Hollywood Takes On Business Travel

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No Highway in the Sky

A British import from 1951, with an international cast led by James Stewart, Marlene Dietrich, and Glynis Johns. Stewart is Stewart—bumbling, befuddled, distracted, lovable, and heroic—and he saves the day by bucking the establishment over the safety of an important new passenger plane. Johns plays the quintessential 1950s stewardess who falls in love with Stewart, moves in with him, and then organizes his life. Corny, charming—and weirdly compelling because the plot is eerily similar to the mid-50s catastrophes that befell the De Havilland Comet, the world’s first commercial jet.

Weekend at the Waldorf

An Americanized remake of 1932’s Grand Hotel, this 1945 version has a gorgeous cast (Ginger Rogers, Lana Turner, and the almost-as-pretty Van Johnson and Walter Pidgeon) and a thousand beauty shots of New York’s Waldorf-Astoria in its heyday. It’s also got Xaviar Cugat, who really ran the Waldorf house band back in the day when hotels had house bands. This is the antidote for too many stays at Hilton Garden Inns, Courtyards by Marriott, and Four Points by Sheraton. I should know: I did a weekend at the Waldorf last year with my frequent-flying wife and we had a marvelous time comparing the hotel then and now.

The V.I.P.’s

Another remake of Grand Hotel, this 1963 British flick moves the action to London’s Heathrow Airport in the early days of jet travel, when the “jet set” was a new phenomenon. An all-star cast (Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, Louis Jourdan, Rod Taylor, Orson Welles, Margaret Rutherford, Maggie Smith, and David Frost) is thrown into a V.I.P. lounge to wait out a long, fog-induced delay. The Terence Rattigan script is supposedly based on Vivian Leigh’s real-life attempt to leave Laurence Olivier for Peter Finch. Which might explain why everything about the movie is bizarre: the fashions, the acting, the plot lines, and the depictions of global business and business travel. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll make fun of Elizabeth Taylor’s Givenchy togs—and then you’ll wonder why your life on the road isn’t nearly so glamorous.

Décalage Horaire

Retitled Jet Lag for its American release, this 2002 French film was Juliette Binoche’s first outing after Chocolat. She plays an unhappy hairdresser running away from her life and into unhappy celebrity chef Jean Reno at Paris’ Charles DeGaulle Airport. They dislike each other on sight, which means they must share the last available room at the airport hotel during a flight disruption. You already know how this goes: brief affair, lots of angst, lives altered, and what the French consider a happy ending. But it is surprisingly effective in showing how a business traveler (Reno) and a tourist (Binoche) react differently to basic travel snafus.

Grosse Point Blank

This may be the best movie you’ve never seen. It was in and out of theaters so fast in 1997 that I’m not sure it ever made in-flight movie rotations. It is dark and disturbing—an assassin (John Cusack) goes to his 10-year high school reunion in search of his life and his true love (Minnie Driver)—but it is also a laugh-out-loud comedy. Watch how Cusack plays his character, especially in the hotel-room scenes, and then tell me he isn’t playing a stressed-out business traveler. Pay attention to Joan Cusack in the tiny but extraordinary role of the office assistant who keeps her frequent-flying boss on track and on schedule. There are also wonderful supporting performances by Jeremy Piven, Dan Ackroyd, and Hank Azaria.

The Fine Print…

Planes, Trains, and Automobiles is the life-on-the-road comedy starring John Candy and Steve Martin. The 1987 box office hit is probably the most successful business-travel film ever. It’s funny, of course, but, for my tastes, a little too much like our real lives—and it makes me squirm.

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