The Flight of the Phoenix (1965) (Masters of Cinema) (Blu-ray)

One of the best plane stories ever made.All actors on fine form, James Stewart gives his best performance.

Maverick Director Robert Aldrich's Scorching Movie The Flight Of The Phoenix Finally Gets The Blu ray Treatment. Released in 1965 with Hollywood Legend James Stewart Heading an all star cast as a group of oilmen and military men crash land Their cargo plane in The Sahara Desert. The group manage To built an entirely flying aircraft from The Tangled wreckage of Their Doomed plane Though The survivors endure many Hardships before The final escape. Director Aldrich builds His movie on character Tension like it's never been played before. James Stewart The star of many classic Hollywood western is Totally Different in This movie To anything he as ever played before. As Frank Towns The pilot of The plane Stewart plays a bitter character Throughout The entire movie only redeeming Himself at The end of The movie. Our very own Richard Attenborough is The co pilot with The secret past of a local Drunk whom Stewart blames for The crash. in one of His early film roles Hardy Kruger is The Aircraft designer who hinges on The idea of building an entirely working aircraft constantly in conflict Throughout The movie with The James Stewart character who proclaims it can't be Done. The penny drops later in The movie when we learn That Kruger's character is actually a model plane designer But The Designs The same proclaims Kruger. The movie just bursts at The seams with off beat characters Then we have Oscar winner Peter Finch as The Military man who just simply want's To walk out of The Desert. if you can go The Distance of The movies 142 mins running Time Flight Of The Phoenix will keep you on The edge of your seat from beginning To end. when it was released in 1964 The movie was a Huge critical success for 20th Century Fox Though it was not without problems. The movie Had encountered Tragedy with The Death of Then Top Hollywood stuntman in flying Paul Mantz and we are asked To remember This at The end of The movie. Flight Of The Phoenix comes in a stunning High Definition Transfer as sharp as The many sand Dunes we see in The movie. extras include The films Trailer a short essay on The movie by Historian Sheldon Hall an isolated music Track The whole package is rounded out with a booklet Detailing The movie and its cast with many rare photos from The film. And can I just add with The exception of a Dream sequence in The Desert you could say a mirage This is an all Male plane Thriller.

This review is for the EUREKA BLU RAY (Masters of Cinema) . An excellent transfer, 16.9 ratio (fills my whole screen), showing up the terrific photography and colour (particularly close ups of faces), good sound and subtitles (English). Do read the enclosed booklet - fascinating, and it has a full cast list. The film? It's very Macho of course. the testosterone on set must have been spectacular. For me, praise must go to Ernest Borgnine who gives a powerful show as a man having a nervous breakdown. Ian Bannen as a wise cracking Scot, and Ronnie Fraser as a grumpy bolshie army sergeant. Christian Marquand scores in an underplayed role as a doctor, and of course Stewart and Attenborough are just right. Watching the film I felt George Kennedy (allright, he hadn't quite achieved star status yet), Dan Duryea, and Barrie Chase were utterly wasted in roles that could have been played by anyone (although they were good), except those of us waiting for Ms. Chase will be very disapointed, I promise you. Considering the film is 2 hrs and 10 mins long director Aldrich keeps the pace and suspense going and I wasn't bored at all. The location filming works well and the studio inserts gell well. It would be wrong not to say that Hardy Kruger almost steals the whole shebang, and Finch plays well out of character. Not a film for everyone, particularly today, but Aldrich/Stewart fans and lovers of good cinema of the period will surely enjoy most if not all of the film.

