It's a big white thing with wings, but that's not important right now.
Airplane! is a comedic remake of an old disaster film, Zero Hour, where Ted Striker (Stryker in Zero Hour), an ex-military pilot, has to get over his personal traumas to pilot a commercial plane after the crew is stricken by food poisoning, and reconcile with his estranged girlfriend at the same time. Take that basic plot, and have a silly joke every three seconds. In fact, that is partly what makes the film work: if a joke falls flat, move on to the next one. Of course, further analysis of the jokes will just hurt the humor of it all. Just see the film for yourself.It was followed by a sequel called Airplane II: The Sequel, in which Striker is forced to pilot a prototype lunar shuttle that malfunctions and goes off course. Without ZAZ at the helm and recycling much of the humor, it suffers from Sequelitis but is still a lot of fun for many viewers. Though the main joke is the title, there is no Airplane in the film.
The various religions and charitable causes being pitched in the airport, especially when Kramer starts charging through them all.
"WZAZ in Chicago, where disco lives forever!" [plane smashes through radio tower and takes out the antenna]
Accidental Dance Craze: When Elaine is dancing in the tough-guy bar, and the man with the knife in his back points at his back, trying to get someone to help him. See All Part of the Show, below.
Ethel Merman plays a lieutenant who, because of shell-shock, thinks he's Ethel Merman.
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar plays a pilot mistaken for Kareem who actually is Abdul-Jabbar, and admits as much when criticized for his lack of success in the NBA by a little boy.
Acoustic License: Bill and his girlfriend continue to have a perfectly audible conversation as one is standing in the doorway of a plane in the midst of takeoff and the other is running along on the ground beside it (and knocking over the steel towers in her way).
Adam Westing: Lloyd Bridges, Peter Graves, Leslie Nielsen, and Robert Stack. In Bridges and Nielsen's case, this movie led to a career change.
Affectionate Parody: Airplane disaster movies and disaster movies in general.
All Part of the Show: While dancing, a guy is stabbed in the back. His partner confuses his pointing at the knife for dance moves.
Anachronism Stew / Two Decades Behind: News reporters still wear fedoras in 1979-1980, and a pair of nuns are seen in traditional garb. Most jarringly, Striker's flashbacks to what would logically be the Vietnam War include shots of World War I triplanes and even a pre-Wright-Brothers whirlygig. Justified by the Rule of Funny (and, perhaps, by the somewhat elderly median age of this movie's cast).
Attack! Attack! Attack!: The attitude of the donation-seekers in the airport to Rex Kramer's Foe Tossing Charge. One unusually dense fellow tries no less than three times, with different pitches. "How about Buddhism?" "Scientologyyyyyyy!"
Bad Guy Bar: The Magumba bar in Drambuie, featuring fighting Girl Scouts and disco dancing.
Bar Brawl: Between card-playing Girl Scouts, no less.
Bar Slide: During the Bar Brawl, a Girl Scout is thrown down the bar and crashes headfirst into a jukebox.
Beat Still, My Heart: Played for laughs as a transplant heart hops off of a table.
Billions of Buttons: A slow pan across a literally endless array of buttons, knobs and switches, which is a control panel from a real four-engine airliner.
Bland Name Product: Trans American Airlines isn't TWA. Nope. Nothing like it at all. It doesn't have a W in its name for a start.
Blatant Lies: While Dr. Rumack is talking to the passengers, he lies so blatantly that his nose grows, Pinocchio style.
Rumack: "There is no reason to panic. It's true the pilot is ill. Slightly ill. The others are doing just fine and they are handling the controls, free to live a life of religious fulfillment."
Ted's cab's passenger, who is left with the meter running at the beginning of the film, shows up again after the credits.
The donation-seekers at the airport who accost Elaine and Ted try again with Kramer, much to their misfortune.
When Kramer is driving to the airport, the green screen behind him changes from a road to a group of charging Native Americans on horses. A few scenes later, Kramer is talking to Lloyd Bridges' character, when a spear pins itself to the wall behind him.
The Cameo: The directors (Jim Abrahams, David Zucker, Jerry Zucker), Barbara Billingsley, Ethel Merman, Howard Jarvis, and Jimmy "JJ" Walker as the window washer at the beginning of the film. According to the director's commentary, he was only "comedy cameo" they accepted. Paramount wanted many of them.
Cigarette of Anxiety: Steve McCroskey, ground support, picked the wrong week to quit smoking (which he says as he lights up a butt). Also the wrong week to quit drinking, taking amphetemines, and sniffing airplane glue.
