Since I needed a COVID break this evening I've been watching Airplane 1 and 2. Great way to forget about all's that's happening. 😁

Surely you can't be serious

8 minutes ago, fs4fun said:

Surely you can't be serious

Nope. Everybody needs to laugh especially now. 😁

I can remember being in the cinema, watching Airplane when it first came out. I started laughing when I saw the exterior shots of the 707 with its WW2 bomber prop engine sounds; there were loads of people in the cinema looking at me wondering what I was laughing at, and I'm like: Yeah I know it has a lot less subtle humour in places which nobody would miss, but to quote the movie itself: Surely you can't be serious? You don't get that joke? This might not be the movie for you...

Edited June 14, 20205 yr by Chock

Please don't call me Surely...............

The homage to Jaws at the start of the 1st movie with the fin in the clouds and the music, followed by the zoom climb - inspired! 😄

As for Otto the autopilot.. 😄😄

I sure picked the wrong week to quit sniffing glue  (especially in these crazy times..) 😵

On the subject of Airplane and its influences, two serious films (surely you can't be serious?) worth watching, because they are both great especially if you are familiar with Airplane! but which will nevertheless give you an unintentionally good laugh, are Forbidden Planet (1956) and The High and the Mighty (1954).

Forbidden Planet has Leslie Nielsen in what might be considered a 'matinee idol' role as the commander of the spaceship C-57D. In retrospect, you simply cannot watch it without expecting a few examples of Nielsen's brilliant deadpan comedy delivery, which although not actually present since it is a 'serious' film, this adds another entirely unintended dimension to the movie. It's worth noting too that Bill Shatner had clearly been watching Nielsen's portrayal of a space commander when deciding how to go about playing the role of Kirk, ironically enough, coming full circle and ending up spoofing that role in Airplane II: The Sequel, as Commander Buck Murdock.

All this aside, Forbidden Planet is worth a watch anyway, as it was a landmark film for a number of reasons, the most obvious of which is the incredible special effects it features for a mid-Fifties movie. Its electronic soundtrack which used ring modulators, tape echoes and reversing recordings was sadly robbed of being eligible for an Academy Award nomination, which it surely would have won, by virtue of the fact that its composers - married couple Bebe and Louis Barron were not members of the Musician's Union. The visual effects were nominated for an Academy Award, but were beaten by the religious Cecil B DeMille epic, The Ten Commandments, but in retrospect you have to say that it probably should have won if technical innovation is the main criteria and when you watch it, you can see some shots which were clearly the influence for shots in Star Wars.

Also worthy of note is the massively expensive and influential prop - Robby the Robot which appears in the movie, although perhaps of longer-lasting influence was the conceptualisation of the spacecraft, uniforms, weaponry, interiors and crew command structure of the C-57D spacecraft, which quite clearly had a major impact on the later Star Trek TV show. Another rather telling influence on Star Trek, is the - unusual for a Fifties Sci-Fi movie - literary and intellectual theme of its plot, which is essentially the storyline of William Shakespeare's The Tempest, and we all how influential Shaekespeare's thematic motifs and indeed the catalogue of Shakespearean actors who've gone on to be in Star Trek, including Bill Shatner and Patrick Stewart of course.

Then you have The High and the Mighty, which is generally considered the prototype movie for the disaster movies which Airplane! is spoofing. In some places, the spoof is pretty much a shot-for-shot parody of the more serious movie it pokes fun at, and then of course you have Robert Stack, who played the Captain of the stricken DC-4 in The High and the Mighty, hilariously lampooning his role in Airplane! This parody is something I doubt his co-star John Wayne would have approved of with his propensity to take his macho icon status a bit too seriously, but since he died the year before, we'll never know for sure.

Unlike Forbidden Planet, The High and the Mighty did pick up a soundtrack award and it too has some great visual special effects as well as a good many practical effects with real aeroplanes. And so of course it features a lot of great aeroplane shots of some real classics and few rarities, thus  any plane buff would be happy to watch it in spite of its melodramatic tone, although in retrospect, that too is funny when you are familiar with Airplane!

 

Edited June 14, 20205 yr by Chock

The movie Zero Hour! is touted as being the serious inspiration for Airplane. Thanks to youtube I found this gem:

 

Yup, that one too, which is also well worth a look for those can't take it seriously moments when you've seen Airplane!

Perhaps not cited quite so often as an influence, but quite clearly it is, was the 1976 spoof movie The Big Bus. This is a pretty funny film which follows all of the tropes which Airplane! spoofs and did so four years prior to it.

The Big Bus has a fairly well-known ensemble cast with some big names, but it probably suffers from being made at a point in time when disaster movies were still popular choices and had yet to become a hackneyed genre. Which just goes to prove that sometimes it is the timing of a release as well as its content and quality which often contributes to its success.

Edited June 14, 20205 yr by Chock

42 minutes ago, Chock said:

Unlike Forbidden Planet, The High and the Mighty did pick up a soundtrack award and it too has some great visual special effects as well as a good many practical effects with real aeroplanes. And so of course it features a lot of great aeroplane shots of some real classics and few rarities, thus  any plane buff would be happy to watch it in spite of its melodramatic tone, although in retrospect, that too is funny when you are familiar with Airplane!

 

The High and the Mighty is one of my favorite aviation themed movies, as is Strategic Air Command starring Jimmy Stewart. Absolutely gorgeous ground and aerial shots of the massive B-36 bomber and the (then) new B-47. Stewart played a former WWII bomber pilot recalled to active duty, which was apropos, since he actually did fly bombers during the war, taking time out from his full time career as an actor. In the movie, he was pulled from a full time career as pro baseball player.

That movie was done with the full cooperation of the Air Force, and shot on location at Carswell and MacDill AFBs. Undoubtedly the AF saw it as a an excellent recruiting tool, and I’m sure it did inspire more than one young man to enlist.

Speaking of the soundtrack and  “having an influence”, I just rewatched it a few days ago. The movie had an inspiring musical number sung by a male choir called “The Air Force Takes Command”, and there was something about the melody that seemed very familiar. I finally realized what it was... the tune appears to be almost note-for-note identical to the main refrain of the theme music from the 1978 movie “Superman”. Perhaps a bit of unconscious plagiarism by composer John Williams?

Forbidden Planet definitely had a major impact on layer Sci Fi movies, and the “Robby The Robot” prop made many re-appearances in later films and TV shows, including the 1960’s series “Lost in Space”, where it did battle with the show’s own “Robot” character, which (like the original Robby), had a very human-like personality.

Edited June 14, 20205 yr by JRBarrett

Don't worry!  I speak Jive....and Peacemaker!  My favorite scene! 😁

 

 

I used to fly with a nice guy (I wont use his name)who was from Barbados originally  but had moved to the UK to play cricket professionally, he played at county level and also for England, so at a very high level and was well known amongst cricket fans. After retiring from cricket he then retrained as an airline pilot.

Whenever I flew with him which was rare as we were the same rank I was always having to look away to stop my self bursting out laughing as I thought of some kid cricket fan coming in for a flight deck visit  " WAIT A MINUTE ! , I know you, you're ….."   I'm sorry son you must have me confused with someone else my name is …. I'm the co pilot"  and subsequently  being dragged out of his seat to reveal he was wearing his cricket trousers and leg guards !

Hey.  My mother's name was Shirley!  But I never ever called her that...

BTW, In the PC world, I don't think Airplane could be made today...

7 minutes ago, overspeed3 said:

Hey.  My mother's name was Shirley!  But I never ever called her that...

BTW, In the PC world, I don't think Airplane could be made today...

Roger, over....huh?