Black Sunday (1977) User Reviews

A Solid No-Nonsense Thriller

[ccthemovieman-1 · 8/10 · 4 November 2005]

There are a number of good things going for this film, among them two things you learn right from the opening credits: (1) John Frankenheimer is the director and (2) it's based on a book by Thomas Harris, the man who created "Hannibal Lechter."

Throw in two intense always-interesting actors, Bruce Dern and Marthe Keller, and you now have a good, no-nonsense story translated to the screen. By that, I mean that when people are shot, that's it, no questions asked, no stupid talking.

Even the football scenes were real-life with actual footage of the Cowboys and Steelers playing in a past Super Bowl.

The suspense was done well, although a bit hokey at the very end (can't say more without spoiling it) but it can't take away from the previous two-plus hours of credibility.

Dern also makes for a good "psycho" (he's almost made a career of it) and Keller is convincing as a villain, too, as she was in a film from the previous year: Marathon Man. Two other consistently- good actors also help make this an interesting film: Robert Shaw and Fritz Weaver.

It was nice to see this film on a widescreen DVD but the picture was a bit grainy. The transfer was okay, but could have been better. The film is worthy of a top- notch print.

Black September attacks in January.

[michaelRokeefe · 6/10 · 30 January 2004]

John Frankenheimer gets to direct one of the biggest stars...the Goodyear blimp. An ex-Navy pilot and prisoner of war(Bruce Dern) teams with a devout member(Marthe Keller) of the Black September terrorist group to hijack/fly the Goodyear blimp and shoot a quarter million rifle darts into the Orange Bowl. Among the 80,000 football fans in attendance watching the Dallas Cowboys and Pittsburgh Steelers in Super Bowl X is the President of the United States. Trying to prevent the disaster is an Israeli anti-terrorist expert(Robert Shaw)who is as ruthless as the people he tracks down. This action thriller is based on the Thomas Harris novel. And accenting the action is a gripping musical score by John Williams.

Shaw is solid and determined. Dern is like a lunatic tightroping the edge of sanity. Keller is as solemn as she is fetching. In support are Fritz Weaver, Steven Keats and Bekim Fehmiu. The violence is vivid while the special effects are average for the time period.

Interesting Type of Thriller Movie

[HorrorDisasterGuy-90617 · 7/10 · 10 April 2023]

I found this movie to be pretty good for the most part. The story is unique with a Black September terrorist group attempt to use a blimp to attack a football stadium with a lot of people there. It build up really well throughout with the terrorist planning progress and the hero attempted to stop them. The movie have a couple of suspenseful moments in like and is thrilling to watch it. The characters are mostly alright for the most part, but the cast did a pretty good job in it. There are a couple of moments that either didn't make sense or some dumb decisions current characters made in it.

The poster of the movie only happens near the climax of the movie. It's definitely the highlight of the movie with the heroes attempted to stop the blimp from reaching the stadium and is really suspenseful to watch it. I do like the way they mange to lure the blimp away from the stadium and towards the ocean. But the way the movie ends feels abrupt.

I do think the movie is a interesting watch.

A long shelf-life

[inspectors71 · 17 March 2005]

This is such a disturbing film, based on a very disturbing book by Thomas Harris, the creator of Hannibal the Cannibal. I read the book in 1976 and actually believed that cunning terrorists might be able to think up a really spectacular way of killing a whole lot of people at one time, but we'd be able to see it coming and stop them, just like in the book. Little did we know . . .

I imagine what it would have been like to see a mid-1930s era movie about a carrier-borne air-strike against an American naval base. It would have seemed so far-fetched, and it would have drawn fire for smearing the race or nationality of the aggressors. Yet, here's Thomas Harris's novel of a disgruntled POW who is hired by Palestinians to set off an enormous shaped charge, packed with steel darts, into the crowd at a Super Bowl. With John Frankenheimer's skill and a great cast of actors, Harris's story really does come to life, and even with the occasional special effects flaw and some really unpleasant violence, it works! I remember being so excited about the movie--it had Bruce Dern and Robert Shaw and that gorgeous woman from Marathon Man, Marthe Keller. The art work was so imaginative! Even in dopey little Spokane, Washington, the Fox Theatre put up a billboard sized blimp on their roof. Frankenheimer even shot two scenes of the President of the United States coming down to watch the action--one, a Jimmy Carter lookalike and the other, Gerry Ford. The movie felt real, even with, as a I mentioned before, some special effects cheese that, for its time, couldn't be avoided.

In January 1977 I had not seen The Manchurian Candidate--I didn't even know who Frankenheimer was; the only directors I knew were Don Siegel (because I loved Dirty Harry) and Roman Polanski (because of--my chronology might be off here--his little dust up with an underage girl at Jack Nicholson's house, or something like that). If I had seen TMC, I might have noticed certain similarities between Candidate and Black Sunday--the damaged war veteran, the cold manipulators, the driven investigator of the truth, and the interspersal of violent, ugly images. Yet, Black Sunday is truly an action movie; its relation to The Manchurian Candidate stops as the bombs and bullets start tearing up the place.

