Alain Delon’s last attempt at American stardom. This film dashed any further hopes and, whilst it was at it, killed off one of the most successful franchises of the 70s: two birds with one stone. All the Airport films are ‘producer’ films,’ exercises in packaging stars and concept with an eye firmly on the box-office. Jennings Lang, the agent who was shot in the balls by Walter Wanger for having an affair with his wife, Joan Bennett, produced this sleazy, low-rent one, based on his own idea. It’s clearly an attempt to cash in on the Concorde trans-Atlantic flights which had recently started service. The plot is no sillier than that of any of the other Airport films but the cast is decidedly less stellar: an attempt to exploit Sylvia Krystel’s recent soft-core porn stardom in the Emmanuelle films, lots of names one was then mostly familiar with from television (Robert Wagner, Susan Blakely, Jimmy Walker, Charo, John Davidson, Eddie Albert), dressed up with a high prestige/ second division and no box-office selection (Bibi Anderson, Cicely Tyson, Mercedes McCambridge, Sybil Danning, David Warner). David Lowell Rich was known for directing Lana Turner in Madame X and lots of TV movies in this period. This is as visually inept but even less fun, with shoddy special effects and no flair for the funny. Sylvia Krystel complained of misogyny on the set. It’s evidenced in the film also. A tawdry and cheapening work, it was nonetheless a big hit, making 65 million on a 14 million budget. Yet it’s so bad it killed off the franchise anyway. Pourquoi Alain? Pourquoi?