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Technically any good? This is classic campy B-movie stuff. It's hard not to make fun of it MST3K-style, especially since Airplane! lined up its jokes so well with this movie. You can literally hear a line of dialog in Zero Hour and speak the punchline from Airplane! It's actually pretty fun to do. However, since Airplane! doesn't take Zero Hour as its sole source, there is plenty in the movie that goes un-lampooned. To be fair, the actors all did perfectly adequate jobs for the kind of movie they were in. I also found the flight footage and even some of the model work to be pretty good, considering the budget (though one model scene was pretty unfortunate). The story works and is, in some ways, actually pretty intense. The lead character's stakes are actually much much higher in this than in Airplane!. I was also surprised at how tense I was feeling during some of the shots of guys talking on the radio.
How did it leave me feeling? Pretty satisfied. Sure, it's cheesy and I'd be lying if I said I didn't quip my way through the film, but it definitely has some merits to it beyond just being cheesy fun. Though, if you don't like cheesy fun, this movie probably isn't for you.
Final Rating? SAM - See A Matinee--well, Netflix it or grab it for $13 from Amazon. It's perfect for movie parties or just putting it on in the background on a Saturday afternoon.