Finally, it's strange to say that casting Bruce Dern as a psychologically damaged former carrier pilot was inspired--the man got rich and famous off playing wackadoodles--but Dern is more tortured, more pathetic than anything I ever saw him in. His character is so sad, so torn up by his experience in the Hanoi Hilton that, while it doesn't excuse his perfidy, he is as three dimensional as Sgt. Raymond Shaw. But Shaw did right at the end; Lander dies trapped by his own anger and hate.

So, if you can find it, I would strongly suggest renting this film. It is disturbingly topical, intense and suspenseful, and an example of a good movie made about an attack against the Super Bowl, unlike the other winter 1977 football disaster, Two-Minute Warning.

Tension, suspense and thrills in this overlong movie with good performances

[ma-cortes · 6/10 · 11 April 2010]

This exciting film begins when international terrorist organization Black September (led by Bekim Fehmiu) is scheming to wipe a crowd on the United States. As a young named Dahlia (Marthe Keller) is the one controlling the operation. She was in the Middle East with the other members of the terrorist group, discussing the operation when some Israelis attack ; the leader, Mossad agent named Kobakov (Robert Shaw) had his weapon on her but didn't shoot her. He along with FBI agent, Corley (Fritz Weaver)and Moshevski (Steven Keats) attempt to find out what it is before it's too late.Though they don't know what their operation is, Kobakov assures them that it will be devastating. Dahlia asks help for a first order massacre to Michael Lander (Bruce Dern who steals the show as nutty criminal), an ex-Vietnam P.O.W., who is psychologically scarred by that prison. As they are trying to blow up Miami stadium where takes place the Super Bowl. At the end focuses a moving chase over the skies involving some police helicopters and the Goodyear blimp that nasties hijack.

This stirring picture is packed with frantic action, political events, tense, hectic intrigue and the suspense is maintained throughout. Interesting screenplay by Ernest Lehman and Moffat , based on the Thomas Harris -Silence of the lambs- bestseller. Spectacular musical score fitting to action by the master John Williams, Spielberg's musician . Appropriate cinematography by John A Alonzo with good aerial scenes though is necessary a fine remastering. The motion picture is compellingly directed by John Frankenheimer . At the beginning he worked for TV and turned to the cinema industry with The Young Stranger (1957) . Disappointed his with first feature film experience he came back to his successful television career directing a total of 152 live television shows in the 50s. He took another opportunity to change to the big screen , collaborating with Burt Lancaster in The Young Savages (1961) and Birdman of Alcatraz(62) ending up becoming a successful director well-known by his skills with actors and expressing on movies his views on important social deeds and philosophical events and film-making some classics as ¨The Manchurian candidate, Seven days of May and The Train¨. Rating : Better and average and well worth seeing. The flick will appeal to frenetic action and suspense buffs.

A most specific atrocity

[bkoganbing · 7/10 · 7 September 2016]

For years down to this day since seeing Black Sunday in the theater I've always watched major sporting events with this film in mind. That's the kind of thoughts that director John Frankenheimer plants in your mind with a viewing of Black Sunday.

Black September the Palestinian terrorist organization of the day and the ones responsible for the slaughter of Israeli Olympic athletes in Munich have something special in mind for America at one of our major sporting events. Israeli intelligence Mosad learns of it and the guy who learned of it is dispatched to the USA to stop it.

Robert Shaw is the agent that is sent and he gives a carefully controlled performance of an Israeli assassin. The kind you send out after Arab assassins. Shaw is quiet and deadly and most effective in his acting.

The other side is represented by Marthe Keller and note that she's not a traditional Moslem woman in her style of living. Nonetheless both she and Shaw have suffered immense personal tragedies which has brought them to their respective positions. Keller has found a former Navy Pilot who was a Vietnam POW Bruce Dern who is more than slightly unhinged. After a court-martial he's bitter against the USA and wants to commit an atrocity and he has a very specific atrocity in mind.

All three of the leads acquit themselves well in their roles. But the real star is the special effects and an ending that for the last half hour will have you on the edge of your seats.

I predict your reaction to Black Sunday will be the same as mine. You will never watch a major sporting event without this film in the back of your mind.

Perceptions Change

[Theo Robertson · 7/10 · 20 January 2003]

Despite being set in the 1970s I couldn`t help noticing that Robert Shaw`s Mossad agent Kabakov is shown as being a violent ruthless cold blooded killer who`s almost as bad as the terrorists he`s hunting . This goes slightly against the common perception in much of the world at the time of Israelis being heroic and plucky freedom fighters striving to defeat terrorism and it should be remembered Israel carried out the legendary raid on Entebbe the year before . It wasn`t untill Israel`s invasion of Lebanon in 1982 that this perception changed towards the state of Israel somewhat . Well I suppose the producers should be congratulated on bringing ambiguity to the story . Likewise the " villain " Lander is a terrorist motivated by the fact that his country has turned his back on him . Sent to fight people in South East Asia he was shot down and left to rot in a North Vietnamese POW camp and on returning home from the most dirty and needless war of the 20th century he finds that even his own wife has forgotten about him . The point being that terrorists are never born but made .

