Films with preposterously long airport runways

October 26, 2017 5:24 PM

I've just watched Fast and Furious 6, where the climactic sequence, of a plane being chased by cars, goes on for many minutes. Which, as calculated by The BBC and Empire makes for a runway of quite some length. Are there any other films where, on reflection, the runway is extremely long?
posted by Wordshore to Media & Arts (6 answers total)

I'm hoping you mean runways metaphorically here: "Minority Report" has this action scene in which Anderton (Tom Cruise) is on the run and the authorities have taken control of his car. So he takes the opportunity of getting out of his automated car and moving car-to-car while this stretch of roadway runs down the side of a building. I can't find where I read it, but given the length of this scene and the apparent speed of the cars, this building (and therefore those like it in the background) has to be preposterously tall.

Good, I found this in the edit window. This video addresses the height of the building, and estimates that it's about 8 times taller than it first appears in the scene looking down the side of the building at the start.
posted by Sunburnt at 6:04 PM on October 26, 2017 [1 favorite]

Does the landing scene in Airplane! count? (At 3:30 the airport PA starts announcing that the plane is arriving at gate eight...gate nine...and so on.)
posted by Room 641-A at 7:44 PM on October 26, 2017 [2 favorites]

I haven't seen it since I was a teenager but I remember the final scene in Die Hard 2 seemed like it went on forever.
posted by mannequito at 9:01 PM on October 26, 2017 [3 favorites]

I just checked and the Goldeneye cold open seems to fit the bill in that the plane clearly covers a longer distance than available runway.
posted by cyphill at 9:15 PM on October 26, 2017 [1 favorite]

Die Hard 2 scene-- looks like they're moving at Taxi-speed for the fight, as McClane has jammed one of the controls surfaces.

Goldeneye scene-- looks like about 50 seconds from when the plane is about a third of the way along until it launches off the end of the runway.
posted by Sunburnt at 3:13 PM on October 27, 2017 [1 favorite]

I'm rewatching Die Hard 2. At 01:43:25, we first see the airplane taxiing, and right around that time, we hear the 5-minute warning from an inbound airplane, running on fumes (and naturally carrying McClane's wife and Richard Thornberg (great 80s-movie antagonist William Atherton), reporter from the original DH). 01:49.14 is when the badguy kicks McClane off the wing ("Bon Voyage!") and he removes the jacket at 01:49:30, meaning the plane can now safely take off. From that point, after a full 6 minutes of taxiing in a straight line, it throttles up to takeoff speed and lifts off, followed quickly by the ignited trail of JP4.

I'd guess it was going maybe 25mph while it was taxiing, and 6 minutes of taxiing alone is 2.5miles, which at 13,200ft is longer than Dulles' longest runways, which are 11,500 ft.
posted by Sunburnt at 9:54 PM on December 14, 2017 [1 favorite]