History Main / BedsheetLadder

* Subverted in the first ''Series/CharliesAngels'' movie, Bosley tries this one, but the Thin Man happened to be stationed below the window the ''BedsheetLadder''.

* In a Bob Hope movie he's being held hostage in a hotel room in NYC. He tries this but when he looks out the window, where he's got a four sheet rope, it looks like he's on the 1,000th floor. The street is so far down the buildings seem to meet. His analysis: "I need more sheets."

* In OpenWater 2, the protagonists take off their swimsuits to make a ladder to get back onto their boat. It doesn't work.

** In ''Literature/DiamondsAreForever'', Bond, who is currently situated in a cruise ship, comes to conclusion that trying to [[DamselInDistress save Tiffany]] by charging through Wint's and Kidd's door would only get her killed, so he rips his bedsheets to form a ladder to get into their cabin below his through their window.
* In the 11th Famous Five book by Enid Blyton, ''Five Have a Wonderful Time'', the climax of the story is set in the top room of a castle tower, where a kidnapped scientist has been imprisoned by a colleague trying to steal and sell his work. The Five have found him, and are attempting to get him out of the tower, but unfortunately the bad scientist comes back on the scene with several henchmen, and is set to imprison them all. However the Five have allies below in the courtyard in the form of people from a travelling fair, one of whom is expert with a throwing knife and another expert in ropes. They manage to throw a knife (point bluntened for safety) high up in the air and through one of the slit windows in the tower room with a thin string attached to it, and the prisoners can use this to pull up a rope ladder which they can tie to a fixed object in the tower room and climb down. Also, in the final stand-off, further developments happen: one of the fair people uses a whip to disarm the main criminal, the criminals end up captives in the tower room awaiting arrest by police, and the prisoners end up free.

* Bloo tries it in an episode of ''FostersHomeForImaginaryFriends'', but forgets to tie the other end down.
* DaffyDuck does it to escape from gangsters in the WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes short ''Golden Yeggs'', but the bottom half of the ladder turns out the be the gangsters themselves.

* In ''HomeMovies'', Melissa is inducted against her will into the Fairy Princess Club, which exists solely to make its young conscripts sell their merchandise at the mall. She escapes the live-in headquarters at night, setting a fire (including an UnflinchingWalk from the explosion she set) and uses a rope made from merchandise cloth...to exit a first story window.

* In ''PuffTheMagicDragon and the Incredible Mr. Nobody,'' Terry, after being told by his parents that his eponymous imaginary friend isn't real, and unable to find him after that talk, runs away to find his friend by making a bedsheet rope and climbing out the window. But since his friend wasn't there to help him tie the knots, the rope comes apart, and he lands in Puff's waiting arms. They go on a journey and eventually find Mr. Nobody, and Terry resolves his issues. [[spoiler:Then it's revealed that he actually landed in the lilac bush outside his window and had been [[AllJustADream knocked out the whole time]].]]

* ''TheBigKnights'' use them to escape from the castle of the princesses' aunties. Sir Morris neglects to tie his on to anything.

* In ''ScoobyDooAndTheReluctantWerewolf'', Scooby and Shaggy use a bedsheet ladder in an attempt to escape Dracula's castle. However, as their room overlooks the moat, they don't actually manage to go anywhere.

* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Stuart,_Lord_Darnley Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley]], second husband of [[MaryOfScotland Mary, Queen of Scots]], escaped a bomb planted in his house via a chair tied to a line of bedsheets. Unfortunately (for Henry, at least) while he made his escape he ran right into the people who planted the bomb and they promptly strangled him.

* In Creator/StephenKing's ''Eyes of the Dragon,'' a prince attempts this with individual threads of the napkins. Guess whether he succeeded or not.

* In ''Film/TheGreatRace'', NatalieWood's character makes one of these out of her clothes. It doesn't work, but we do get to enjoy several subsequent scenes of her in [[OfCorsetsSexy period lingerie]], so [[FanService it's all good]].