BLACK SUNDAY is a very good political thriller full of good but often violent action scenes which means it`s not a film for everyone . Likewise watching this film in the 21st century which involves a plot to kill tens of thousands of innocent people at a public event means many viewers will be uneasy watching this . Sometimes you can take a plot and make it a little too realistic

Top notch excitement

[jrs-8 · 9/10 · 15 May 2002]

"Black Sunday" is a flat out exciting motion picture about the planning and execution of a terrorist attack during the Super Bowl. Robert Shaw plays the head of an agency trying to prevent the attack. Bruce Dern is at his creepy best as a brainwashed Vietnam vet enlisted by the lovely Marthe Keller to help carry out the sinister plan. Dern is a blimp pilot and the perfect person to help detonate a contraption that will send thousands of deadly needles into the unsuspecting crowd. Dern was born to play parts like this and it's a reminder of how terrific an actor he is and how sad it is that he doesn't work as much as he used to.

The final 40 minutes is intercut between the game (actually shot during the real Cowboys-Steelers Super Bowl game of 76) and the unfolding of the final stages of the plot. It's tense and exciting as Shaw and cohorts commandeer helicopters to try to catch the blimp heading to the big game to unleash its deadly attack.

Kudos to director John Frankheimer for keeping the pacing on this 2 hour 25 minute thriller moving. The editing is first rate and the music score by John Williams is one of his best though it is never mentioned when his name comes up.

If you like a good thriller that is never boring and will keep you on the edge of your seat, I highly recommend "Black Sunday."

It's interesting to see how it builds up the tension

[philip_vanderveken · 7/10 · 19 August 2005]

Hollywood has always been keen on disaster movies and I guess movies about a massive terrorist attack could be put in that same category. And it has to be said, terrorism may well be a hot item today, but it already existed in the seventies. Take for instance the Olympic Games in Munich in 1972 during which several Israeli athletes died after being taken hostage by a group of Palestinians. Hollywood saw those images too of course and they were obviously inspired by it. What other explanation could there be for this movie?

A terrorist organization called Black September is planning to attack a large target in the USA. One of them is Michael Lander, a Vietnam veteran, who is psychologically scarred because he was held as a prisoner of war and lost his wife because the government didn't help him. Another member is a German-Arabian woman called Dahlia who leads the operation and who appears to have a personal reason for this attack. When her house is invaded by the Israeli secret service, Major Kobakov has his gun on her, but doesn't shoot. They let her live, but before blowing up the house, the secret service manages to capture some vital information, which they give to the USA to inform them about what is about to happen. They don't know what the target will be, but Kobakov is convinced that there will be plenty of victims and that the damage will be large. With the help of FBI-agent Corley, he tries to stop them before it's too late, but his methods aren't always appreciated by the Americans...

Normally I'm not too much a fan of action or disaster movies, but this one was different. Thanks to the tension that is built up throughout the entire movie, I kept my interest in this film. For a long time this felt much more like a thriller than like the average action movie and that's a very good thing. Also the fact that it isn't immediately obvious why 'the bad guys' want to attack the USA is interesting. Normally that's the kind of information that they give away immediately, but not this time. I really appreciated that. Also worth mentioning is the acting and the relevance of the subject today. It will all feel quite familiar, although I don't think the makers of this movie could ever have thought that it would..

The only 'problem' that I had with this movie is the ending. In my opinion that was a bit too much and quite predictable. It just didn't seem to fit in with everything that I had seen before that and I admit that it spoiled a part of my fun. Still, that's no reason to believe that this movie isn't any good. I still give it a 7/10.

Where's the DVD???

[jbirtel · 9/10 · 3 January 2003]

With so much crap on the dvd store shelves, you gotta wonder who's in charge from preventing this (sadly) prophetic minor classic from being available.

Unless this is presented in widescreen, I refuse to see it again because the pan & scan version skips out half of the visuals; it's just not the same movie.

I saw this in 77' at the theater and again at the drive-in and my heart raced twice as fast (the 2nd time seeing it) during the last half of the movie because Frankenheimer had such a grasp on building tension. A couple of years later, I saw it broadcast on CBS, Sunday night AFTER the televised Pittsburg vs Dallas Super Bowl (in the late 70's, the Super Bowl started much earlier...CBS executives must of had a field day on the irony of that match up). I couldn't believe the epic scope that was lost on the pan & scan.

Everyone is top notch (yes, I had read the book). The 'good' guys are almost as ruthless as the terrorists in their quest to prevent thousands of innocent lives lost. Don't expect any snappy one liners after someone is dispatched; these are harsh, brutal portrayals. In these times, the movie is no longer escapism, but a frightening reality that (arguably) may be preventing the dvd release.

