The Langoliers (miniseries)

Plot

A red-eye flight from Los Angeles to Boston becomes a nightmare when passengers wake up to find everyone else gone, leaving behind items like surgical implants. The remaining group includes pilot Brian Engle, who is deadheading; MI6 assassin Nick Hopewell; schoolteacher Laurel Stevenson; tool and die worker Don Gaffney; violinist Albert Kaussner; troubled teen Bethany Sims; mystery author Bob Jenkins; blind girl Dinah Bellman; sleepy businessman Rudy Warwick; and bond trader Craig Toomy.

Brian and Nick discover the cockpit empty, so Brian takes control. After failing to contact air traffic control or other planes, Brian reroutes the flight to Bangor, Maine, which angers Craig, who insists on attending a business meeting. At the deserted, powerless airport, the group finds everything dull and lifeless: matches won't light, sounds lack echo, and food has no taste. Dinah hears a distant crackling noise, and Bob theorizes the plane passed through a time rip into a past moment empty of people and energy.

Craig’s mental state deteriorates as he hallucinates his abusive father. He finds a gun in a locker and takes Bethany hostage; Albert attacks and is shot, but the bullet falls harmlessly. Nick ties Craig’s arms and urges the group to leave before the noise arrives. While restrained, Craig tells Dinah his father warned him about the Langoliers, monsters that chase and eat lazy children.

Cast

Patricia Wettig played Laurel Stevenson, a school teacher who uncharacteristically answered a personal ad to meet a man in Boston. Dean Stockwell portrayed Bob Jenkins, a mystery writer with a strong ability for deduction who pieces together the situation and provides theories that come true, sometimes with his sidekick Albert's help. David Morse played Captain Brian Engle, an airline pilot on his way to Boston after hearing his ex-wife had died in a fire; he is qualified to fly the plane and lands it safely.

Mark Lindsay Chapman played Nick Hopewell, a British secret agent and hitman going to Boston for a final mission, who is tough, quick, yet compassionate for the other passengers with the exception of Toomy. Frankie Faison played Don Gaffney, a military aircraft tool-and-die worker on his way to Boston to meet his first granddaughter. Baxter Harris played Rudy Warwick, a businessman whose insatiable appetite and sleepiness helps Bob deduce situations.

Kimber Riddle played Bethany Simms, a rebellious teenager on her way to Worcester, Massachusetts, to stay with her aunt, though she is convinced she'll be in drug rehab. Christopher Collet played Albert 'Ace' Kaussner, a violinist on his way to attend a music school in Boston who becomes the 'Watson' to Bob Jenkins. Kate Maberly played Dinah Catherine Bellman, a blind girl on her way to Boston for surgery to restore her eyesight; she has strange psychic powers and is able to see and communicate with Toomy telepathically.

Bronson Pinchot played Craig Toomy, a bond trader who is psychologically unsound because of childhood abuse by his domineering father. Christopher Cooke played 9-year-old Craig, and John Griesemer played Roger Toomy, Craig's cruel father. Stephen King appeared in a cameo as Tom Holby, Craig Toomy's boss. Tom Holland also appeared in a cameo as Harker, Nick's mission handler.

Casting

On her role of Laurel, Patricia Wettig thought she was moving away from roles that had stereotyped her with 'sensitive listener roles', although she conceded that she 'should probably resign myself to it'.

Production

Richard P. Rubinstein, through his company Laurel Entertainment, secured the rights to Stephen King's story "The Langoliers" from the collection Four Past Midnight in 1992. Rubinstein saw it as a "popcorn movie," contrasting it with his previous King adaptation, The Stand, which tackled heavier subjects; he described it as King's version of Ten Little Indians mixed with an Irwin Allen disaster film. Rubinstein had met Tom Holland during the stalled development of an adaptation of King's Thinner at Warner Bros. While waiting for that project to move forward, both King and Rubinstein agreed Holland was the right director, as King admired Holland's earlier work on Fright Night and Child's Play.

King was far less involved than he had been with The Stand, offering notes only on early screenplay drafts and reviewing the first ten days of dailies, with his remaining input limited to conversations with Holland.

Pre-production

For the airplane sequences, the production team obtained a retired Lockheed L-1011 TriStar from Japan. The aircraft was cut into pieces, shipped to the set, and reassembled to look whole. At the time, no other similar mock-up existed in the country, making it available for future rentals. The cockpit was detached and mounted on a hydraulic rig that could be moved to simulate turbulence.

Filming

The miniseries was shot almost entirely at Bangor International Airport in Bangor, Maine, King's hometown, during the summer of 1994. Producer David Kappes noted that the crew considered using closed airports in Pittsburgh and Denver but chose Bangor to film at the actual location from the novel. The crew worked out of a Cold War-era bomber hangar, which was convenient but had noise and heat problems, requiring a large air conditioning unit. A second L-1011, retired from Trans World Airlines and salvaged for the production, was used for takeoff and landing shots.

Filming days ran 12 to 15 hours, with actors usually working six days a week. The final scenes were filmed in a functioning airport waiting area.

Reception and legacy

Critics were split on the 1995 miniseries. Ken Tucker of Entertainment Weekly gave it a B, describing it as a four-hour Twilight Zone episode that still had its moments. TV Guide awarded just one out of five stars, panning the dull script, cardboard characters, ludicrous special effects, and a dishwatery cast saved only by Bronson Pinchot, who one critic said chewed more scenery than all the Langoliers combined.

Variety thought the first three hours worked well but fell apart once the monster appeared. Despite the reviews, the series was a ratings hit for ABC, finishing in the top five for its week. In 2021, Greek filmmaker Aristotelis Maragkos reworked the TV movie into an experimental feature called The Timekeepers of Eternity.