Note: This was tested by the ''Series/MythBusters'' and ''confirmed''-- Grant was able to climb down a 14-story building using a rope made from prison bedsheets. Kari did it with [[RapunzelHair human hair plaited into a rope]], while Tory did the same thing with ''toilet roll''.

* ''ThreesCompany'''s trio tried to do this when trapped in Jack's bedroom by diamond thieves (yes, really,) but they ended up throwing the whole sheet out the window.

* One ''CalvinAndHobbes'' strip had Calvin use one of these to sneak out of the house and phone his dad that "It is now three in the morning. Do you know where I am?"

* ''Film/jamesBond''

* In Literature/TheBible itself, Michal helps her beloved David escape her father, King Saul's, wrath with this trick.
** Perhaps because one, it's not one of the more well-known passages, and two, because it isn't clear from the text that this was the method by which she let him down from the window. She did, however, cover an image so that when the messengers went to bring him to the king, Michal could tell them he was sick so they wouldn't get close enough to find out he wasn't there.
** 　Rahab probably also helped the spies get out of Jericho by a similar trick. (Her residence was built right into the city walls.)

* In ''Film/{{Octopussy}}'', Magda uses a variation of this to escape from Bond: she ties one end of the sari she's wearing to a balustrade and jumps off the balcony, "riding" the garment down to safety as it unravels.

* In ''Literature/DiamondsAreForever'', Literature/JamesBond comes to conclusion that trying to [[DamselInDistress save Tiffany]] by charging through Wint's and Kidd's door would only get her killed, he rips his bedsheets to form a ladder to get into their cabin below through their window.

* In ''WorldWarZ'', one of the anecdotes is an Otaku telling the chronicler that he escaped from his high rise in Japan by making a BedsheetLadder...it was slow going and extremely dangerous given that he was weaponless, the high rise was full of [[ZombieApocalypse zombies]], and he had to break into a new apartment every couple of floors to get more sheets.

* In the Literature/{{Discworld}} novel ''Discworld/TheFifthElephant,'' Sybil Vimes escapes a room via this method; it was one of the more useful things she learned while attending her all-girls boarding school.

* In ''Literature/DiamondsAeForever'', Literature/JamesBond comes to conclusion that trying to [[DamselInDistress save Tiffany]] by charging through Wint's and Kidd's door would only get her killed, he rips his bedsheets to form a ladder to get into their cabin below through their window.

Note: This was tested by the ''MythBusters'' and ''confirmed''-- Grant was able to climb down a 14-story building using a rope made from prison bedsheets. Kari did it with [[RapunzelHair human hair plaited into a rope]], while Tory did the same thing with ''toilet roll''.

* This does not always work out so well, as the DarwinAwards people will attest. [[http://www.darwinawards.com/darwin/darwin1997-12.html One Pennsylvania man]] fell to his death when his rope was cut by window glass.

* ''BurnNotice'': In "Better Halves", Fi gets angry with Michael when he rips the skirt of her expensive new gown and uses it (along with his tuxedo jacket) to create a ladder to get them off a hotel balcony.

* Referred in episode 42 of ''RedvsBlue'', when Church and Grif were trapped in a cell and left to die.
-->Church: We gotta find a way to escape, Grif.
-->Grif: If only we had bedsheets.
-->Church: There's no window. What good is tying together bedsheets gonna do us?
-->Grif: Who said anything about tying them together? I wanna take a nap. If I have to die of hunger, I wanna do it in my sleep.

* In ''TheGreatRace'', NatalieWood's character makes one of these out of her clothes. It doesn't work, but we do get to enjoy several subsequent scenes of her in [[OfCorsetsSexy period lingerie]], so [[FanService it's all good]].

** When Bond tries something similar in ''TheWorldIsNotEnough'', he dislocates his arm from the sudden stop at the bottom.

* In ''TenaciousDInThePickOfDestiny'', a young Jables manages to escape his room this way.

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