And the world lost so much with Robert Shaw's untimely passing. What a range of talent!

8.5 out of 10! One of the most gripping thrillers I've ever seen.

Good film; Frankenheimer's direction the best aspect

[MovieAddict2016 · 7/10 · 10 December 2005]

John Frankenheimer was one of the cinema's best and most talented directors, yet for some reason he rarely achieved the same status of respect as, say, Martin Scorsese, Alfred Hitchcock, or even Brian De Palma.

"Black Sunday" is based on the novel by Thomas Harris ("Silence of the Lambs"), and is one of four books he's written that does not deal with the character of Hannibal Lecter. The book is pretty interesting (if not great) and the film does a commendable job of translating it to the screen.

It seems all the more prescient today, given the political turmoil in the world and particularly between the United States and the Middle East. Robert Shaw plays an FBI agent who stumbles upon plans by a demented war veteran (Bruce Dern, "The 'burbs") to attack the US Superbowl with the help of Iraeli conspirators.

You may remember this in another film a few years back named "The Sum of All Fears" (2002). That was based on a book by Tom Clancy, who stole from Harris and allegedly had accusations brought against him. (It's not the first time he's been accused of "stealing" from other authors - Elmore Leonard accused him of having stolen the name Jack Ryan from a mystery thriller he wrote named "The Big Bounce").

Shaw and Dern both give good, solid performances but in the end it is Frankenheimer's thrilling, paranoid direction that makes this worth seeing. Definitely one to check out.

His suffering makes your heart ache.

[lancaster2778 · 9/10 · 31 October 2004]

Hang on tight for this one, folks! This flick moves so fast sometimes that you might think you missed something along the way. Basic story line holds up well through the years. Good chase scene on the Florida streets! Excellent camera work all the way through. Cast is excellent--especially Mr. Shaw (as usual). He gives David Kabakov a healthy measure of humanity that sprays out of the film and covers you like a heavy wool coat; his suffering makes your heart ache. And boy, is that blimp a pest! This one is worth the view--from beginning to end. A classic!

Solid Terrorist Thriller.

[AaronCapenBanner · 7/10 · 21 September 2013]

Robert Shaw plays Israeli agent Kabokov, who learns that a terrorist organization named Black September is planning an attack on the United States, which involves a known woman terrorist named Dahlia(played by Marthe Keller) who has enlisted the services of disgruntled Vietnam Veteran Michael Lander(played by Bruce Dern) to fly a Good Year blimp in the next Super Bowl, crashing its bomb-laden body into the stadium, killing thousands, all on national television. Kabokov races against time to stop this plan before it is too late...

Exciting and provocative film(especially today) has an interesting story, good action, and fine acting, which never lags despite its nearly Two & a half hour length.

Based on the Thomas Harris novel, and directed by John Frankenheimer.

I don't get all the good reviews

[mls4182 · 3/10 · 8 May 2021]

I thought this film was excruciating. Ninety percent of it was crazy people screaming in bad accents. There was no drama, no suspense. The ending was almost comical. The panic crowd scenes were so badly done they are hilarious and the pathetic special effects were painful to see. Robert Shaw performing acrobatic stunts? Oh as if!

Not quite escapism anymore

[drosse67 · 29 August 2002]

Black Sunday was considered a "what if" disaster movie in the '70s, although it's not a disaster movie along the lines of Earthquake!, Flood! or the others. Now of course it seems less like a "what if" movie and some of the lines of "fictional" dialogue have actually been quoted in the news recently. This is an absorbing thriller, and does not rely on the special effects that so many thrillers like "The Siege" (and probably The Sum of All Fears, which I haven't seen) employ. Too bad Robert Shaw passed at such a relatively young age--in all of the movies I've seen him in (The Sting, The Taking of Pelham 1, 2, 3, Jaws and this one), he created such different types of characters. I didn't even recognize him at first in this one, going from the Irish accent of Jaws to the Israeli accent in Black Sunday. John Frankenheimer gripped my attention for the whole movie, and considering its length (nearly 3 hours) this is no small feat. Even Bruce Dern, doing his usual psycho thing, was good. Highly recommended.

Terrorists are killers, no matter how tragic their past lives were.

[mark.waltz · 7/10 · 13 January 2022]

This is an enjoyable but massively over long Thriller dealing with the attempts of Palestine supporting terrorists to create panic at the Super Bowl over there during over the United States involvement in supporting Israel. That's a combination of thrills for sports fans and for fans of complex political thrillers, taking director John Frankenheimer back down the territory of mind control that he first showed in "The Manchurian Candidate", which was ironically out of circulation at the time. It's an ironic emphasis on the lyric of the bombs bursting in air during the Star-Spangled Banner as the Goodyear blimp above Miami prepares to make its flight over the stadium. The mind control has obviously work on a suicidal Vietnam War veteran played by Bruce Dern, and others involved in the plot, including Martha Keller and Robert Shaw, have their own agendas.

