Let us not forget The Hebrew Hammer.
Unless, you know, you want to forget it, like I’m not even here, like you should just ignore me and go about your business, just go on doing whatever you’re doing, I’ll be all right here by myself…
By the way, I’ve lately been binging on 30 Rock and its comic sensibilities are often very Airplane-ish, except that episode that took place almost entirely on an airplane which was more Police Squad-ish.
wrongfully accused
That’s a great interview. Thanks.
Top Secret! for tossing an Elvis expy into WWII spy movies.
Spies Like Us for Cold War spy movies and Vanessa Angel in her underwear.
Concur, maaaaybe the Emma Stone sequence, but God that movie sucked.
I’ve probably shared this story here before…
I was a freshman at the University of Wisconsin in the spring of '84, when I saw an ad in the student newspaper that Zucker, Abrahams, and Zucker were doing a screening of their new film at the student union that evening – ZAZ had gone to school at the UW, and “Kentucky Fried Movie” had been based on skits they’d done in live theater near the campus. My roommate and I got in line several hours before the screening time, and were able to get in.
It was a rough cut of “Top Secret!”, and they were doing a test screening to judge how well the various jokes and gags were working. The three of them had spread out into the audience, as they wanted to be able to hear the reactions of the student audience. One of the Zucker brothers sat in front of us, with his wife; early on in the film, there’s a gag in which Hillary says, “My uncle escaped from America in a balloon during the Jimmy Carter administration,” which got a good laugh. Zucker turned to his wife, and said, “See! I told you that was funny!”
Afterwards, they did a Q&A session, and described Paramount deciding to make a sequel to “Airplane” without them. They said that they had debated, for their next film after “Airplane”, whether they would spoof WWII movies, spy movies, or Elvis movies – and ultimately decided to do all three.
“I’m a lawyer you idiot!” Is worth the price of admission.
Not even close to the same type of movie. Galaxy Quest is a standard comedy set in a science fiction setting. Airplane! and it’s children were surreal comedies filled with puns, stupid jokes and sight gags. Just because they were parodies does not make them the same.
Witness: Striker was the squadron leader. He brought us in real low. But he couldn’t handle it.
Prosecutor: Buddy couldn’t handle it. Was Buddy one of your crew?
Witness: Right. Buddy was the bombardier. But it was Striker who couldn’t handle it, and he went to pieces.
Prosecutor: Andy went to pieces?
Witness: No. Andy was the navigator. He was all right. Buddy went to pieces. It was awful how he came unglued.
Prosecutor: Howie came unglued?
Witness: Oh, no. Howie was a rock, the best tailgunner in the outfit. Buddy came unglued.
Prosecutor: And he bailed out?
Witness: No. Andy hung tough. Buddy bailed out. How he survived, it was a miracle.
Prosecutor: Then Howie survived?
Witness: No, 'fraid not. We lost Howie the next day.
Prosecutor: Over Macho Grande?
Witness: No. I don’t think I’ll ever get over Macho Grande. Those wounds run…pretty deep.
I disagree completely. I think George Takei is spot on about GQ:
I didn’t say it was bad. I didn’t say it wasn’t funny. I said it’s a completely different style of movie and doesn’t belong in this discussion. It’s a very good movie on many levels. But the Airplane! style of movies are basically a completely different genre. If someone asked me about Naked Gun style movies (like the OP) I would think of Galaxy Quest about the same time as I would Citizen Kane.
I think I get what you’re saying, Loach. Airplane, Naked Gun, etc. are packed full of anything-for-a-laugh gags that keep taking you out of the movie if you’re trying to suspend disbelief; while Galaxy Quest respects its own reality
Remove a couple of gags from Galaxy Quest and it would be a standard science fiction movie. Remove the jokes from Airplane! and it would be a 15 minute silent movie.
I have a Top Secret! story as well, but it’s not as good.
I had a really good friend in high school and college, which was the 1980s for us. About '86 he was in a program studying Russia (language, culture, history) and was going there for three months over the summer. Before he left, I must have mentioned that Top Secret! was going to be on cable while he was gone. He asked me to tape it for him, so I did.
It was a few weeks later I was writing him a letter. I wrote “I taped…”, and then stopped. I decided to finish the sentence with “…that movie you wanted me to.” Figured it was a bad idea to put the words “top secret” in a letter I was mailing to the Soviet Union.
…, altogether?
No love for Student Bodies?
In Airplane! style movies, the plots are secondary to the outrageous absurdist comedy. Merely a backdrop and setting to toss in all manner of parody, gags, spoofs and literal interpretations of things meant metaphorical. Tons of clever word play and sight gags (especially in the background). Think of the chalk-line of the body floating on the water at the beginning of The Naked Gun. Or Lloyd Bridges yelling out at the photograph off the base on his wall, as if it were a window in Hot Shots. Even impossible things happening, like Priscilla Presley’s wrist bracelet ending up around her ankle, Frank compliments her on it, and she says, “Oh, did that slip down there again?”
That’s not the kind of stuff Galaxy Quest is known for. Three Amigos, neither, although the Invisible Swordsman scene was pretty close. These movies fall under the straight-up spoof, parody or outrageous comedy classes, like Police Academy, or even the Vacation films.
Altogether?
I suppose you’d be left with Flight into Danger or Zero Hour!
Anyway, for another example of the genre, I suggest The Wrong Guy, which plays like a sight-gag Hitchcock parody. It’s currently (I suspect not entirely legally) on YouTube at the moment.
I take your point, but remove the “Star Trek” phenomenon and there’s no point in making GQ at all. The premise would not stand on its own. IMHO, anyway. 
The style has nothing to do with the fact that it is a parody. There have been plenty of parodies that do not fit the style of Airplane! and The Naked Gun. The OP didn’t ask for parody movies. He asked for Naked Gun style movies. Galaxy Quest is a very good movie on both a dramatic and comedy level. Young Frankenstein is a all time great comedy. Neither are Naked Gun style movies despite both being parodies.
While I agree with this interpretation other people beg to differ.
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=802662
Thanks again for the recommendations everyone!
Yes, exactly. The Zucker style is basically “every line is a joke, and half of what you see is also a joke.” Whereas other comedies set things up or exploit fairly logical situations for comedy. There also doesn’t have to be even a nod to the concept of plausibility. And I"m not talking about the implausible stuff like, “There’s a meteor the size of Texas heading for Earth and only some blue collar oil drillers can save the planet”, but stuff like, “Pamela Anderson is so blonde that she’ll ask her friend’s severed head if she’s okay.” They aren’t even trying, the focus is 100% on the joke. It’s actually a small miracle that their movies have a story at all.