The Comically Serious: The key to the movie's charm. David Zucker made a conscious decision to give the comedic roles to actors known for playing serious, tough-guy characters: Lloyd Bridges, Robert Stack, Peter Graves, and, believe it or not, Leslie Nielsen.
Companion Cube: Otto the automatic pilot, who's a blow-up inflatable doll.
In Finnish, it's "Hey, We're Flying!". This led to a whole series of imported American comedies being titled Hey, We're [X]!
In Polish it's "Is there a pilot with us?".
In Brazilian Portuguese, "Fasten Your Seatbealts, the Pilot has Disappeared!"
In Italian, it's "The Craziest Airplane In The World".
German has "The incredible voyage in a crazy Airplane".
Australia has 'Flying High!'.
In Spanish, the film was released as "So where is the pilot?" in Latin America and "Land [as well] as you can" in Spain. From then on, almost every movie that had Leslie Nielsen in its cast was released as "So where is X?" and "X as you can".
Parodied when Ted Striker, upon meeting the African tribesmen he and Elaine would be working with for their time in the Peace Corps, teaches them how to shake hands. This being accepted, he goes for a "gimme five" and gets punched out for his trouble.
Later, as media outlets around the world are reporting on the runaway aircraft, a stereotypically Polynesian reporter with very little technology at his disposal relays his story by drumbeat. There is a child's drawing of an airplane on the drawing board behind him, instead of a newsroom graphic. Then he's handed a different pair of drumsticks for his next news report, and turns to a different camera.
Creepy Changing Painting: A comedic version in the inflatable "Otto" pilot doll. Although the face of an inflatable doll receiving a blowjob is still fairly creepy.
Crew Of One: Ted Striker flies (and lands) a modern jet airliner by himself.
Disaster Movie: It's a parody of the genre, but is heavily based on one that plays it straight.
Dressed To Heal: Dr. Rumack is introduced wearing a stethoscope for no reason, first shown right after he's asked if he's a doctor. In a later scene, he's giving an OB-GYN exam for no apparent reason - yes, in flight. With stirrups.
Driven to Suicide: Three people commit suicide rather than listen to Ted Striker's reminiscing. Double subverted with the third case; the man drenches himself in gasoline and lights a match, then blows it out in relief when Ted leaves his seat, only to explode anyway.
Driving a Desk: Rex Kramer's drive to the airport. Parodied viciously as he passes everything from traffic accidents to raiding Indians on horseback, with only his terrified passenger reacting to what's notionally going on.
Droste Image: McCroskey stands in front of a framed photograph of himself, striking the exact same pose as in the photograph, which itself contains the same framed photograph in its background. They took it one step further in the sequel.
Executive Meddling: The studio wouldn't let the producers use a propeller plane as the airliner, so the producers gave the jet a propeller plane sound instead.
Face Cam: Elaine and Ted Striker during the dance scene in the bar.
Falling into the Cockpit: Ted Striker must pilot a multi-engine jet airliner even though he has only flown single engine fighters.
Fanservice Extra: The buxom Francesca "Kitten" Natividad pulls uncredited double-duty here as both the jiggling passenger in the white T-shirt and the naked woman who appears directly in front of the camera from out of nowhere for no reason while the rest of the plane is panicking. She makes another blink-and-you'll-miss-it uncredited appearance as the jiggling woman in the "Moral Majority" T-shirt in Airplane II.
Flashback: Ted and Elaine (meeting in the bar, in the Peace Corps, in the hospital, rolling on the beach), Ted's war memories.
The white zone/red zone argument over the PA, coupled with that baggage behind the cars that nobody actually gives a damn about. Yeah, many jokes are really that hard to catch.
Shortly after that, Ted runs into the airport and through security. It's on-screen maybe three-tenths of a second: the security X-ray shows a chest X-ray.
At the beginning of the movie, a magazine rack is labeled "whacking material." Oveur picks up from it the latest edition of Modern Sperm.
The beating heart at the Mayo Clinic, which jumps off the desk and goes hopping around the table while Dr. Brody talks to Oveur.
Behind the doctor at the Mayo Clinic, you'll see an entire wall filled with jars of mayonaisse.
A funny foreground event-wherein the doctor describing the symptoms of the food poisoning caused by tainted fish is in the background, while its latest victim is in the foreground, suffering from each symptom that the doctor describes as he's describing it.
Genre Killer: Arguably killed off the whole disaster movie for a while by making audiences unable to take them seriously anymore.
Genre Savvy: When Kramer casually tosses a match out of the window, McCroskey immediately covers his ears expecting an explosion, despite there being no logical reason for one.