It takes nearly two hours for them to get to the actual Super Bowl sequence, but there is plenty of action on the way as well as Carnage, with Keller quite the adept assassin, at one point posing as a nurse and killing a security guard to get to a hospitalized target. You get to know these characters I've been personally too, and certainly while you routed them to fail, the sympathy towards their cards isn't completely missing even though it has evil intentions. This isn't your typical disaster flick (a genres that was slowly decreasing in popularity at the time), but one that utilized real world politics as part of its plot development.

The film becomes more nail biting as it reaches its climax, and it's pretty obvious that somehow the mission is going to fail, but just how becomes the Intriguing elements. This is a high-budget thriller well written and well-made, although I could have easily seen a good 20 minutes trimmed off of it. Keller is the most sinister of the three, dispatching her victims simply as if she was throwing out a Big Mac container. There's also an appearance by President Carter, seeing arriving at the Super Bowl, giving an even bigger political agenda, just like the film "Hennesy" had done years ago with the sequence of terrorist Rod Steiger in Westchester Abbey in London with the queen present. It takes a little patience to stick with this during the slow points, but ultimately it all worked out as an engaging, exciting thriller.

brutal terrorism thriller

[SnoopyStyle · 7/10 · 4 October 2021]

Global terrorists gather in Beirut to plan an attack on America. They plan to attack the Super Bowl. American special forces attack the hideout but the plan is already set in motion. Dahlia (Marthe Keller) is the terrorist. Lander (Bruce Dern) is her American accomplice. Israeli Kabakov (Robert Shaw) leads the pursuit.

This is a brutal thriller from both sides. I'm a little surprised that the good guys are willing to go torture up some info. I wouldn't say that it's that thrilling. It has plenty of action. It doesn't have the standard twists and turns. The story flows in a straight forward manner. If they add in more shaky-cam action, this would be a modern thriller. The use of the actual Super Bowl really adds to its authenticity. In the pre-9/11 world, this would have been outlandish terrorism and threatening torture something unthinkable.

Super Brawl movie: Good Vs Evil.

[ironhorse_iv · 7/10 · 3 February 2013]

In a post 9/11 world, a movie such as this will never get made in fear of copycats or giving terrorists ideas. Even if it did, with all the political correctness and fear of Muslim threats, it would be a tough task to get it produce. The whole movie would be neutered to death. Pre-9/11 controversial movies such as this could be made. The film was created in 1976 no less than 4 years after the Munich massacre at the 1972 Olympics, where 11 members of the Israeli Olympic team were taken hostage and eventually killed, along with a German police officer, by the Palestinian group Black September. For a movie to come out just a few years later after such a tragedy, using similars to that event, it was very surprising that this was even made. Well, in the 1970s movies had more freedom to being made since the majority of the film back then was focus on gloom and violence. Before the Star Wars blockbuster, gloom movies such as this was popular. Today is Super Bowl Sunday, and I thought why not, let's talk about Black Sunday. Let's toss the pigskin around for a bit. Black Sunday was first a novel by Thomas Harris whom would later be known as the man who scare us all in a different way with Hannibal Lector in the book 'Silence of the Lambs'. The book was pick up and made by John Frankenheimer. The director was known for his works in political thriller such as 'The Manchurian Candidate' and 'Seven Days in May' and 'Black Sunday' was no different. Black Sunday is the story of a Black September terrorist group attempting to blow up a Goodyear blimp hovering over the Super Bowl stadium with 80,000 people and the President of the United States in attendance. David Kabakov (Robert Shaw) is an Israeli commando working for the Mossad hunting down members of the Black September terrorist group. Robert Shaw was great. Sort of a humorless Israeli James Bond who doesn't chase women. He is bad ass, but his character was kinda out there. I love the way he pulls no punches in his actions. He takes his actions to extreme. He discovers the Super Bowl plot, masterminded by Dahlia Iyad (Marthe Keller), a brutal female killer assassin. The assassination attempt scene where Dahlia dress as nurse was later pay homage in films like Kill Bill, and Dark Knight with Daryl Hanah and the Joker, by the way. It's clear that Dahlia Iyad is getting help from a deranged Vietnam veteran Michael Lander (Bruce Dern) who captain the blimps during the weekends. Bruce Dern is great at being chilling. The way he longs for suicide, and how he wants to kill the cheerful, carefree American civilians that he sees from his blimp each weekend is dark. In some scenes, even dark horse Dahlia is scare of him. Bruce Dern was everyone's favorite psychopath in the '70s. It's also great to see how author Thomas Harris has Michael Lander and David Kabakov perfectly opposed of each other, but so similar to each other: both men are dark for different reasons. David wants to revenge for Munich against all the Black September terrorists and willing to kill anybody to stop them. Michael is willing to kill others as well as himself just because of his unhappiness. It's nice to see director John Frankenheimer creates a chilling portrait of people obsessed with a cause for which they will die. In an incredible finale, Dern and Keller navigate the lethal airship into the terror-stricken stadium, pursued by Shaw in a helicopter, climaxing one of the most exciting and unusual chases in movie history. While the movie is interesting, it's the same old story between the two psychopaths. Boy finds girl, boy loses girl, girl finds boy, boy remembers girl, boy and girl try to kill people with blimp. Goodyear? No, probably their worst. I like how the movie was able to get real NFL logos and teams and the Goodyear just to makes it much more realistic. If they made this today, they'd probably use fake teams and blimp company. Luckily, Frankenheimer had a good relationship with the heads of Goodyear as a result of working with them on his earlier film Grand Prix. While Goodyear allowed the use of their airship fleet, they did not allow the Goodyear Wingfoot logo (prominently featured on the side of the blimp) to be used in the advertising or the poster of the film. Thus, the words "Super Bowl" are featured in place of the logo on the blimp in the advertising collateral. Frankenheimer was even able to secure the unprecedented cooperation of the NFL and the production was allowed to film at Super Bowl X no less. So the game was really the Super Bowl, not staged. The final attack on the stadium was filmed later, using a mock-up of the forward section of the blimp and 10,000 extras. One of the biggest faults of the movie is that the movie suffered the death of "1000 cuts" in this long-awaited climactic scene. It still gives me a headache to watch this one-take figurative and literal screen disaster with deplorable special effects. Oh well, it's not like they had any real competition that year, just that "Star Wars" flick, so no problem. The score John Williams gives in the film add tension and thriller to already action-packed film. The fight scene along with the blimp with the music gave me goosebumps. The movie didn't do any good PR for Goodyear by the way, and thus Goodyear started using the blue and yellow markings after the film was made to save itself. While the movie is a great flick, it's suffers from post-911 fears. After all, it doesn't seem so far-fetched today. If you want to watch a thriller. It's worth trying.

