The Towering Inferno

B+


Directed by John Guillermin

A classic of the genre, John Guillermin's 1974 disaster epic has aged remarkably well for an action film made before the days of CGI and must have been jaw dropping stuff when it was first released.

Paul Newman (a much younger Newman, suffice it to say) stars as Doug Roberts, the head architect of the world's tallest building, a 135 story residential and commercial skyscraper in the middle of San Francisco's downtown. Roberts plans on making a brief appearance at the buildings opening ceremonies before retiring for good, heading up into the Northern reaches of California with his lady, played by none other than Faye Dunaway. Esteemed guests arrive to the christening of the monolith and are whisked up to the top floor where they will celebrate this modern day Tower of Babel in swankky fashion, all at the expense of Jim Duncan, the developer responsible for the tower. Things start to go awry, however, when a fire breaks out on the 81st floor following a short circuit in the electrical system. Newman...I mean Roberts, investigates and finds out the Duncan's son in law, the evil Roger Simmons, may have allowed shoddy workmanship to go by unnoticed in order to save a buck or two. Roberts has no time to investigate further, however, as the fire spreads quickly throughout the building, trapping the guests on the top floor. Sensing danger, in comes none other than the chief of the fire department STEVEN MCQUEEN (!!!) who must organize a complex rescue plan with the help of Newman.

Guillermin's film is quite succesful at creating dramtic tension by presenting a worst case scenario and then letting his characters figure otu how to save themselves. As the movie progresses, the situation gets more and more dire as the fire moves up towards the helpless partiers on the top floor, leading Newman and McQueen to go to more extreme lengths to save lives. Many of the strategies developed to save the revelers are hilariously complex and dangerous, such as fashioning a zip line between the 135th floor and the roof of a neghboring high rise and encouraging the dapper dinner guests to whisk themselves over the gaping abyss between the two buildings. Needless to say, it's exciting stuff.
One of the big drawbacks of "disaster films" films such as the "The Towering Inferno" is that a core group of characters is usually introduced early in the film and it is made rather clear at the beginning of the film who will survive and who will not, thus sapping the film of much of its suspense. Not so in Guillermin's film where main characters are killed off left and right, often with little warning and after we, the viewer, have become fairly comfortable with the fact that they will survive the ordeal. Indeed, everyone appears to be fair game in Guilermin's film which heightens the suspense immensely since the viewer is never sure that anyone, even Newman and McQueen's characters, will make it out alive.

Although it certainly could have benefitted from the wide array of CGI possibilities available to current films when ti was made way back in 1974, "The Towering Inferno" is still one of the greatest catastrophe films ever made and is complete, unadulterated fun to watch.