Get A Hold Of Yourself Man: When everyone lines up to slap/punch/hit/shoot a hysterical woman, with increasingly lethal implements of mayhem.
Getting Crap Past the Radar: Fellatio, cunnilingus, bestiality, paedophilia, topless women (see Fanservice Extra above), a young girl who takes her coffee black (like her men), pornographic magazines (see Funny Background Event), and repeated drug use, and it gets a PG rating? (Granted, PG-13 didn't exist back then...) Looks like the censors picked the wrong week to stop sniffing glue! In an interview on Later With Bob Costas, Robert Stack was amazed A) that ZAZ got away with the 'Shit hits the fan' joke and B) that it made him laugh a lot.
Giving Them the Strip: As Ted Striker is going through the airport, he's accosted by a religious donation seeker. He slips out of his jacket and continues on, leaving his jacket in the guy's hand.
Glasses Pull: Captain Rex Kramer and his sunglasses. Two pairs.
Rex Kramer launches into a rant about how poorly suited Striker is to fly the plane, not realizing that his microphone button is pressed. This causes Ted to go into his 10-Minute Retirement.
Elaine, pressed into service to handle the microphone while Ted flies, relays a statement that Ted didn't really intend her to.
Ted: "It's a good thing he doesn't know how much I hate his guts." Elaine: (into microphone) "It's a good thing you don't know how much he hates your guts."
Kramer continues rambling to Ted long after the crash is over and everyone's left the plane — less of a "Is this still on" and more of a "Is anyone still listening to me?"
Kramer: "Municipal bonds, Ted. Triple-A rating, best investment in the book!"
Jive Turkey: The two black men and the white woman (Barbara Billingsley!) who interprets for them. "Cut me some slack, jack!"
Just Plane Wrong: The jet airliner has the sound of prop-driven engines. Of course, this was done on purpose for the Rule of Funny.
Late to the Punchline: So, so many jokes hiding in plain sight. Try watching it as a kid and then later as an adult.
Littlest Cancer Patient: The little girl who needs a heart transplant. A horrific moment of Black Comedy (not to mention Soundtrack Dissonance) occurs when Randy sings "River of Jordan" to cheer her up and inadvertently knocks out her IV. Twice.
Mirror Routine: Sort of. A blink-and-you'll-miss-it gag has Rex Kramer dressing in front of a mirror. In the next shot we see him seemingly step out of the reflection; between shots the mirror was switched with a doorway and Robert Stack switched positions.
Mixed Metaphor: "I guess the foot's on the other hand now!"
My Name Is Not Durwood: Parodied, as it's Dr. Rumack who's misunderstanding. "I am serious. And don't call me Shirley!" This was considered one of the more memorable movie quotes in history.
Narm:invoked The line from Zero Hour (We need to find someone who can not only fly this plane but who didn't have fish for dinner" convinced the Zuckers to make Airplane!
No Celebrities Were Harmed: Hilariously averted with Lieutenant Horwitz, who still thinks he's Ethel Merman.
Parental Bonus: One of the greatest things about this movie is that kids and parents can both watch it, but they laugh in, shall we say, different places. Of course, as noted under Getting Crap Past the Radar, many of the jokes are not really appropriate for pre-teens.
Pinch Me: Ted Striker to a sailor in the Magumba Bar, when he first met Elaine.
Playing Against Type: Leslie Nielsen, Lloyd Bridges, Robert Stack and Peter Graves (all serious dramatic actors), doing comedy. In the case of Nielsen, this role redefined his career, and would become his default shtick for the rest of his life. Bridges also briefly became a comedic actor before his death in 1998.
Prison Rape: Captain Oveur has apparently had some unusual experiences.
Oveur: "Joey, have you ever been in a Turkish prison?"
Rapid-Fire Comedy: Often summed up by critics with the line "Don't worry if you didn't like the last joke. Another one will be along in thirty seconds."
The Remake: The plot and much of the "straight" dialogue were taken from Zero Hour!. Here's the dialog script, so you can see for yourself. The lines that also appear in Airplane! are in boldface.
Rousing Speech: Played sort of straight, except that it's also a parody of the famous "Win one for the Gipper" speech. (Ronald Reagan was elected the same year the movie was released.)
Rule of Three: "I just want to tell you both good luck. We're all counting on you."
Running Gag: The page quote, Ted's drinking problem, Ted's suicidal Flashback confidants, "but that's not important right now", "Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit (drinking, smoking, sniffing glue, amphetamines)," "The red/white zone is for the loading and unloading...". There are so many threads of repeating gag loops, fading in and out throughout the film, that it's like a comedy movie written as techno music. "I just want to tell you both good luck. We're all counting on you."
