The High and the Mighty is a 1954 WarnerColor American "disaster" film in CinemaScope directed by William A. Wellman and written by Ernest K. Gann who also wrote the 1953 novel on which his screenplay was based. The film's cast was headlined by John Wayne, who was also the project's co-producer. Composer Dimitri Tiomkin won an Academy Award for his original score while his title song for the film also was nominated for an Oscar (but the title song did not actually appear in release prints, nor, indeed, in the recent restoration, of the film). The film received mostly positive reviews and grossed $8.5 million in its theatrical release. The supporting cast includes Claire Trevor, Laraine Day, Robert Stack, Jan Sterling, Phil Harris and Robert Newton.