After Airplane!, it's almost impossible to keep a straight face through this sprawling disaster movie, particularly since it features George Kennedy, who went on to specialise in sending up the sort of role he plays here, most memorably in the Naked Gun series. But he and the rest of the starry cast (including Burt Lancaster, Dean Martin and an Oscar-winning Helen Hayes) are commendably serious throughout. The result is competent, soapy entertainment.

An airport manager tries to keep his terminals open during a snowstorm, while a suicide bomber plots to blow up a Boeing 707 airliner in flight.