Air Force One (1997)
Air Force One is a 1997 American political action thriller film directed and co-produced by Wolfgang Petersen and starring Harrison Ford, Gary Oldman, Glenn Close, Wendy Crewson, Xander Berkeley, William H. Macy, Dean Stockwell, and Paul Guilfoyle. It was written by Andrew W. Marlowe. It is about a group of terrorists who hijack Air Force One and the president’s attempt to rescue everyone on board by retaking his plane. The film was a box office success and received mostly positive critical reviews.
Plot.
A joint operation between American and Russian Special Forces captures General Ivan Radek, the dictator of a rogue neo-Soviet regime in Kazakhstan that retained its nuclear weapons, threatening to start a new Cold War. Three weeks after the mission, U.S. President James Marshall attends a diplomatic dinner in Moscow, Russia, during which he praises the operation and insists the U.S. will “no longer negotiate with terrorists”. Marshall and his entourage, including his wife Grace and daughter Alice, and several of his cabinet and advisers, prepare to return home on Air Force One. In addition, members of the press have been invited aboard, including six Radek loyalists disguised as journalists led by Egor Korshunov.
Korshunov, assuming that it is merely a Secret Service agent that is in the cargo hold, contacts Bennett and demands Radek’s release, threatening to kill a hostage every half-hour. Marshall and military advisors devise a plan to trick Korshunov to take Air Force One to a lower altitude for a mid-air refueling, buying time for the hostages to parachute safely off the plane. As a KC-10 tanker docks with Air Force One, Marshall helps to capture another loyalist and escorts the hostages to the cargo hold, where most parachute to safety. Korshunov discovers the deception and forces Air Force One to leave,
causing the fuel to ignite and thus destroying the tanker; the consequent shockwave disrupts the escape process, and Korshunov is able to stop Marshall, Chief of Staff Lloyd Shepherd, Major Caldwell and Gibbs from escaping. Some hostages and the captured loyalist fall out of the plane without parachutes.
With the president and his family under his control, Korshunov violently scolds Marshall (in revenge for killing his men) and forces him to contact Russian President Petrov and arrange for Radek’s release.
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Production.
A large part of the crew took a tour of the real Air Force One before filming. They based some of the film’s scenes on the touring experience when the terrorists disguised as journalists survey the plane’s layout and begin to take their seats. The character of Deputy Press Secretary Melanie Mitchell was based largely on their real-life tour guide, and the crew felt uncomfortable having to film the character’s execution by the terrorists. For the exterior scenes, the producers rented a Boeing 747-146 aircraft, N703CK from Kalitta Air and repainted it to replicate the Air Force One livery.
He knew the terrorists from his CIA days and so they included him in their operation. The scene was considered too long to tell and so it was cut from the film. The director also felt that it was unnecessary to have in the film so it was removed as it was irrelevant to the plot. Petersen also said that in the original draft, Gibbs revealed himself as the mole early and joined the terrorists in hijacking the plane. The director felt it was more suspenseful to keep the audience guessing in the final cut and specifically pointed to the scene in which Marshall gives Gibbs a gun before escorting the hostages from the conference room to the parachutes in the cargo hold.
Box office, Home media.
One of the most popular action films of the 1990s, Air Force One earned $172,650,002 (54.9%) domestically and $142,200,000 (45.1%) in other countries. It grossed a total of $315,156,409 worldwide in the box office. It was the year’s fifth highest-grossing film worldwide. Air Force One was released on VHS, LaserDisc, and DVD on February 10, 1998, and on Blu-ray on June 2, 2009. A 4K UHD Blu-ray followed on November 6, 2018. The US LaserDisc release of the film is notorious among LaserDisc collectors as being extremely prone to “Laser rot”, a form of optical disc degradation, due to repeat production issues at the Sony DADC facility where the discs were produced.
Novelization.
A novelization of the film was published in June 1997 by author Max Allan Collins. Although the book has the same central plot and outcomes as the film, its main storyline has additional scenes and lines not in the film. The book develops characters more than the film. Marshall is described as possessing a smile that is described in the novel as “the most valuable weapon in his public relations arsenal” He promotes an interventionist line on foreign policy and a strong stance against terrorism (met with political opposition from opposition Speaker of the House, Franklin Danforth, in the novel). He is described as a first-term President, up for re-election later on in the year that the film is set in. Marshall’s home state is Iowa. A two-term former governor of Iowa in the novel, he first campaigns in the film for the US House.
Secretary of Defense Walter Dean, Deputy NSA Director Thomas Lee, Deputy Press Secretary Melanie Mitchell, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Northwood, Air Force General Greeley (who Marshall served under in Vietnam). His Party is Republican in the novel.
Marshall is described in the novel as “a moderate-Republican version of Bill Clinton, minus the womanizing reputation, and without a hint of personal or professional scandal” Korushunov’s family is expanded upon, and it is revealed that Korushunov is not his real name.