just awesome

[colin1-1 · 10/10 · 6 January 2004]

Black Sunday? Where do I begin? Until The lord of the Rings series, nothing could dethrone what should have been a classic as my all time favorite film. It is the film that made me want to write movies.

This is a movie that has a sad history. One of the reasons attributed to BS not making a lot more money was because Two Minute Warning which was a horrible film from Universal came out three months before it.

Black Sunday was a perfect child of seventies movie-making - believable characters thrown into an unbelievable situation. Frankenheimer allowed the audience to see what was motivating each of the main characters, so that when the conclusion happened we cared. Not to mention, the action and stunts at the end combine to make one of the best chase sequences today.

Yes the blimp crashing could have been done better, but they probably didn't have the fx or the budget. But still, it is amazing film-making.

Having just looked at it again on my new DVD I have new appreciation for it. Robert Shaw comes across as having seen it all. He's tired. Bruce Dern isn't just crazy. We learn why he is crazy. In a weird way, although he is a murderer I still feel sorry for him when he pleads with Marthe Keller to help him. And even Fritz Weaver doesn't come across as an idiot FBI agent which is what we are spoon-fed in almost every movie. John William's score is one of his best.

This is definitely a classic. And a tension-building movie that would be hard to make today. I recommend it to anyone who enjoys a thriller that starts off small and ends with a bang. Literally.

Way ahead of its time considering the horror of 9/11.

Bruce Dern acts unhinged, Robert Shaw acts intense, Marthe Keller acts like Arnold Schwarzenegger

[rhinocerosfive-1 · 7/10 · 22 January 2008]

John Frankenheimer made very good movies and very bad movies and very mediocre movies. He is not one of the greats, and he is not among the worst. This movie is no "Manchurian Candidate," but it's no "Reindeer Games" either. ("Reindeer Games" indeed. Ernest Lehman's toilet paper reads better than Ehren Kruger's most polished script. Robert Shaw picks slivers of guys like Ben Affleck out of his molars. In the psycho mastermind department, I'll take Bruce Dern over Gary Sinise any day, night, afternoon, whatever. And as far as supporting players, give me one Fritz Weaver against ten Donal Logues and I still got you covered.)

Much is made these days of this film's (and book's) prescience in the field of international terrorism. Such comments are made by folks who apparently have no historical perspective from which to speak. Black September was the Al Quaeda of the 1970s, as real a specter then as any we have now. The Munich Olympics had already happened; Athens had already happened; Khartoum too; and, as Spielberg's "Munich" has reminded us, Mossad was already busy shutting Black September down. "Black Sunday" simply uses headlines as fuel. It's like calling "Psycho" prescient for its use of the serial killer, or "Taxi Driver" for predicting (inspiring?) a botched political assassination. I like watching Mossad agents shoot jihadists as much as the next guy, but let's call this what it is: timely then, and sadly still timely now. The only real anachronism is Goodyear, in return for massive product placement, accepting its flagship symbol's presentation as a weapon of mass destruction.

