A decent thriller that suffers from over length and was presented in the cinematic wonder of the late 1970's SENSURROUND, essentially big speakers rumbling at a low bass level. The process was only used in about 4 films and then apparently abandoned. Besides Sensurround the film is noted for being one of the few screenplays written by Richard Levinson and William S. Link creators of the Columbo TV series and primarily writers of high class television mysteries. Rollercoaster was one of the few times they wrote for motion pictures.
The plot is the old mad bomber story with clean cut Timothy Bottoms playing the clever mad bomber who is running circles around the FBI and police as they attempt to catch him. Into the mix comes safety inspector George Segal who is a lot sharper when it comes to figuring out the bomber's mind games than the police are.
The film is well directed by James Goldstone and Bottoms and Segal are very good in their roles. However the problems with the film are it's length, it probably could have been about 10-15 minutes shorter (maybe one less rollercoaster ride) and the studio releasing it during the summer when it had to compete with films like Star Wars, Smokey and the Bandit and the latest James Bond film. Jazzing the film up with Sensurround didn't really help the box office.
Still, if you are looking for a decent thriller Rollercoaster ain't bad. The running time is 119 minutes.
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