 614 - SAN FRANCISCO INTERNATIONAL
Genre: TV-Movie Melodrama (1970, Color)
Synopsis: This feature is a TV-movie that was the pilot for a short-lived TV drama about the running of the San Francisco International Airport.
And, like all nighttime soapy dramas, this one has multiple storylines.
In the main storyline, a gang of men is trying to pull an airport heist.
One of the men, an ugly guy with huge ears, kidnaps the wife of an airlines pilot (David Hartman) and holds her hostage with a second guy in the gang until the pilot delays his flight by one hour.
(There must be a lot of kidnapping going on at airports, because almost every flight
is delayed!)
Then the third and final guy in the gang, played by Tab Hunter, kidnaps a secretary and hold her hostage
in his car.
He makes the airport force a jet that just landed to taxi to the end of the runway.
There at the end of the runway, Big Ears is waiting and he searches through the luggage hold of the jet, finding some money but then only taking some magazines (I guess he
couldn’t wait for the latest issues to hit the newsstands).
Tab Hunter releases his hostage and runs into the airport while Big Ears escapes an attempt to capture him (although he leaves behind his magazines,
dang-it!). The three men meet in the airport with their
pilot’s wife hostage and give each other a bunch of knowing glances.
Meanwhile, in a side storyline, an annoying guy is complaining to the director of the airport that a hippie slugged him.
The director brings in the Made-for-TV hippie and decides that the annoying guy deserved the punch (I agree).
And in the final storyline, the ignored kid of a couple getting divorced steals a little red plane and takes off.
So someone has to fly up and talk him down. Finally, in the end, the kid is back safely on the ground (boo!) and his worried parents decide to not get a divorce so they can spend more time with the little brat.
The TV-movie wraps up as the three man gang is captured, bringing an end to their nefarious plans to delay flights and steal magazines.
Don’s Review: Although it started a bit slow, this turned out to be a great experiment
– the riffing, by the end had me laughing constantly (especially
Crow’s
hilarious riffs in the flying kid storyline). The host segments were a bit mixed, with an
Urkel skit going on a little too long (although the appearances by Jan-in-the-Pan,
Neveena, Santy Claus, Old Pitch, and Torgo were all pretty enjoyable).
Still, despite the weak host segments, this is a fun episode that I look forward to seeing again.
Don’s Rating: 
Forrest’s Review: This movie really reminds me of the movies shown in the KTMA years.
And it’s really bad; slow, relentlessly boring, and hilarious at the same time.
Season Six sure pumps out a lot of great episodes and this is yet another addition to
the season’s greatness. The riffing can get a bit sparse at times, but
it’s due to the heavy dialog in the movie, but it’s well worth the wait for some big laughs down the line.
The movie is, well, a failed TV pilot for a television idea.
Must I say more? Master Ninja, Time of the Apes, Fugitive Alien, all these are TV movies, and they all have one thing in common, they suck. And San Francisco International continues the tradition of crappy made-for-TV movies.
The riffing at times is hilarious in this episode, as there are many huge burst of laughter scattered throughout.
Season Six sure was good at getting really boring, slow, piece-of-crap movies, and then turning them into true pieces of art.
The best lines in the movie are the little scattered ones that pop in and out, and each one would make me laugh manically
("Lawrence of San Francisco"). The host segments were amusing, as Mike acted like Urkel, and everyone thought it was funny, save for Torgo, who ruined the perfectly good mood (Mike, as Torgo never fails to make me laugh).
It was a great episode due to some great riffing, but in no way one of the very best.
Forrest’s Rating:
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