Mostly this movie is notable for being one more excellent job by John Alonzo. I don't think he had it in him to expose a bad frame. Man, the 70s had Alonzo, Michael Chapman, Vilmos Zsigmond, Laszlo Kovacks, Gordon Willis, Sven Nykvist, Owen Roizman. Even guys who had done their best work in the 50s and 60s were still available: Philip Lathrop, Robert Surtees, Lucien Ballard. Now, happily, we've got Roger Deakins and Janusz Kaminski in effect, and Michael Ballhaus still turns in a wonderful job now and then though his best days are behind...but I wonder if we'll see days like those again. I suppose the digital age has rendered many skill sets obsolete. Fine. But digital has a long way to go before it produces an image as remarkable as any half-dozen in a b-grade Alonzo effort like "Black Sunday."

One of Frankenheimer's Best

[MovieGuyFunTime · 9/10 · 4 March 2021]

Not sure why this film doesn't get better ratings. It really is a great movie with a great (and very realistic) story line.

The acting is superb (especially Bruce Dern) along with the action scenes which are as good or better than anything you'd see today... and it was done without CGI!

The story is basically about a terrorist organization that believes the US is on the wrong side of the Palestine/Israel feud and seeks to punish Americans until they change sides. Pretty basic modes-operandi that we've been dealing with forever: "If you don't help us we will kill you." Some bargain... :\

Anyway, the locations for the film are very impressive including an actual football game and other public locations where most of the "extras" were real people who didn't know what was going on... as Frankenheimer was known to do.

If you've ever seen the Batman movie "The Dark Knight Rises", the plot line and ending are suspiciously similar to "Black Sunday."

The only reason I give it 9 stars instead of 10 was that some of the visual effects near the end of the film were a little low-budget and cheesy and the final moment was a little underwhelming and anti-climactic. Even without the use of today's CGI wizardry, I think they could have done a bit better especially given the incredible action sequences up to that point.

Anyway, this is a great film and a good reminder that there are always evil monsters out there ready to do horrible things to innocent people just to get their way.

Methodical pacing Drags Smart Thriller

[kgprophet · 6/10 · 3 September 2013]

Based on a best selling novel. The book, which I have never read, probably is in the style that Tom Clancy made famous, with a slow methodical setup of the small details of creating the bomb and getting it to the target. In the movie version of "The Sum of all Fears", they threw out all the slow build-up, and made a crackerjack modern thriller. When Black Sunday was made in 1976, John Frankenheimer decided to stick with the slow buildup. IMDb trivia remarks that it has one of the slowest editing rates of a major film. (5.3 seconds). Perhaps influenced by the hand-held documentary style of the cinematography in the successful "French Connection", many scenes are played out with a hand held camera walking around the room as the characters interact. In action scenes, too, the cameraman follows the characters as they infiltrate the compound for Black September.

My recollection of this film when I saw it for the first time on TV, was the big climax scene was choppily edited and looked fake. I also couldn't help but react like everyone else to the ploddy pacing. Which is too bad, because within the extended build-up, there are well executed actions scenes and a well directed thriller. Frankenheimer had a deep well of supporting actors and a good sense of dialogue from directing drama for television. In fact, it seems like they had a tie-in with CBS, with familiar actors from 'Hawaii 5-O' or perhaps 'Kojak'. But for today's audiences, editors know their attention span and edit the pace of the film accordingly. A good contrast was the reaction to the wildly successful "Exorcist" when it was re-released in theatres on the 2000s. I could feel the impatience as I sat with an audience during a showing. The editing pace in the 70s was much slower. The idea of shooting every scene with multiple cameras was not common. Directors such as Spielberg preferred playing out scenes in a wide shot, letting the audience "edit" for themselves by choosing what to look at. It is a brilliant technique that only works if the scene is staged cleverly.

There are many points where the slow pacing of this film tries your patience, even back then. Bruce Dern is fun to watch as a crazy guy, but his scenes are allowed to ramble on too long. Robert Shaw is an Israeli commando. Marthe Keller is fantastic as the lead, a beautiful woman playing a terrorist. Her performance could have been as Oscar nominee if it wasn't for the clunky finale.

Frankenheimer also had expert help with Tom Rolf editing and John Williams (who also worked with Frankenheimer in TV) composing. So it is hard to fault this film. But there are just too many scenes that drag out the plot or the characters when there is not enough time. For instance, after Shaw is injured, he and his partner talk about the complications involved with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It is relevant and provides depth to the plot, but the movie runs 2 hours and 23 minutes. The subject matter does not justify extended runtime.

It is really too bad the level of sophistication with effects were still not developed when this movie was made. Ironically, ILM was born the same year as Black Sunday was released in 1977. The screenplay and dialogue are smart and the subject matter is ripped from the headlines. With a ton of gravitas supporting the film, it only falters as it tries to drum up the tension as Shaw tries to stop the blimp at the end.

See it for the intelligent drama, forgive the laughable effects.

