Guilty Pleasure #86: The Horror at 37,000 Feet (dir by David Lowell Rich)

Posted on October 9, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

I imagine that it should go without saying that, if you’re on an airplane and you’re flying high above the ground, the last thing that you want to deal with is a bunch of angry ghost druids.

And yet, that’s exactly what happens in this made-for-TV horror film from 1973.

The ghost druids are upset because two architects (played by Roy Thinnes and Jane Merrow) have traveled to England, specifically so that they can supervise the deconstruction of ancient druid altar. Now, they’re flying the pieces of the altar back over the ocean so that the altar can be reconstructed in the United States. The spirits of the ancient druids aren’t happy about being moved so they start doing everything they can to make the journey difficult.

First, they attempt to freeze the plane. When that doesn’t work, they decide to rip it in half. One of the passengers, Mrs. Pinder (Tammy Grimes), suggests that maybe the druids will settle down if they’re offered a sacrifice. When the druids reject an offer of a doll, the passengers start to wonder if maybe the spirits would be happier with a human sacrifice.

Although some of the passengers are reluctant to buy into the whole sacrifice thing, a few of them do start to come around. For instance, there’s a perpetually angry businessman who is played by Buddy Ebsen. Once he realizes that the druids aren’t going anywhere, he has no problem with the idea of a human sacrifice. There’s also a cowboy played by Will Hutchins. If sacrificing a human is what he has to do to have another chance to ride the range, that’s what he’s going to do. Paul Winfield plays a distinguished doctor who tries to keep everyone calm while Chuck Connors is stuck in the cockpit, trying to keep the plane in the air while his passengers and crew debate the ethics of human sacrifice.

And then there’s William Shatner.

Shatner plays a former priest who has lost his faith. From the minute he gets on the plane, he starts drinking and he doesn’t stop for almost the entire movie. It doesn’t matter what’s happening on the plane, Shatner always has a glass in his hand. Playing a character who never has anything positive to say, Shatner smirks through the entire film. Shatner delivers all of his lines in his standard halfting and overdramatic fashion and it’s something of a wonder to behold. Shatner has said that The Horror At 37,000 Feet may be the worst movie in which he ever appeared and just one look at his filmography will show why this is such a bold statement.

The Horror at 37,000 Feet is definitely a film of its time. The plane comes complete with a swinging cocktail lounge, William Shatner wears a turtle neck, and all of the flight attendants wear boots and miniskirts. Everything about this film screams 1973. It’s an incredibly silly but undeniably fun movie. With a running time of only 73 minutes, the pace is fast and the druids don’t waste any time getting down to business. The film’s on YouTube so check it out the next time you’ve an hour and 13 minutes to kill.

Previous Guilty Pleasures

Retro Television Review: The Chadwick Family (dir by David Lowell Rich)

Posted on July 7, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Sundays, I will be reviewing the made-for-television movies that used to be a primetime mainstay. Today’s film is 1974’s The Chadwick Family! It can be viewed on YouTube.

Who are the Chadwicks?

They’re a family living in San Francisco. They claim to be an average middle class family but, as has apparently been typical of television since its very first broadcast day, they live in a way that can only be explained by having a good deal of wealth.

Consider this: Patriarch Ned Chadwick (Fred MacMurray) is a prominent newspaper columnist who writes so well that a mere column from him can settle a potential labor strike. A national magazine has noticed the power of Ned’s words and they’ve offered him a job. They want to turn him into a national figure. The only catch is that he and his wife (Kathleen Maguire) would have to leave their beloved San Francisco and move to Chicago. There’s no ocean in Chicago, as Ned puts it. Sure, it would mean more money but who needs money when you’re a fabulously wealthy couple pretending to be middle class?

Moving would also mean leaving behind their children, all of whom have dramas of their own to deal with. Tim (Stephen Nathan) is a college student, struggling to make the grade. Lisa (Jane Actman) is engaged to Lee (Frank Michael Liu) and, for some reason, decides that it would be a good idea to tell her future mother-in-law that her desire for a long engagement is “bad chop suey.” (Lee’s family is Chinese.) Eileen (Lara Parker) is pregnant and her husband worries this will sabotage their support for “zero population growth.” And Joan (Darleen Carr) is having to deal with the fact that her charismatic and fun-loving husband, Duffy (a young Barry Bostwick), is seriously ill and might even die before he can finish teaching Ned how to play the bagpipes. Like all middle class people, Duffy owns his own airplane.

This is one of those movies that was obviously meant to serve as a pilot for a weekly television series and it’s easy to imagine Ned handing out wisdom to his kids on a weekly basis as they tried to navigate their way through the 70s. Fred MacMurray gives off a nice grandfatherly vibe as Ned, so much so that it’s hard to believe that he’s the same actor who brought to life memorable heels in Double Indemnity, The Caine Mutiny, and The Apartment. Unfortunately, the rest of the cast is not as memorable as MacMurray, largely because their roles are underwritten and their characters never feel like more than caricatures. Barry Bostwick acts up a storm as Duffy but the fact that he’s listed as being a “special guest star” in the opening credits pretty much gives away his fate from the start. As for Lisa, I usually like any character who shares my name but how much sympathy can you have for someone dumb enough to use a phrase like “bad chop suey” while speaking to her Chinese future in-laws. Indeed, it was kind of weird how everyone in the family seemed to be totally comfortable with making jokes about Lee being Chinese and speaking with an accent. One has to wonder how Lee felt about that.