I think it is very good I like led the film thank u very much

Eureka! Masters of Cinema 2016 blu ray release:This is an excellent film which I last saw on TV and had recorded onto VHS (remember those cassettes?). For a film to hold the audience for over 2 hours running time is no mean feat due largely to the superbly transparent direction by Robert Aldrich, the intelligent script and the solid acting ability of the actors, not to mention their interaction with one another within the constraints of their downed aeroplane surrounded by miles of scorching desert, especially the tension created by the unemotional theoretical logic of Hardy Kruger's engineer. Good to see Peter Finch too in another well-honed role playing the stalwart army captain. Richard Attenborough steals the film in the classic scene where his pitch perfect decent into lunatic laughter of desperation says more than a page of dialogue could ever hope to say. I won't elaborate for fear of spoiling the plot for others.The picture quality is very good - clear, sharp photography, fine colour balance portraying the heat and relentlessness of the sand surrounding the characters - well done Eureka! for such a good restoration. Well done the prop man too as the aeroplane was also well constructed looking authentic. Films like this prove that, with good direction and a fine cast, one can turn the minimum of a situation into an entertaining film - something I hope some of today's directors will take note of.

It must have been around 1975 or 1976 that I had the pleasure of seeing this film for the very first time. I watched it together with my parents and my younger brother. Our parents allowed us to stay up until the film had ended, at 22:30. Getting to bed after 22:00 was also a first experience. I was 11 years old, my younger brother 9.The Flight Of The Phoenix has had a big influence on my since I first saw it. I used to build LEGO airplaines that looked very similar to the one that starred in the film and I reenacted the film lots of times using my toys.I have seen the film several times again and never grew tired of it. I still love the scene in which Frank Towns uses a cartridge to clean the engine from dust and soot and succesfully gets it running.When I saw that it was available on DVD I ordered it, planning to watch it with my two sons of 18 and 14 years old. They loved it!

As title suggests

Bon film

Genial todo

Adapté d'un roman à l'idée audacieuse de Elleston Trevor, voilà un récit de survie qui m'a vraiment captivé. Il est intéressant d'y voir un pilote expérimenté et un peu bourru qui ne souffre pas d'entendre un jeune blanc-bec lui faire une démonstration de connaissances en "avionnerie"; et de par le fait même démontrer aux autres survivants les lacunes du vieil entêté.Ce conflit de génération est rendu avec force par James Stewart et Hardy Kruger. Un duel qui inquiète le navigateur (excellent Richard Attenborough) ainsi que les passagers encore vivants, et qui aimeraient bien le rester. Tous devront donc apprendre à travailler ensemble pour satisfaire l’ego des deux seuls individus représentant le mince espoir de s'extirper du désert brûlant où ils se sont écrasés.Ce film est à voir pour l’exceptionnel casting d'acteurs mâles...oui, car il aurait été difficile d'y ajouter (à cette époque) un personnage féminin travaillant dans une exploitation pétrolière du Libye. Le "remake" de 2004 avec Dennis Quaid fera place à une femme dans l'équipe œuvrant en Mongolie.Il est amusant d'apprendre dans les bonus, que Robert Aldrich, en bon producteur des années 60, ait pensé à réaliser une bande-annonce avec des femmes qui présentent le film. Un subterfuge pour appâter le public féminin, mais qui ne fut pas utilisé finalement.Pour ce qui est du blu-ray de l'éditeur RIMINI: Qualité de bon niveau pour ce titre de 1965. Et même s'il est indiqué Zone "B", il peut être visionné sur une platine zonée "A". Par contre, côté bonus, seules les bandes-annonce seront lisibles sur un zone A.Merci au vendeur qui a bien voulu m'envoyer ma copie au Québec. :-)

A wonderful story populated by fascinating characters.

