Zero Hour! (1957) Reviews

• "I guess I picked the wrong week to give up smoking."

  FeverDog2003-09-06

  Oh. My. Gawd. TCM had a ZAZ-fest recently, with THE NAKED GUN, TOP SECRET, AIRPLANE!, and...a certain movie that I've never come across before. ZERO HOUR! is the first time I've watched a movie I've never seen before but could quote the dialogue along with. Examples: "Sluggish, like a wet sponge." "I just want to say 'good luck'." "You're a member of this crew. Can you face some unpleasant facts?" "Flying a plane is no different than riding a bicycle." "You ever been in a cockpit before?" "No sir, I've never been up in a plane before!" "The survival of everyone on board depends on just one thing: finding someone on board who can not only fly this plane, but who didn't have fish for dinner." Sound familiar? In addition to the verbatim dialogue (and the exclamation point in its title), AIRPLANE! contained many other similarities. The co-pilot played by a former Los Angeles pro-ball player. The female passenger in hysterics. Little Joey visiting the cockpit (where the pilot puts his arm around him with perhaps inappropriate affection before giving him a toy plane). The unmarried stewardess. A wife awakened in the middle of the night by a phone call telling her to come to the airport immediately. Ted Stryker flashing back to the war and recovering in a veterans' hospital. Newspaper headlines prognosticating disaster. Inclement weather. The plane landing while losing its wheels. I could go on, but, really, the only things missing were a jive-talking black duo and a crucial moment in which the heroine's bobby pin saves the day. ZERO HOUR! was of course never intended to provoke laughs, but how can anyone watch this story now with a straight face? Try watching an old Leslie Nielsen drama without cracking up. It was actually a delight learning where the ZAZ boys got a lot of their material (and AMC occasionally runs AIRPORT 1975, which is where, if I remember correctly, the nun, sick little girl and singing stewardess originated). If TCM ever runs ZERO HOUR! again, I implore every fan of AIRPLANE! to sit down for eighty minutes and watch it. It's an eye-popping experience, in a whole new way.

• Gripping stuff

  David_G_Young2000-09-14

  This is an exciting film which is well acted and directed with all the tension needed to keep you sitting bolt upright throughout the climactic finale. Perhaps the rushed narrated intro is just a little too over-dramatic but it does not detract from the quality of the rest of the film. I am well aware of the film's relation to "Airplane!" (which is hilarious) and some moments are impossible to watch without one being reminded of their parody versions (the reference to quitting smoking especially). Nevertheless, it still works as an exciting piece of cinema.

• If you're an Airplane! fan, you've got to see this film.

  Beth5552001-07-03

  I was always told that Airplane! was a take off of the Airport movies of the 70s. It might have been, but the main source for the film was Zero Hour! This film is hilarious if you're a big Airplane! fan. As I watched ZH, I was reciting the same Airplane! dialogue in my head. I've never seen two movies that are so similar. It's quite a hoot!

• "Our survival hinges on one thing - finding someone who not only can fly this plane, but didn't have fish for dinner."

  bensonmum22007-08-22

  It's like déjà vu all over again. Until last night, I had never seen Zero Hour!, but I feel as if I've seen it a dozen times. I knew that some of Airplane! (the sick girl and singing nun for example) came from Airport, but I had no idea just how much was taken from Zero Hour! Airplane! is like some weird comedic remake or re-imaging of Zero Hour! - and they nailed it right down to the exclamation mark. And it's not just ideas or concepts that were taken from Zero Hour!, entire sections of dialogue were lifted and used in Airplane! I'm shocked to discover that lines like "I guess I picked the wrong week to give up smoking" weren't written especially for Airplane! The dialogue is so similar that when little Joey visits the cockpit and the captain asks if he's ever been in cockpit before, I kept waiting for him to ask "Have you ever seen a grown man naked?" as he does in Airplane! Even some of the performances in Airplane! are eerily reminiscent of Zero Hour! Take Robert Stack in the role originally done by Sterling Hayden. Amazing stuff! The funny thing to me about this example, however, is that Hayden is actually more intense in the role than Stack could have dreamed. Giving a rating to Zero Hour! is difficult. Even if you've only seen Airplane! once (and I've probably seen it a couple of dozen times over the years), it's all but impossible to keep a straight face (Who am I kidding? It's impossible not to downright laugh out loud.) when Johnny goes to make coffee or when Stryker straights sweating buckets behind the controls of the plane. It's impossible to take the melodrama of Zero Hour! seriously. So I don't know how I would rate the movie had I never seen Airplane! I would like to think I would have still enjoyed the experience and would have formed a similar opinion. But I have seen Airplane!, so I have that built in bias. In the end, because the movie kept me entertained (for whatever reason) throughout it's brief 81 minute runtime, I'm rating Zero Hour! a 7/10.

• Zero Hour is High & the Mighty With Food Poisoning ***1/2

  edwagreen2009-08-22

  Tense drama with Dana Andrews who never forgot his unfortunate incident with a plane at the end of World War 11 is Wiesbaden, Germany. Fast forward to 10 years later as Ted Stryker, Andrews, is unable to keep a job and his wife, the love Linda Darnell leaves him with her young son. He catches them on the plane only to find an in air situation where he must take over the plane when the 2 pilots fall ill due to eating fish. Other passengers fall ill as well. Enter Sterling Hayden, who was with Andrews during the war, who will now help guide him down. Hayden is terrific as the chain smoking pilot, who could make anyone nervous by how he delivers his instructions to Andrews and Darnell, who handles the radio. This is gripping drama at its best.