History Film / TheToweringInferno

** Arguably the small scene in which Lorrie sees a plastic object with the Duncan motto ("We Build for Life") being consumed by the flames foreshadows both [[spoiler:the corners that were cut in the building's construction and her own imminent death]].

* {{Dedication}}: To the fire fighters of the world.

* SuitWithVestedInterests: The developer James Duncan tries to thwart both the architect and the city's fire chief when they urge the top floor be evacuated during the opening gala due to the fire some stories below (it would clearly and embarrassingly undercut his previous public assertions that this record-breaking building was safe). Duncan even tries to pull rank on the fire chief by mentioning the presence of a U.S. senator; as well as San Francisco's mayor, the chief retorts that in an emergency, he outranks everyone there.

** Inverted [[spoiler: with Simmons. While the character cost cuts on the electrical in both the novel and the film, the film hints that he did so at the behest of Duncan due to cost overruns. The novel version does it deliberately without anyone's knowledge, then tries to frame someone else for the cost cutting by forging their signature on the change orders, because he's having an affair with the man's wife.]]

* {{Foreshadowing}}: The opening has a number of them in addition the usual [[TemptingFate refusal to accept that there is any risk]], from the visual (the tower shaped cabinet full of smoke) to character's conversations ("You'll never leave", "After the party, come on downstairs and watch me burn my black tie!", "We won't be so messy tomorrow. We're gonna try charcoals").
** Arguably the small scene in which Lorrie sees a plastic object with the Duncan motto ("We Build for Life") being consumed by the flames foreshadows both [[spoiler:the corners that were cut in the building's construction and her own imminent death.]]

* FromBadToWorse: [[spoiler: Once the express elevator is put out of commission, the probability of survival grows dimmer and dimmer for the remaining trapped guests as both other escape options (The scenic elevator and the breeches buoy) end up being rendered useless by the middle of the third act. By the end, they're reduced to blowing the water tanks to dump a million gallons of water on the fire and tying themselves down in the desperate hope the water won't wash them out the windows. While some survive, many don't.]]
** Also happens with Dan and Lorrie. [[spoiler: The fire is big when they first notice it, but there's a possibility they might have made the stairs if they left then. They end up waiting, and the fire spreads to the interior of Dan Bigelow's office, meaning that when he makes his desperate escape attempt, he has to run through TWO rooms that are engulfed in flames. Bigelow doesn't make it, and Lorrie dies shortly after.]]

* HopeSpot: Sending the scenic elevator down via gravity brake. [[GoneHorriblyWrong Until...]]

*** Bert McGraw, who built the building. Elements of the character (specifically his being the father of Patty Simmons,) are incorporated into the Jim Duncan character played by Holden.

* DiagonalBilling: The TropeCodifier, created to assuage the rivalry between Steve [=McQueen=] and Paul Newman [[DuelingStarsMovie starring in the same movie]].

* AdaptationalHeroism: Two from ''The Glass Inferno''. While still a nuanced, somewhat sympathetic character in the novel, Harlee has a longer, more successful career of having conned old women. The film makes it vague if he's ever been a successful conman before meeting Lisolette. Bigelow is also a lot more unpleasant in the novel, being an adulterer who callously dumped his mistress, and abandoned her while she she was passed out drunk in an attempt to save himself, while in the film, there's no indication that he's married and he charges out, braving the flames in an effort to find someone to get her out.

** So what happened to Wes (the utility guy) and all the people in the power room? And what became of [=Maureen McGovern=]?

*** An unnamed waiter with three children who draws one of the last numbers to be evacuated in the lottery but is nonetheless able to FaceDeathWithDignity.

*** Senior architect Ben Caldwell, who is concerned about the possibility of corner cutting but underestimates the scope of it when asked if the party should be cancelled, and posses a keen idea of how unlikely any rescue attempts are to save everyone.

*** Firemen Dennis Howard and Lou Storr, who are sent to try and open some blocked stairwell doors but fail and end up taking refuge along with the trapped party guests.

