The Hindenburg
- PG
- Year:
- 1975
- 125 min
- 320 Views
The Hindenburg is coming again.
That's what all the excitement is about.
In spite of protests like this...
the pride of Germany is due here
on the morning of May 6.
During the 1937 season...
the giant airship is scheduled
to make 18 round trips...
from Frankfurt to Lakehurst, New Jersey.
Just 150 years ago,
the Montgolfier brothers, two Frenchmen...
made the first controlled flight
in a hot-air balloon.
This rock-a-bye baby is perkin' along
with a new gas:
hydrogen.Soon, an airborne banana split
with four scoops.
In the Gay Nineties,
ballooning really got off the ground.
Ladies, check the balloon sleeves on
those stylish aeronauts in the basket.
By the early 1900s everyone agreed...
like a cigar.
Yes, sir, what the world needed
was a good five-cent flying machine.
Alberto Santos-Dumont,
achieved a major breakthrough...
when he hooked a two-cylinder
gasoline motor to the basket.
Flat tire, Alberto?
All the same, he went on to win
the 100,000-franc prize...
in his 80-foot Tootsie Roll.
Next came the semirigid airship...
with a light metal frame supported by...
Oops!
Things are looking up.
more varieties than Heinz.
Bigger and better airships,
all of them air-conditioned...
continued to pop up
before the World War.
The outdoor types.
With a girl along,
that probably was more fun...
than the rumble seat of a Stutz Bearcat.
Around this time,
a retired German army officer...
known as the crazy old
Count von Zeppelin...
flew a 400-foot sausage equipped
with two marine motors for 20 miles.
But seriously, folks,
after this amazing feat...
everyone wanted to be associated
with the Zeppelin Company.
The count and a young associate,
Dr. Hugo Eckener...
founded the world's first
air passenger line.
In 1924...
an airship for the U.S. Navy...
the LZ 126,
rechristened "The Los Angeles".
Until last year the Graf Zeppelin...
was considered the marvel of the age.
Since 1928 she has carried 13,000
passengers over a million miles...
without a single mishap.
But then, at the Zeppelin Company
works in Friedrichshafen...
German genius created
the airship supreme: the Hindenburg.
Her vast, cathedral-like hull,
almost three football fields long...
is an intricate web spun from more
than ten miles of duralumin girders.
Fifteen stories high...
it houses 16 giant cells containing
over 7 million cubic feet of hydrogen...
which lifts her 242 tons
of luxury into the clouds.
She is the climax of man's
dream to conquer the air...
the new queen of the skies.
The embassy received hundreds of letters
like that last year, Mr. Ambassador.
Mostly from cranks.
We can expect many more this season.
Mrs. Rauch's letter is different.
It's specific.
She spells out how and where
the zeppelin will be destroyed.
A time bomb over American territory.
- Franz.
- Erwin.
Showing us how you do it in Spain?
I'm afraid I don't fly very much there.
Good to have you back, Franz.
We hear they're giving you
a Knight's Cross to your Iron Cross.
For writing up dossiers, I suppose.
Half the time on our own people.
They're turning us
into a Gestapo, Erwin.
Get me out of Intelligence.
Get me back my Reconnaissance command.
That might not be easy, Franz.
Why not? All you have to do
is sign the order.
You've been brought back for
a special problem which we've inherited.
We've had our suspicions, Colonel...
and now that letter confirms there is a plot
to sabotage the LZ 129 on this flight.
Obviously, Dr. Goebbels, the sane thing
to do is to cancel the flight...
until the Gestapo uncovers the plot.
Sane but weak.
The propaganda value of the LZ 129
is highly important.
From a military standpoint,
she's a flying dinosaur.
Colonel, the LZ 129
is a world symbol of Nazi power.
It is an honor to guard her safety,
and you've been chosen.
My field is the estimation of enemy
air operations, it's not espionage.
You're being loaned to the LZ 129...
as the officer in charge
of security for this trip.
You will have the power to do
anything you think necessary...
but quietly and discreetly...
or it might appear
we have internal opposition.
Ah. And you're afraid it might
strengthen the resistance movement.
There is no
resistance movement, Colonel.
That's reassuring coming
from the Minister of Propaganda.
I mustn't keep you
from your next appointment.
Let us hope that you will change
your opinion of our "flying dinosaur."
Perhaps I will, unless there's
an egg hatching in her.
The Hindenburg is scheduled
to leave in two days, Colonel.
Why did the Gestapo
wait till now to show us this?
It's inexcusable that our passengers have
to make other travel arrangements this late.
- The flight hasn't been canceled.
- Not canceled? I thought...
- Why are you here?
- I'll be aboard.
A sort of special security officer.
I'd like you along, Captain Lehmann,
You may have to work with the Gestapo,
Colonel, but I don't.
You built the Hindenburg, Dr. Eckener.
Don't you want to protect your interests?
I've protected them for 40 years
by taking no risks.
Even if I wanted to go,
you'd never be able to clear it.
Dr. Eckener and I are out of favor
at the chancellery.
I refused to name the
Hindenburg after the Fuhrer.
Captain Pruss, the new commander,
is an excellent airshipman.
We trained him.
Don't embarrass yourself
by requesting me, Colonel.
They won't allow it,
and I prefer to leave it that way.
It's all arranged.
I'll see you at the airfield Monday.
Give me a break. Give me a break.
These stupid S.S. men crawling
through our ship morning till night...
with dirt on their shoes.
If we hid an elephant in the lounge,
they couldn't find it.
They weren't looking for an elephant.
Did you see Karl
when the S.S. dog barked?
He jumped ten feet, and the dog
bit him in the brains... here!
Better than being bitten by the S.S.
You should've refused
to go on that whale.
The crew might think I'm a Jonah.
I can't bear it.
Alfred, then Spain, now this.
We aren't far from Switzerland, Franz.
- I was walking along the river today and...
- No.
But you hate what you're doing now.
What would you have me
tell them in Switzerland?
That yesterday I was a colonel
in the German Air Force?
No. It'd be different if we were
Jews or pacifists, or even Communists.
- I can't.
I'd be a deserter.
Listen to me, Eleanore.
I spoke to Erwin.
He says he'll try to
get my old group back.
We could live in the south,
far from Berlin.
Poor Franz.
One, two, three, four, five,
six, seven, eight, nine, ten!
The winner!
You'll be drunk, Karl!
We'll be dry for two days
on board, woman.
Please, Karl. Not tonight.
One, two, three, four,
five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten!
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"The Hindenburg" Scripts.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 12 Nov. 2024. <https://www.scripts.com/script/the_hindenburg_20423>.
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