It seems so long since I've reviewed what I consider to be a 5 star film...maybe too long, so I decided to review one of my favorites in The Flight of the Phoenix (1965), a tense and wonderfully entertaining, character driven film about a small, yet diverse, group of men struggling to not only overcome the adversity of a harsh and deadly environment, but also having to come to terms with each other, the strengths and flaws inherent within themselves, to complete a nearly impossible task, one that will determine their very survival.Based on a popular novel by Elleston Trevor, the film is incredibly well directed by Robert Aldrich (whom I'm a big fan of), who also did Hush... Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1965), The Dirty Dozen (1967), and The Longest Yard (1974), to name a few. The film boasts an impressive cast, including James Stewart, Richard Attenborough, and Peter `I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore!' Finch. Also appearing are Ernest Borgnine, Hardy Krüger, George Kennedy, and Ian Bannen.As the film begins, we see a small group of men, some military men, but mostly crewmembers who work on an oil field located somewhere in the Sahara Desert, preparing to leave by plane, one piloted by Captain Frank Towns (Stewart), a world weary airman who's found himself in the position of shuttling men and equipment between outposts in rickety contraptions that resemble airplanes, along with his navigator (who has a penchant for the booze), Lew Morgan (Attenborough). The flight begins well enough, but soon a sandstorm disables the engines, and the plane is forced to crash land in the desert, miles away from any type of civilization, including that precious commodity many of us take for granted being water. After a few days, and hopes of a rescue dwindle away, a German engineer named Heinrich Dorfmann (Hardy Krüger), returning from visiting his brother at the oil field, proposes a completely fantastic and equally outlandish plan of building another plane from the wreckage of the first. The idea is not well received, especially by Captain Towns, due to its' seeming absurdity, but soon it becomes obvious that this one in a thousand chance is the only one they have, as the alternative is to do nothing and allow the desert to consume them slowly, as they suffer from heat and water deprivation. Now it's a race to complete the insurmountable task of constructing a workable aircraft before their limited water reserves run dry, fighting not only the elements within the desert, the burning heat during the day, the freezing cold at night, murderous nomadic tribes, and the ever present sand (don't you hate it when sand gets in your clothes? I do...), but they must also face their own weaknesses, those now magnified as the ever present threat of death looms so very close.While this film is listed as an action/adventure/drama, the main element that holds it together is the character driven aspects of the plot featuring those played by Stewart, Attenborough, and Krüger. Stewart's character seems locked in a tense battle of wills against Krüger's, as the realistic captain, concerned with the welfare of his charges, feeling the weight of responsibility, fights for control against Dorfmann, the pragmatic, analytical, and logical engineer with Attenborough's character squarely in the middle, trying maintain the peace and keep hope, along with themselves, alive. The rest of the cast does am extremely fine job in their supporting roles, and I especially enjoyed that of Ian Bannen, as the jovial pessimist, who could nearly always be counted on to provide a bit of harsh levity no matter the situation. The one thing I really enjoyed within this film, and reminded me a little of the Humphrey Bogart film The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1946) in that as the story progresses, we see the characters stripped of all the superficial aspects they possess, as their true natures are revealed, for better of worse. Aldrich's direction is impeccable, giving the right amount of attention to all the various aspects of the story, and just generally really putting the viewer within the story, feeling not only the disparity of the situation as the characters do, but the hope and faith the men manage to maintain, qualities I believe to be brought forth from our own instincts of survival and self preservation. One thing I noticed is that the film has no qualms about killing off various characters, regardless of the actor's prestige. So often I've seen films populated with seemingly pointless characters, only to watch them predictably perish, but that's not the case here. There are a number of deaths, and not all of them anticipated. Not only that, but also a few characters who normally would have been marked for death in other, more traditional stories, made it through to the end. The film runs nearly 2 ½ hours, and some would consider that too long, but I really didn't notice as the time was used well developing the characters and creating a sense of empathy for their plight, and ultimately a genuine concern for their well being and a desire to see them succeed in their impossible task.Presented here is a beautiful widescreen anamorphic picture, with the choice of either Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo, Dolby Digital 1.0 audio tracks, both of which sound clear and crisp. There's little in the way of special features, as all that's included are three versions of theatrical trailers for the film, one in English, another in Spanish, and a third in Portuguese. I've noticed there's a remake scheduled for release later this year, starring Dennis Quaid, Giovanni Ribisi, Hugh Laurie, and someone named Sticky Fingaz (I'm serious...that's his name...I later found out he was a member of the hip hop group Oynx, and has since appeared in quite a few films). All I can say is they've got their work cut out for them...Cookieman108