Airplane - is an American comedy film, first released on July 2, 1980, produced by Jim Abrahams, David Zucker and Jerry Zucker, and starring Robert Hays, Julie Hagerty, Leslie Nielsen, Robert Stack, Lloyd Bridges, and Kareem Abdul Jabbar. It is the second of a number of movies produced and directed by the trio. In some foreign releases , Airplane! was entitled Flying High. The film is regularly shown on television, with many devotees repeatedly rewatching the film, in the process catching other gags that they didn't notice earlier due to the sheer number of often overlapping sight, sound, and dialogue gags. Airplane II The Sequel, first released on December 10, 1982, attempted to tackle the science fiction film genre. Although most of the cast reunited for the sequel, the two films have no writers in common. The plot of Airplane is a well-travelled one. The story of an in-flight medical emergency, caused by food poisoning, started as the CBC TV movie Flight Into Danger, then became the 1957 Paramount Pictures movie Zero Hour!. Thus Airplane! is the fourth remake of the Arthur Hailey novel Runway Zero-Eight. Airplane! is very close to Zero Hour!, following it virtually scene for scene, and lifting its major characters and most of its story line. Indeed, many of the best known lines are repeated verbatim, for example,Can you face some unpleasant facts? and I guess I picked the wrong week to quit smoking, which becomes a running gag. As the plot escalates, so does the potency of the drug. Even the odd sports cameo remains intact. In Zero Hour!, the cameo is by Elroy Crazy Legs Hirsch. In Airplane!, it is basketball star Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Airplane! also has elements based on films in the Airport series, specifically Airport '75, which was also based on novels written by Arthur Hailey. The elements that the film lifted from Airport '75 included the guitar playing nun (played by Maureen McGovern in Airplane! and Helen Reddy in Airport '75) and the sick little girl that the nun's guitar is played for (played by Linda Blair in Airport '75 and Jill Whelan in Airplane!). When the pilots of a commercial airliner get sick, an ex-fighter pilot, Ted Striker (Robert Hays) must conquer his fear of flying and fly the plane to its destination. Striker's ex-girlfriend (Julie Hagerty) is a flight attendant. Nielsen portrays a doctor on board. His catchphrase in the film became famous worldwide. In response to the question from a passenger Surely you cant be serious? Nielsen's character would respond: I am serious, and don't call me Shirleyand don't call me Shirley has entered the language as an all-purpose, nonplussed response. Lloyd Bridges portrays the chief air traffic controller, and Robert Stack plays Hays' former commander, who is brought in to aid him in landing the airplane. Howard Jarvis, the author of California's property tax initiative Proposition 13, plays a man who patiently waits in the back of Strikers cab throughout the movie. Some critics have claimed that the movies most important achievement was in bringing to an end the Airport series of movies, which could no longer be taken seriously.
