The movie poster
Pilot Lights[]
Pilot Lights is a 2018 Canadian drama film based on Pan Am Flight 38. In the film, the fictitious American air crew of Pan Am Flight 38 had to fly a Boeing 737 aircraft into a water landing near Yarmouth, Nova Scotia on Doomsday. The name comes from the cockpit lights turning off after an electro-magnetic pulse destroyed the plane's electrical systems and the pilot then shouting "Hey, the lights, they just went out!". The movie is infamously known for not naming any of its characters.
Plot[]
On September 25, 1983, Around 7:40 PM, Pan Am flight 38 from Boston, Massachusetts, to St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador takes off.
Around 8:40 PM, Doomsday begins. The subsequent electro-magnetic pulses caused by the nukes destroys the plane's electrical systems. The unnamed pilot then shouts "Hey, the lights, they just went out!". In the following moments, the passengers panic as the plane starts to go down. The pilot then tries to pull up and tries to attempt a water landing. The aircraft crashes at sea and is evacuated. The 32 crew and passengers are later rescued by a fishing boat and taken to safety in Yarmouth the next day. They recovered from early hypothermia and lived there for the rest of their lives.
Reception[]
It was shown at film festivals around the world. It had critical and box-office successes in Canada, and the US. It also aired on CBC and NBC in 2019 with a rate of 60M viewers and 40M viewers respectfully. During an interview with Celtic news, one of the interviewers asks him why he didn't name any of the characters. The director then says that "Doomsday affected everyone in the world. Perspective does not matter since we were all in that together." The movie has been archived at the Library of Congress in Torrington.