Airplane!

This spoof of the Airport series of disaster movies relies on ridiculous sight gags, groan-inducing dialogue, and deadpan acting -- a comedy style that would be imitated for the next 20 years. Airplane! pulls out all the clichés as alcoholic pilot Ted Striker (Robert Hays), who's developed a fear of ...more

Any fool can tell a long succession of dumb jokes, but it requires a special gift to toss 'em off with the fleet-footed élan and rapid-fire precision that the writing/directing team of Jim Abrahams, David Zucker, and Jerry Zucker achieve in Airplane! No pun is too silly, no gag is too obvious, and no stunt is too tasteless for these men, as long as someone will laugh at it. Unlike the many filmmakers who followed this film's path, the Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker team understood the notion of context, ...more