The Hindenburg (1975)

Everyone's familiar with the Hindenburg disaster. "Oh the humanity" (cried out by radio reporter Herbert Morrison as he reported on the crash live) has entered our vocabulary when horrible things happen (or when flightless turkeys are dropped from a helicopter, as in WKRP in Cincinnati.) In any event, no one really knows why the Hindenburg crashed. The most widely accepted hypothesis is an electrical spark caused by a buildup of static electricity. This movie goes in a different direction. It emphasizes the sabotage theory - a theory rejected by both German and American investigators, but nevertheless tailor made for conspiracy enthusiasts and movie making.The movie's pretty well done. It has a feel of authenticity to it. I know about the Hindenburg disaster, but I never really had a sense of what the Hindenburg was like for its passengers. The movie gives us a pretty good sense of what it would be like to be a passenger on such an airship. It's not as luxurious as an ocean liner, apparently, but it would have been a pretty exciting voyage. I liked the sets, and the bit of a picture we get of how the airship flew. That was all well done.There's a large cast of characters in this, headed by George C. Scott playing Col. Ritter, a Luftwaffe intelligence officer who's assigned as head of security for the ship. The sabotage angle is played up with that character, plus a Gestapo agent who's both helping him and watching him, in that delightful fashion Nazi Germany had. Both suspect sabotage; both are looking. As is normal with this kind of movie, there are all sorts of possible suspects on board the ship, and no particular reason to suspect one above any other. In that sense, the movie lost a bit of an opportunity to create more suspense by giving away the identity of the saboteur maybe half way through. Ritter turned out to be anti-Nazi enough to be willing to let the sabotage happen, as long as it didn't endanger the passengers. In the end, the real tension comes from the fact that the Hindenburg's landing at a Naval Air Station in New Jersey was delayed, meaning that the bomb would go off before the passengers disembarked, unless Ritter could stop it - which, of course, he couldn't.The movie has a good cast. Aside from Scott, there's Ann Bancroft and Burgess Meredith and Charles Durning among others. There's even a bit of humour thrown in as a pianist and acrobat on board put on a show for the passengers and crew that turns out to be a shot at the Nazis, poking fun at Hitler and the party with a song called "There's A Lot To Be Said For The Fuhrer." In the end, the portrayal of the fire and crash of the airship is extremely dramatic and well done."The Hindenburg" is an interesting movie. It's highly speculative, but if you're interested in the sabotage theory, this presents at least one plausible sabotage scenario to consider. (6/10)

I'll go against the consensus and say that I think this is a pretty decent film.I think it suffers from being called a disaster flick. There's a big difference. Most all the disaster flicks were fictional stories. There's some pretty good history here, although admittedly Hollywood has fictionalized it somewhat...but after all, it's not a documentary.So if it's not a disaster flick, what is it? Historical fiction. A very different genre with very different expectations.The special effects and sets here are awfully good for 1975. I give it very high marks in that category.In terms of the story, it's one version of what happened to cause the disaster. Is it the correct story? Who knows? And since it's not a documentary it has no responsibility to present alternate hypotheses.The cast is rather impressive. George C. Scott is good in a somewhat subdued performance as a Luftwaffe Colonel assigned as special security for the Hindenburg. I'm not much of a fan of Anne Bancroft...and after this film I'm still not a fan...but she does her job. I was glad to see Burgess Meredith, Richard Dysart, Robert Clary, and Charles Durning in the supporting cast.I do have two big criticisms of this film. The first has been mentioned by a couple of other reviewers. I wish the German characters had an accent so we could tell more about each character's nationality without having to work at making conclusions. They all sounded too American. Secondly, I don't think going to black and white for the conclusion was effective at all, although I imagine it saved them lots of money rather than trying to recreate the crash/explosion in color. Too bad colorization of newsreel film couldn't be done effectively in 1975.Nevertheless, I say give this movie a shot. I think you'll like it. It was a money-maker when it came out, so lots of people did like it back then. Perhaps its too historical to be exciting enough for some light weight audiences.

It will be very hard to review without resorting to aeronautical clichés so I'll leave it in my summary and press on. Disaster movies fall into two categories, imaginary catastrophes which have the advantage of surprise in that you don't know just how it's going to end, examples being I suppose "The Towering Inferno", "The Posiedon Adventure" and "Airport", while of course the other type seeks to recreate a well-known tragedy such as "Pearl Harbour" "Titanic" and this dramatisation of the demise of the great German airship the Hindenburg, its disastrous final moments forever caught in the live footage shot by a newsreel camera of the day replete with the heart-wrenching commentary of the on-the- spot-reporter..."Oh the humanity..." indeed.The problem with the latter three features is that the producers always seem to feel the need to concoct imaginary stories as a backdrop to the real-life events and while I appreciate the need to fill in the intervening time, the fact is I've never seen it done well. Worse, in this film, to I guess enhance the tension, is the re-use of the old "Airport" plot- peg of a concealed bomb on board, when I believe that most historians contend it was a flash of lightning which did for the Zeppelin. It therefore makes events seem contrived and as for the human interest elements these come across only in a shallow way, not helped by the use of little-known actors in the supporting roles.In addition, good actors as they are, lead players George C Scott and Anne Bancroft are neither charismatic or energetic enough to carry the viewer along, so that all we're left with are some nice mock-ups of the ship itself, good aerial camera-work and of course the explosive ending, sympathetically in monotone and blended in to actual footage of the day.However to reduce such a calamity as this to an unengaging whodunit and minor character-study for me just hits the wrong note, impressed as I at least was with how the conclusion was handled.

But they did that to slip in actual footage of the Hindenburg blowing up into the cheaply done special effects. Honestly, it would just have been better to simulate actually blowing up the ship in miniature. (They'd probably do it in CGI Today.) Okay, the "Melodrama" here is that a Luftwaffe officer played by George C. Scott is trying to uncover a plot to destroy the Hindenburg. Lots of really good actors make up the suspect list, some of whom were past their prime (Burgess Meredith, Anne Bancroft) others you hadn't heard of yet. (Roy Thinnes, Rene Auberjonis.) What probably got this greenlighted was it was the early 70's, and they had all sorts of disaster movies- Earthquake, Airport, Towering Inferno, Poseiden Adventure - so why not a dirigible? Get an ensemble cast of b-list actors and whether they survive or not is up to their q-score.I would be remiss if I didn't point out the other factor here. All the characters we are supposed to sympathize with hate the Nazis. The ones we don't think Hitler was the best thing since sliced bread. Again, this is kind of typical for a movie where the plot is someone sabotaging the ship, I guess, but it's not really credible. It's really a lot of backtracking.