The Towering Inferno

The Expectation:
I have to admit that I watched this film because I read one of the books it was based on almost 10 years ago- The Glass Inferno. Since then, I learned that this movie was adapted from two books that were so similar it would have been silly to make two separate films (and thus two studios could combine their resources to make one giant blockbuster). A fire engulfs the largest skyscraper in the world (in San Fran), wreaking havoc on the many different players still residing within- the builders, businessmen, residents, rescue teams.... Think about a 1970's version of The Lord of the Rings- or something to that effect. Billed as a Disaster Movie!, I got very excited when I saw the cast- Steve McQueen, Paul Newman, Faye Dunaway, Fred Astaire, Robert Vaughn, Robert Wagner, OJ Simpson?- and thus, I prepared myself for a fantastically 70's blockbuster extravaganza.

The Result:
Terrible! I was expecting cheesy dialogue, out of date special effects, and blockbuster-esque epics but this film takes it to a whole new level- so much so that I kind of wish that I was alive when it came out so I could objectively weigh the contemporary response to it. Was it embraced like so many of our wonderfully over the top blockbusters today (Transformers, we love you!) or was it shunned into bankruptcy? The problem that I have with so many big films is that they forget about the story. This film almost had no story, unless you can somehow synthesize the many half stories mixed together to make the complete film. The movie focused only on spotlighting its many A+ list actors- and the mini stories that their characters held- without actually developing the creation of the fire, the back story where animosities lay, the consequences, etc. Each actor got their own film-and long drawn out scenes that rarely connected to the whole climactic fire arc. As it should have been, the building was one of the star characters, but the film spent too much time taking in the scenery of it all- as if to impress the audience watching at the time. "Ooh, look at the plush carpets, the sloping lobby, the grand penthouse", etc. I half expected to see some obvious product placement. And at its core, the film pitted the architect (Newman) against the fireman (McQueen) for its final lesson of development versus safety. Where is that border anyway, where profit and greed eclipse human decency and compassion? In some way, this shameless film is a hypocrisy of the film's final scenes- where the fireman chastises the architect for not asking him how to build a safe skyscraper. Alas, I fear we still have not learned thirty years later.

If you see it watch out for:
Don't watch it- your curiosity is not worth the pain.

Flickr Image- Chris Friese