The Seventies: Released in 1980, this was probably the first film to spoof Saturday Night Fever (and the disco subculture in general).
Sorry To Interrupt: During the autopilot reinflation scene, the doctor opens the door, sees what's going on and turns right around.
Soundtrack Dissonance: Randy belting out "River of Jordan" while the heart transplant patient is desperately trying to plug her own IV back in. May qualify as Adult Fear, although the ambulance scene at the end implies she survived (at least until we heard it crash).
The Stinger: The guy left in Ted Striker's cab at the very beginning of the movie says, "I'll give him another twenty minutes. But that's it!" after sitting there for the entire movie.
Stock Footage: Ted Striker's memories of The War, which appears, for Rule of Funny, to be World War II, but goes even further back in time to the turn of the century's strange flying experiments.
The jet airliner sounds like a prop-driven plane. Accounts differ as to whether this was deliberate or a result of Executive Meddling.
Straight Man: Every actor (except for Johnny) acts as they are not speaking hilarious lines, which is one of the main reasons why this movie is so great. One of the reasons for avoiding "comedy cameos", according to the directors, was to keep everything seeming serious.
Suspiciously Specific Denial: At first. Roger Murdoch denies he's Kareem Abdul- Jabbar as though he doesn't even know who Kareem is.
Take That: "WZAZ, where disco lives forever!" [Plane immediately flies overhead and slices the radio antenna clean off, stopping the signal]
McCroskey:[to Capt. Oveur's wife] Your husband is alive, but unconscious.
This Is No Time to Panic: As the unconscious pilot and co-pilot are dragged down the aisle, and when Elaine asks if there's anyone on board who can fly a plane.
Train Station Goodbye: Parodied as the plane takes off, complete with an "All aboard!" call. It does double-duty as a parody of war movies where the heroic soldier gets a sendoff from his girl.
Transparent Closet: Capt. Oveur likes to read "Modern Sperm" and hit on young boys. His wife is cheating (with a horse) probably because she already knows about him.
Unusually Uninteresting Sight: Girl Scouts brawling in a bar (only Ted seems to be concerned by this), a man being stabbed and killed in a bar (Elaine likewise is the only one who notices), the plane's pilots being dragged down the aisle by the stewardesses, McCroskey jumping out a window... the list goes on.
Visual Pun: "The shit's going to hit the fan," "Okay, boys, let's take some pictures," "They're on instruments," and "We'll get him down safe," among others. The "check the radar range" pun hasn't aged well, though — although Amana still makes RadarRange microwave ovens, it's no longer the best-known brand.
What's a Henway?: "Surely you can't be serious" and countless others.
McCroskey: "How 'bout some coffee, Johnny?" Johnny: "No thanks!' (in a later scene) Steve McCroskey: "Johnny, how 'bout some more coffee?" Johnny: "No, thanks!"
"You Never Did That For Me": Played for Laughs. When her husband has a second cup of coffee, we hear the thoughts of the wife (listed in the credits as "Mrs. Hammen") echoing in her head: "Jim never has a second cup of coffee at home." Later, when he's sick and hurling into the barf bag, she thinks, "Jim never vomits at home..." This was a parody of a Yuban coffee commercial from the late 1970s.
Billions of Buttons: Again, a slow pan across an endless panorama of buttons, knobs and switches, only this time at Alpha Beta Base, which is Murdoch's Berserk Button.
They don't know what all those lights do either, they just keep blinking on and off.
The Cameo: Bob Costas, Pat Sajak, Jack Jones and Art Fleming.
Celebrity Paradox: When we see McCroskey in the Old Folk's Home (for senility), the nurse mentions that he "...thinks he's Lloyd Bridges."
Closest Thing We Got: Brought up, then intentionally subverted, as this time Striker does know exactly what he's doing, but it's the shuttle that's malfunctioning.
Continuity Nod: While talking to Buck Murdock on the radio, Ted says "Roger, Murdock". Roger Murdock was the character in Airplane! played by Kareem Abdul-Jabar. The scene even does a beat so you don't miss it.
In the courtroom scene one of the jive talking passengers from the previous movie appears as a witness, as does the hysterical woman.
Conveniently Coherent Thoughts: Played for laughs. After the Mayflower space shuttle malfunctions, someone in the space traffic control room asks "What do your people think?" The audience is briefly granted the power of Telepathy so we can hear the controllers' thoughts.
