otto@whuxle.UUCP (George V.E. Otto) (06/25/84)
I just saw the film *Top Secret* this afternoon. This film comes from the makers of the original *Airplane* (not the Wright brothers!). It is humorous, although not as good as the original. I never saw *Airplane II* so I can't compare it with that film. This film is good summertime fare. It doesn't make all that much sense, but then again it's not supposed to. (Did *Airplane* make that much sense?) It pokes fun at several different films or film types: *Blue Lagoon*, spy films, Elvis films, etc. It has the expected mix of sight gags and verbal pranks. However, a number of the jokes center on male sex organs or acts. I wonder if the GP rating is appropriate. These jokes go beyond the simple "dickless" gag used in *Ghostbusters*. In the closing credits is one section marked THIS SPACE FOR RENT and the role of the cow was played by Daisy. Did anyone else note any gags in the credits? George Otto AT&T Bell Labs, Whippany ------------------------
kaufman@uiucdcs.UUCP (06/25/84)
#N:uiucdcs:10700068:000:591 uiucdcs!kaufman Jun 25 15:49:00 1984 If you liked Airplane, You'll love Top Secret. Zucker Zucker and Abrahams (and one other this time, I think) have done it again with their bang bang laugh laugh style. Some of the (usually visual) joke effects are extremely predict- able - and perhaps funnier for that. Others come as suprises, and these too are often sidesplitting. A bunch of us are already planning to take up skeet-surfing (see the movie for reference). The film incorporates spoofs of the old Elvis movies, James Bond films, The Blue Lagoon, The Great Escape, The Wizard of Oz, and probably others. Go and laugh.
mats@dual.UUCP (Mats Wichmann) (06/26/84)
Top Secret was quite a bit of fun. It makes minimal sense - who cares.
It has almost every sight gag ever thought up somewhere in it.
Looking carefully, you will find ripoffs of almost anything we hold
dear - Monty Python, Casablanca, Raiders of the Lost Ark, the Beach Boys,
50's music, and almost everything else (I don't count Blue Lagoon as
something I hold dear, BTW). The credits have LOTS of gags in them, although
one may have to see the film a couple of times to catch them. It is worth
watching pretty carefully to try to catch all of the references to famous
movies - anybody care to take a stab at naming some of them?
Mats Wichmann
Dual Systems Corp.
...{ucbvax,amd70,ihnp4,cbosgd,decwrl,fortune}!dual!matsknight@rlgvax.UUCP (Steve Knight) (06/27/84)
Alright! Someone else saw this film and has helped give us a break from
the tedium of net.movies.latest_rage, the torch for which has recently
been passed to "Gremlins..." Anyway.
I was extremely disappointed in "Top Secret." I was damnably glad that
I saw it at a $2.50 matinee, because I would have felt taken had I paid
full price. Now, maybe my reaction is a little bit of the old not-
living-up-to-inflated-expectations story, because I loved both "Airplane!"
and "Airplane II." (No, the sequel didn't live up to the original, but
it did a better job at capturing its spirit than I was expecting, so I
was very pleasantly surprised.)
The biggest reason for my disappointment with "Top Secret" is that I just
didn't think it was very funny. Sure, there are enough gags in it that
*some* of them hit the mark, but a lot of them are too obvious (e.g.,
"...thirty minutes to get the smile off his face..."), and too often
Abrahams, Zucker and Zucker try to extend a joke for too much screen
time. Things that would have been good throw-away gags in "Airplane!"
get stretched until they're not funny anymore. This is particularly true
of the "production numbers;" sure, you have a whole dining room full of
clich'e old fogeys rocking out to a pseudo-surf number, but it's been
done before, and it's certainly not funny enough by itself to sustain the
whole song.
If you do go (despite this small warning), do watch the credits. One of
the gag credits I *didn't* miss was:
HEYDIDDLEDIDDLE The Cat and The Fiddle
Or something similar. Overall, though, I feel you're much better off
seeing some other movie. Maybe a comedy.
--
Steve Knight
{seismo,allegra,some other sites}!rlgvax!knightgrw@fortune.UUCP (Glenn Wichman) (06/27/84)
bip. AIRPLANE: Big Joke: verbal misdirection gags (A Hospital? Doctor what is it?) TOP SECRET: Big Joke: visual misdirection gags (Station pulls away from train) Big problem: most of them are in the commercial; you've already seen them. Top Secret is not as funny as AIRPLANE!, it is also not as funny as THE KENTUCKY FRIED MOVIE. Strangest of all, it is technically not as good as KFM, which was a shoestring affair. Example: outdoor scene. Quick cut to other scene. Cut back to first scene. Lighting is TOTALLY different. oops. Good points: THE MUSIC!! "Skeet surfing": proof that Brian Wilson really only wrote one song. (I bet the "video" for this shows up on MTV or Fri. Night Videos). THE LEAD ACTOR! The guy who played Nick Rivers (I think his name is Val Somebody). Watch for this guy in other films. Does his own singing. Overall rating: 7.5 on a 12 scale. Wait til it comes down in price. No cute signoff, -Glenn
moriarty@fluke.UUCP (Jeff Meyer) (07/05/84)
Well, I had expected to see a much worse movie than I did... critics and
net-sayers alike seem to have panned this. I think if you liked Airplane,
you'll enjoy this... I found it not as funny as its fore-runner, but much
better than the dismal Airplane II. My few criticisms (avec spoilers)
follow... you may wish to stop here if you haven't seen the movie.
Generally I found three things annoying about TOP SECRET:
1) The rate of jokes was not as frentic as in Airplane... there should have
been four or five jokes going on at once.
2) They shouldn't have been so afraid to have the audiences miss a few
jokes... there were quite a few that were emphasized to the point where they
weren't funny anymore. I particularly recall the "get this to New York by
Tuesday joke"... after the person is shot, he burns the envelope, which is
obviously a Publisher's Clearing House envelope. But they then insist on a
close up to show you that it is just such an envelope. This harkens back to
my first point.
3) The dance scenes were still a bit dull, and there was a GREAT deal more
bathroom humor here... I remember quite a bit more political humor in
AIRPLANE.
Best scene: The Pinto sequence (also the underwater fight scene).
Moriarty, aka Jeff Meyer
John Fluke Mfg. Co., Inc.
{allegra,ihnp4!uw-beaver,hplabs!lbl-csam,decwrl!sun,ssc-vax}!fluke!moriartyCIThomas.PA@XEROX.ARPA (07/06/84)
So, you want to know about "Top Secret." Well, to be honest with you, the film stinks. "Top Secret" and "Police Academy" were previewed at my college, U.C. Santa Barabara which gives you an idea of what kind of audience they are catering to. If you are not put off by stupid jokes that are trying to pass off as actual humor, you may like the film. But if you see movies to actually be entertained, don't waste your time on this one or on "Police Academy." ~Carol I. Thomas