The Towering Inferno is a disaster movie. No, the movie wasn't a disaster, it was a disaster movie like Titanic, Poseidon, Airport, etc. It seems that the 70's laid the groundwork for future big budget disaster movies. The Airports and The Towering Inferno set the bar for the 90's and 2000's disaster movies that would becoming bigger and bigger. The Towering Inferno even had the big budget cast: Paul Newman, Steve McQueen, Robert Vaughn, William Holden, Faye Dunaway, and even a pre-white Bronco O.J. Simpson.
Like many, if not all disaster movies, this had explosions, cave-ins, heroic rescue efforts, and tragic deaths. It also had the important relationships so that viewers had a reason to be at the edge of their seats. Who cares about some random people about to die right? We need to know that there is an unbreakable bond between two people so that when she is in danger we feel the hero's worry, angst, and pain. I'm being sarcastic if it's not apparent.
Personally, I think the love interest angle is overrated. I'm a human being and I have a soul. If people are in danger and they're not wicked and unbearable I want to see them saved. There doesn't need to be a bold promise, a damsel in distress, or a lover in limbo for there to be drama in the disaster. It's a disaster. Shouldn't that be enough?
Nevertheless, the love interest in peril was, and is, a part of the script. Part of me says don't blame the 70's disaster movies for that, they were making movies for their era. They had no idea that their formula would be duplicated over and over again with little variation so that we'd see another 40+ years of stale disaster movies. And the other part of me says, "It's all your fault. You started this nauseating trend." But let me not beat up on the 70's too much here. The Towering Inferno was a good movie. I won't hold future movies against it.