* AssholeVictim: Roger Simmons, full stop. It is his negligence and cost-cutting that causes the massive inferno, and at no point does he ever appear to lament his part in it. He tries to muscle his way to the front of the line for the breeches buoy as the fire nears the top floor, and in the struggle that ensues he deliberately kicks two men rushing to stop him to their deaths, taking a third with him when the buoy is blown off the building, causing his own death in the process.

* BittersweetEnding: Despite O'Hallorhan's report that the loss of life in the disaster could've been a lot worse, we are still left with the haunting images of the nearly 200 people who didn't survive the blaze and with a grim lesson in what happens when architectural safety in a high-rise building is compromised. [[spoiler:Not to mention that San Francisco loses their mayor, and one U.S. state loses its sitting U.S. Senator. It's unknown whether Sen. Parker is actually a senator from California, or another state. His presence at the party is because Duncan is trying to coax him into giving him funding though the Urban Renewal Committee Parker is the Chairman of. Whatever the case, the film kills him off.]]

* CareerVersusMan: Susan hesitates between following her fiancé Doug, who wants to live in the countryside, and applying for the position of editor of the newspaper she works for. In the end, she chooses to follow Doug.

* ConMan: Harlee Claiborne is a con man who sells forged bonds.

** Frighteningly averted by what happens to Bigelow. He just runs into a burning room and the sheer heat causes him to burst into flames
* CuttingCorners: The whole hellish situation can be laid at Roger Simmons' feet for caring more about saving money than about keeping to safety code.

** In both books, only one person is killed by the burning elevators, as opposed to a crowd that rushes them. In ''The Glass Inferno'' the building owner manages to keep the panicking restaurant customers who want to go down in the elevator from doing so by pointing out that if the elevator was safe, then the firemen would have came up in it to help them. Several floors below and sometime earlier, Security Chief Jernigan also prevents a rush on the elevators, after seeing signs of fire damage, by punching out a belligerent tennant. One building employee who drunkenly tries to take the elevator is killed, though. In ''The Tower'' one guest hijacks the elevator, which was falsely assumed to be safe, right before it would have been used to evacuate the women [[HoistByHisOwnPetard causing him to die while they remained up there]].

* DevelopingDoomedCharacters

* HoistByHisOwnPetard: Duncan, Roberts, and Simmons all qualify for the irresponsible decisions they made in the building's construction. It is Simmons however who takes the cake when he tries to commandeer the breeches buoy for himself against everyone's protests, an act that gets him killed when the buoy finally gives way.

* ManOnFire: In a gigantic skyscraper on fire? Loads and loads. Along with women.

''The Towering Inferno'' was the first Hollywood movie to come from ''two'' major studios -- it was a joint production between Creator/WarnerBros and Creator/TwentiethCenturyFox. The story was based on two similarly-plotted novels, ''The Tower'' and ''The Glass Inferno''. Warner had purchased the film rights to the former, and Fox the latter; producer Irwin Allen realized that two DuelingMovies about a skyscraper on fire would basically cannibalize the audience for both films (as would happen a couple decades later, when the aforementioned 20th Century Fox released ''Film/{{Volcano}}'' not long after Creator/{{Universal}} released ''[[Film/DantesPeak Dante's Peak]]'', both films dealing with sudden volcano eruptions). To prevent this from happening it was decided it would be better for both studios to combine resources to make one BIG picture. (On a side note, ''The Glass Inferno'' was co-written by Thomas N. Scortia, who tends to write a lot of books about fires.)

A 1974 DisasterMovie produced by Creator/IrwinAllen, directed by John Guillermin and featuring an AllStarCast headed by [[Creator/SteveMcQueenActor Steve McQueen]] and Creator/PaulNewman. Or, headed by Creator/PaulNewman and [[Creator/SteveMcQueenActor Steve McQueen]] depending on how you view the billing.