Black Sunday

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This article is about the book and movie Black Sunday. For other meanings see Black Sunday (disambiguation).

Black Sunday is both a 1975 novel by Thomas Harris and a 1977 movie starring Robert Shaw, Bruce Dern and Fritz Weaver. John Frankenheimer, who also directed The Manchurian Candidate, directed this film.

Plot

[Spoiler warningSpoiler warning]: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Michael Lander (played by Bruce Dern in the film) is a psychotic American Blimp pilot deranged due to years as a tortured prisoner of war in Vietnam, a failed marriage, and a bitter court martial. Conspiring with a Palestinian terrorist group known as Black September, Lander launches a nefarious plot to detonate a flechette-based bomb, housed in the undercarriage of a blimp, over a football stadium during the Super Bowl. American and Israeli intelligence agencies, led by Mossad agent David Kabakov (played by Robert Shaw) and FBI agent Sam Corley (Fritz Weaver), race to prevent the catastrophe. To add further intrigue and a pall of doom, the President of the United States attends the Super Bowl despite the pleas of Kabakov and Corley.

The film was a commercial hit when it was released in 1977. Although director John Frankenheimer lamented shortcomings in the visual effects of the finale (due to a small budget), many critics trumpeted the final scene featuring a helicopter/blimp chase over the Orange Bowl as one of the more riveting and unusual in movie history. Black Sunday is also another triumphal soundtrack from musical conductor John Williams.

A significant portion of the filming was done during actual Super Bowl X at the Orange Bowl in Miami, Florida, on January 18, 1976. The Pittsburgh Steelers defeated the Dallas Cowboys 21-17. In the movie, Kabakov discusses the security arrangements for the game with Miami Dolphins owner Joe Robbie, who plays himself.

Differences between the book and the movie

In the book, the blimp is owned by the Aldridge Rubber Company. In the movie, the Goodyear Rubber Company agreed to allow its blimp to be used in the film. A representative of Goodyear noted that it is not possible for two people alone to launch the blimp.
In the book, Kabakov's assistant Mochevsky survives to the end of the story, but Kabakov, the helicopter pilot and the FBI Agent Corley are killed when the blimp explodes. In the movie, Mochevsky is killed about 1/2 way through and Kabakov is not killed in the blimp explosion.
In the book, the terrorist who assisted Lander and the female terrorist survive and are taken back to Israel (by Mochevsky) to stand trial; in the movie, Kabakov shoots and kills him during a running gun battle through Miami in which he kills half-a-dozen bystanders and police.
In the book, the Super Bowl takes place in New Orleans; in the movie it takes place in Miami.
In the book, Kabakov has a love interest.

External links

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