Controller #1: They're screwed. Controller #2: They're dead. Johnny: Did I leave the iron on?
Courtroom Antics: Both the prosecution and the defense during Ted Striker's trial.
Droste Image: McCroskey in front of the framed photograph of himself, which contains a framed photograph of himself, etc. Recycled almost verbatim from the first film.
Flashback: A woman is testifying in court and has flashbacks to when everyone lined up to slap her out of her hysterics in the first movie. This memory sends her into hysterics...
Funny Background Event: The drug deal gone bad in the flight control center, among others.
Heroic Dog: Scraps, little Joey's dog, catches the suitcase with Joe Seluchi's bomb before it can hit the ground.
Hysterical Woman: Recycled almost verbatim from the first film. As she testifies in court about her first episode, she goes into a fresh bout of hysterics.
Inner Monologue: The flight controllers' opinions about the passengers' chance of survival. Parodied by Johnny's, "Did I leave the iron on?"
Is This Thing Still On?: Commander Buck Murdock of Alpha Beta Base on the Moon. He just... keeps... talking...
Ignored Expert: Striker's treated this way in the first half of the film, as his warnings about the shuttle's safety problems (based on being the test pilot) go unheeded.
Kangaroo Court: Striker was transparently framed for the crash of the prototype lunar shuttle to cover up the faulty wiring.
Ludicrous Speed: Point Five Worp does some strange things to people.
Mile-High Club: A woman twice propositions men to have sex with her. The second time, we see a line of men waiting to take their turn... and later a donkey.
Woman: "I don't mean to sound forward. I mean, I know I don't know you, but I don't think we're going to live through this, and I've never been with a man before. I know this isn't the right place..."
McCroskey: "I want you to tell me everything that's happened up until now." Johnny: "Well, let's see. First the Earth cooled, and then the dinosaurs came. But they got too big and fat, so they all died and they turned into oil. And then the Arabs came and they bought Mercedes-Benzes. And Prince Charles started wearing all of Lady Di's clothes. I couldn't believe it! He took her best summer dress and he put it on and went to town..."
Overcrank: Parodied; when Joe Seluchi hurls the briefcase with the bomb into the air, its brief flight is shown in extreme slow motion, but during the scene one of the passengers, in normal time, checks his watch as if to wonder why everything's suddenly going so slowly.
Rousing Speech: Subverted. McCroskey tries giving one to Striker like in the previous film, only for Ted to point out that he's fine; it's the ship that's screwed up. Later, Buck Murdock tries it, but gets so involved in his own narrative that he's completely oblivious to the fact that Striker has already landed.
Space Friction: When the space shuttle is about to crash into the sun, Striker finally regains control of it and brakes it to a halt. It fishtails 180 degrees and you can hear tires skidding.
Spit Take: Ted Striker, after the psychiatrist tells him that Elaine is getting married.
Airport officer 1: "We could get McCroskey." Airport officer 2: "I don't know. Ever since Reagan fired the controllers, he's been completely senile." Airport officer 1: "Yeah, but what about McCroskey?"
There's also one against Public Broadcasting: Two women discussing how the shuttle wouldn't have gotten into trouble in the first place if it had been piloted by vegetarian women instead of meat-eating men, while a third translates into sign language.
Terrorists Without a Cause: Joe Seluchi tries to blow up the shuttle so his family can receive his insurance money; it turns out it was an auto insurance policy, not a life insurance policy.
FBI Man: "That's right. This clown is impotent, suicidal, and incredibly stupid."
The suitcase with the bomb has stickers from touristy places like Dresden, Hiroshima, Iwo Jima...
This Is No Time to Panic: During a riot a sign flashes "DON'T PANIC", then changes to "OK, PANIC".
Values Dissonance:invoked Parodied. At the "Ronald Reagan Hospital for the Mentally Insane," the sign reads "We Cure People the Old Fashioned Way". Cut to a bunch of orderlies beating a patient with slapjacks, while telling him "It's for your own good!"
Video Phone: Parodied. Someone on the moonbase turns on a screen and after some static and wavy lines appear is able to get through to Buck Murdock. There's a brief conversation, then Murdock opens the door in front of him to reveal that he was talking to the man through a window.
Who's on First?: The pilots' names, and the courtroom testimony.
Unger: "Dunn, weren't you under Oveur in the Air Force?" Oveur: "Dunn was over Unger, and I was over Dunn."
(...)
Witness: "But then, Striker said to go down into that fog, and our squadron went in too low." Prosecuting attorney: "And he went to pieces?" Witness: "Naw, Andy was a rock! Striker went to pieces."
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