A typical Danzigers production creating bricks without straw with a noisy jazz score, a script by Brian Clemens and a surprisingly large cast of speaking parts liberally sprinkled with familiar faces ranging from intrepid girl reporter Pauline Yates (later Mrs Reginald Perrin on TV during the seventies) to Valentine Dyall as her boss (directing her from a tiny office while fighting a losing battle with an Irish accent).
4 Reviews
A bit limp, but you keep watching
lucyrfisher15 May 2020
Warning: Spoilers
It's one of those portmanteau movies, with stories linked by two young reporters. The girl has a miniature tape recorder in her handbag, though she never asks her subjects' permission to record - and never seems to transcribe the tape, either. (Movie reporters never take notes.)
The "human stories" of those waiting to see who has survived an air crash in the alps are variable. Some are crudely tear-jerking - the blind mother, and her daughter in law pretending "Susan's flight has been delayed". The young couple whose child awaits an operation that can only be performed by the surgeon who was on the plane.
But some are lifted by the actors - Nyree Dawn Porter as the pilot's wife who's just had her first baby, for example. Though would she be able to get up and fly to Switzerland the next day? (Note how babies are not left with their mothers but taken to a nursery - when did that change?) The displaced children waiting for their foster mother avoid mawkishness, and the matron of the (huge) children's institution convinces. (Didn't she run a women's hostel in Millions Like Us?)
The best "back story" is the ageing star of stage and screen whose faithful agent awaits her return. He boosts her to anyone who inquires. And think of the publicity! He is obviously in love with her, though he has a cosy relationship with his secretary which has gone on for years. Both of them are convincing and likeable.
The young reporters are somewhat drippy, and as for that ending - oh dear, oh dear! Never mind, Women's Lib would be along in about eight years.
The "human stories" of those waiting to see who has survived an air crash in the alps are variable. Some are crudely tear-jerking - the blind mother, and her daughter in law pretending "Susan's flight has been delayed". The young couple whose child awaits an operation that can only be performed by the surgeon who was on the plane.
But some are lifted by the actors - Nyree Dawn Porter as the pilot's wife who's just had her first baby, for example. Though would she be able to get up and fly to Switzerland the next day? (Note how babies are not left with their mothers but taken to a nursery - when did that change?) The displaced children waiting for their foster mother avoid mawkishness, and the matron of the (huge) children's institution convinces. (Didn't she run a women's hostel in Millions Like Us?)
The best "back story" is the ageing star of stage and screen whose faithful agent awaits her return. He boosts her to anyone who inquires. And think of the publicity! He is obviously in love with her, though he has a cosy relationship with his secretary which has gone on for years. Both of them are convincing and likeable.
The young reporters are somewhat drippy, and as for that ending - oh dear, oh dear! Never mind, Women's Lib would be along in about eight years.
Basic film, basic plotline
Marlburian13 May 2020
Seems I'm the first to review this film, which was screened on Talking Pictures TV the other day.
A plane has crashed in Switzerland with only three people known to have survived, but their identities are unknown. Back in Fleet Street, an ace reporter is teamed up with a girl journalist to check the backgrounds of all the passengers and crew. (He resents her at first, but you can guess what happens.) Happily everyone lives in or close to London and the duo complete their mission within 24 hours.
They now have a variety of "human stories": the pilot's wife has just had a baby; one passenger is a vital witness who could testify for a crook facing the death penalty; a somewhat elderly would-be foster-mother is about to adopt two new children; a surgeon is needed to perform a complicated operation on a child; there's a drug-smuggler; and a couple more. The rescue party is delayed, so the journalists and interested parties (the crook's lawyer, for example, and the child's parents) all fly out to Switzerland and wait in a chalet.
Then the rescue team arrives, with the three survivors ...
The film passed 90 minutes or so of Lockdown pleasantly enough, but it was hardly brilliant. A passer-by in Fleet Street staring at the camera has been noted in Goofs, and some of the back-projection as the reporters drove along in their car suggested that the following vehicle was almost rubbing bumpers.
All the cast were adequate, except for Pauline Yates, who didn't convince.
A plane has crashed in Switzerland with only three people known to have survived, but their identities are unknown. Back in Fleet Street, an ace reporter is teamed up with a girl journalist to check the backgrounds of all the passengers and crew. (He resents her at first, but you can guess what happens.) Happily everyone lives in or close to London and the duo complete their mission within 24 hours.
They now have a variety of "human stories": the pilot's wife has just had a baby; one passenger is a vital witness who could testify for a crook facing the death penalty; a somewhat elderly would-be foster-mother is about to adopt two new children; a surgeon is needed to perform a complicated operation on a child; there's a drug-smuggler; and a couple more. The rescue party is delayed, so the journalists and interested parties (the crook's lawyer, for example, and the child's parents) all fly out to Switzerland and wait in a chalet.
Then the rescue team arrives, with the three survivors ...
The film passed 90 minutes or so of Lockdown pleasantly enough, but it was hardly brilliant. A passer-by in Fleet Street staring at the camera has been noted in Goofs, and some of the back-projection as the reporters drove along in their car suggested that the following vehicle was almost rubbing bumpers.
All the cast were adequate, except for Pauline Yates, who didn't convince.
its a danziger film so you know what to expect
malcolmgsw2 June 2020
Basically no expense spared.So most of the film consists of family and friends of the passengers being interviewed by the journalists.Its only in the last few minutes when some tension is injected into the situation that it becomes reasonably interesting
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