantz
Arranged by Marius Cultier

User Reviews

a fun action/drama flick with amusing cast and special effects

I finally managed to track down copy of this CONCORDE: AIRPORT 79 cash-in directed by the the violence-obsessed Ruggero Deodato. I'm surprised this flick doesn't come up in discussion more often since it does have a pretty fantastic cast and crew and a pretty good storyline too.

Joseph Cotten and Edmund Purdom are big New York executives who are informed that the Concorde has failed numerous safety checks, yet they have them fly anyway. Right away of course, a Concorde crashes into the Carribbean Sea leaving a stewardess (Mimsy Farmer) as the only survivor. Of course she is first picked up by some members of an international mob (including Richard Raymond and Venantino Venantini). They demand a million dollars ransom for the girl to the hotshot executives, who respond by unleashing their hit men on everyone who knows about the crash in a vain attempt to cover it up. Enter James Franciscus as the heroic journalist who steps in and rescues the stewardess from the mobsters and barely gets her to the authorities in time to learn a second Concorde (piloted by Van Johnson!) is experiencing similar trouble and may also crash if she doesn't remember what caused her flight trouble. Turns out the mobsters were behind the whole thing and that they're all in a little over their heads.

This oddity certainly doesn't pack the best special effects I've seen (the Concorde footage is all either stock footage or cheesy little model airplanes), CONCORDE AFFAIR 79 still manages to be a lot of fun. There's murder, mobsters, & mayhem, and an underwater scubadiver fight or two. The cast is top notch, with even Robert Kerman dropping by as an air traffic controller who has to talk Mimsy Farmer to her senses at the end. Genre veterans may also recognise that same black guy from ZOMBIE and DOCTOR BUTCHER M.D. as one of the fishermen who rescues farmer and is promptly killed off. The photography, in this case by both Federico Zanni and Gianlorenzo Battaglia is pretty good, but fails to make the Godzilla movie-ish miniatures seem realistic. Stelvio Cipriani's musical score is about exactly usual for his work, yet adding a couple interesting new variations.

All in all, I think this flick was alright. It's totally rare and impossible to find in a decent quality print, but in my opinion it's well worth the effort tracking down.