Another masterpiece thriller from John Frankenheimer

[Leofwine_draca · 9/10 · 21 July 2017]

Black Sunday is another exemplary thriller film from the 1970s that can be put in the same class as THE TAKING OF PELHAM 123, JUGGERNAUT, and Roller-coaster. It's another feather in the cap for director John Frankenheimer, a directed who began his career shooting remarkable pictures like THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE and ended it still making remarkable pictures like RONIN, and it's one of his strongest works.

The plot is simple, a manhunt slightly reminiscent of DAY OF THE JACKAL. Ruthless Israeli agent Robert Shaw is on the trail of a couple of mad bombers who plan to attack the American Superbowl. The running time is lengthy and the first half slow, but as a slow burner this grips the attention throughout and it builds to large-scale greatness at the climax.

Shaw is excellent, as always, and Bruce Dern and Marthe Keller make for suitably disturbed villains. The only thing dated here are the special effects, but that's irrelevant because the rest of the film is so well made and exciting. Black Sunday is a film that offers grittiness, harsh violence, suspense, strong acting, inventiveness, and fear in equal measure, and another great movie from a decade full of them.

Sunday bloody Sunday?

[dbdumonteil · 7/10 · 16 October 2006]

John Frankenheimer tried to steer his career towards novel directions in the first half of the seventies: it gave inti mist works like "the Gypsy Moths" (1969) and "I Walk the Line" (1970) while "the Impossible Object" (1973) flirted with European intellectualism. But these assumed perspectives didn't convince the mainstream public and as they weren't all guarantees of artistic achievement were deadlocks in his filmography. So, the filmmaker returned to a genre in which he excelled: the action film with "French Connection 2" (1975) a less enticing work than its elder brother. If it could be pigeonholed in the same category, "Black Sunday" (1977) based on the first novel by Thomas Harris who will later gain worldwide celebrity as Hannibal Lecter's father could also belong to the disaster movie which was thriving in the mid-seventies. More important, this was one of the first films to deal with the grave issue of terrorism that started to be really prevailing in the seventies. A quarter of a century later, this is a work that stays in tune with the current period.

Action-packed stories were Frankenheimer's specialty and "Black Sunday" confirms it. It is filmed with energy, nervousness and almost never gives respite to the audience. The filmmaker is known not to say celebrated among insiders and moviegoers for his innovating choice of camera angles. In the antsy moments, he has recourse to a fresh, novel device at the time: the camera hold at the shoulder which helps to make palpable on the screen a sense of urgency. Later, he will profess that the sequence in which Kabakov hunts Fasil down in Miami was one of the best he ever filmed. The terror on the walk-ons was natural. And certain shots are mind-boggling. I particularly relish the one which goes from Dahlia's car to showcase a part of the full stadium and ends on Kabakov. To give the very long sequence of the super bowl final a larger than life authenticity, most of it was shot on the day it really took place and so, it was real footage that Frankenheimer used with the main actors playing their own roles. The tail and quite fuzzy end of the scene which sees the spectators panicked with the zeppelin just over their heads was shot the eve of the final.

During the film, Frankenheimer even finds time to construe the personality of the threesome of characters. Kabakov hunts down the formidable duo of terrorists with a disillusioned air in his eyes as if he felt that terrorism was here to stay and as one of the characters says to him at one point about Dahlia: "she's your creation". Lander and Dahlia form a terrifying, intelligent pair of terrorists and Frankenheimer tries to understand what prompts them to commit acts of deadly violence. Lander is the most interesting to describe. He is convinced of his own perspective because he was a prisoner of war and never recovered from the humiliations the USA made him endure. "Black Sunday" has even a connection with "the Mandchurian Candidate" (1962), Frankenheimer's magnum opus. Bruce Dern and Laurence Harvey were both brainwashed under different circumstances and act against their native countries. In the same way of understanding, Robert Shaw's behavior could make think of Frank Sinatra's: they try to stop an impending threat. And the two films capture a paranoid aura.

Beyond the simple level of an entertaining action-packed story, Frankenheimer's film makes a bitter assessment of terrorism and arouses major issues still relevant today: how can certain people contemplate such acts of madness? How is it possible to put a break on terrorism or to stop it? How can one struggle against this dangerous will of destruction? This is a film to meditate.

Please, a Sense of Reality

[Hitchcoc · 4/10 · 30 November 2016]

I'm okay with the anger and the violence brought about by it. We are in a time of terror, some forty years after the making of this film. We have had 9/11 and have been fighting one of the longest wars in our history. This is a great motivation for the plot here. There have been other movies made about these people and those that heroically oppose them. But you can take any situation, no matter how interesting, and utterly ruin the movie by making a rescue that is so beyond belief that human being could never carry it out. Bouncing around through the sky on a blimp, rigging things up, shooting things, cliffhanger exploits are too much. The contrivances are all over the place. The point that should have been made is lost in superfluous exploits of superhuman characters that are not believable.