Anyway, as far as I know, The Chadwick Family has no further adventures but their sole outing will live forever thanks to YouTube.

Coming Down The Mountain: Runaway! (1973, directed by David Lowell Rich)

Posted on June 3, 2019 by Jedadiah Leland

Runaway! begins with a train starting a slow descent down a snowy mountain. On board the train are collection of skiers, gigolos, conductors, and engineers. One couple discusses their upcoming divorce. An athletic father tries to bond with his less-athletic son. A slick con artist tries to convince a depressed young woman not to throw herself from the train. A group of skiers put on an impromptu concert, banging on their suitcases like bongo drums. They get so loud that the conductor doesn’t even hear the engineer desperately trying to contact him. What none of the passengers realize is that the train’s brake engines have frozen and the train is about to start hurtling down the mountain. Unless the chief engineer can figure out a way to stop the train, everyone’s going to die!

Made for television in the year between the release of The Poseidon Adventure and The Towering Inferno, Runaway! is a low-key but entertaining disaster movie. With a running time of only 70 minutes, Runaway! doesn’t waste any time getting down to business and, even if it is a low-budget movie, there’s no way that an out-of-control train racing down a mountain can’t be exciting.

Compared to the other disaster movies of the era, Runaway! does not exactly have an all-star cast though there are some familiar faces. Vera Miles and Ed Nelson are the divorcing couple while Martin Milner is the father who puts too much pressure on his son. Ben Murphy is the gigolo who refuses to pay for a ticket on general principle while Darleen Carr is the woman who wants to jump to her death. Most of them are just there as placeholders. It’s obvious from the start that the real stars of the film are going to be the train and the mountain. However, the famously gruff character actor Ben Johnson manages to make an impression just by being Ben Johnson. Johnson plays the chief engineer and, as long as he’s manning the engine, you know that the train’s passengers are in good hands.

Runaway! has never been released on DVD or even VHS but it is currently available on YouTube.

A Movie A Day #244: Death of a Gunfighter (1969, directed by Allen Smithee)

Posted on September 9, 2017 by Jedadiah Leland

At the turn of the 20th century, the mayor and the business community of Cottonwood Springs, Texas are determined to bring their small town into the modern era. The Mayor (Larry Gates) has even purchased one of those newfangled automobiles that have been taking the country by storm. However, the marshal of Cottonwood Spings, Frank Patch (Richard Widmark), is considered to be an embarrassing relic of the past. Patch has served as marshal for 20 years but now, his old west style of justice is seen as being detrimental to the town’s development. When Patch shoots a drunk in self-defense, the town leaders use it as an excuse to demand Patch’s resignation. When Patch refuses to quit and points out that he knows all of the secrets of what everyone did before they became respectable, the business community responds by bringing in their own gunfighters to kill the old marshal.

Death of a Gunfighter is historically significant because it was the very first film to ever be credited to Allen Smithee. The movie was actually started by TV director Robert Totten and, after Widmark demanded that Totten be fired, completed by the legendary Don Siegel. Since Totten worked for 25 days on the film while Siegel was only on set for 9, Siegel refused to take credit for the film. When Widmark protested against Totten receiving credit, the Director’s Guild of America compromised by allowing the film to be credited to the fictitious Allen Smithee.

In the years after the release of Death of a Gunfighter, the Allen (or, more often, Alan) Smithee name would be used for films on which the director felt that he had not been allowed to exercise creative control over the final product. The Smithee credit became associated with bad films like The O.J. Simpson Story and Let’s Get Harry which makes it ironic that Death of a Gunfighter is not bad at all. It’s an elegiac and intelligent film about the death of the old west and the coming of the modern era. It also features not only one of Richard Widmark’s best performances but an interracial love story between the marshal and a brothel madame played by Lena Horne. The supporting cast is full of familiar western actors, with Royal Dano, Harry Carey, Jr., Larry Gates, Dub Taylor, and Kent Smith all making an impression. Even the great John Saxon has a small role. Though it may be best known for its “director,” Death of a Gunfighter is a film that will be enjoyed by any good western fan.

Victim of Love: Clint Eastwood in THE BEGUILED (Universal 1971)

Posted on April 12, 2016 by gary loggins

cracked rear viewer

THE BEGUILED was the third of five collaborations between star Clint Eastwood and director Don Siegel. It’s definitely the most offbeat, a Gothic Western set during the Civil War. Clint plays John McBurney, a wounded, half-dead Yankee found in the woods by one of the girls from Miss Martha’s Seminary for Young Ladies. What unfolds from there is unlike anything the duo ever did before or after, a tale of sexual desire and vengeance that’s one of the most unusual entries in the Western canon.

Clint Eastwood has one of his most unsympathetic roles as McBurney. Although we feel bad about the condition he’s in, we soon realize what an amoral, manipulative scoundrel he is. Flashbacks reveal his lies about his role in the Union Army. Even as he suffers some major “misery” (hint, hint) at the hands of Miss Martha, Clint’s McBurney isn’t a likeable figure. This offbeat casting probably contributed to the…

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