1970s in film was far less successful. "The Towering Inferno" teamed Steve McQueen and Paul Newman against a fire in a San Francisco skyscraper. The film cost a whopping $14 million to produce (expensive for its time), and won Academy Awards for Cinematography, Film Editing, and Best Original Song. The same year, the epic "Earthquake" featured questionable effects (camera shake and models) to achieve a destructive 9.9 earthquake in Los Angeles. Despite this, the film was one of the most successful of its time, earning $80 million at box office. By the late 1970s, the novelty had worn off and the disasters had
The High and the Mighty (film) sequels (along with the "Airplane!" parodies, the first of which featured Stack lampooning himself). "The High and the Mighty" served as a template for later disaster-themed films such as the "Airport" series (1970–79), "The Poseidon Adventure" (1972), "The Towering Inferno" (1974), "The Hindenburg" (1975), and "Titanic" (1997). The film was one of Wayne's co-productions in which he also starred, a practice which would not become widespread until the 1980s and 1990s. "The High and the Mighty" had its premiere in Hollywood at Grauman's Egyptian Theatre on May 27, 1954. It was commercially released on July 3, 1954. Although the choice