Well after a couple of weeks of nothing but seriousness I decided to give myself a break from the real world and retreat to the 1970s. Well, I didn’t drag out a Leisure Suit or start playing the Bee Gees or anything like that but I decided to drag out some 1970s comedies. First up was Foul Play starring Goldie Hawn and Chevy Chase; next the slapstick classic Airplane starring Robert Hedges, Julie Hagerty and a cast of all-stars including Lloyd Bridges, Robert Stack, Leslie Nielsen, Peter Graves and even Kareem Abdul Jabbar and finally Smokey and the Bandit starring Burt Reynolds, Sally Field and Jackie Gleason.
Sometimes I need these kind of nights. I wrote yesterday about things that trouble me and yes they still do, but to maintain some sense of sanity I need to break away and clear the brain housing unit. Baseball does this a lot for me but alas it is not yet the regular season and not much is on although I could tune in to the MLB channel and maybe catch a Spring Training game or speculation and analysis of the coming season.
But tonight I needed to laugh and laughing is good for us and that is in the Bible, Solomon wrote in Ecclesiastes that there is a “time to laugh” of course there are other verses in the Bible that make laughter to be a bad thing and I don’t think that the Apostle Paul would approve of my taste in comedy. However after Paul’s shipwreck he might have gotten a kick out of Airplane, but then maybe not. But Karl Barth the great Swiss Theologian once said that “laughter is the closest thing to the grace of God” and I think that he was right and that if we can find things that allow us to laugh, even at ourselves that it is good for us.
I love comedy and lover to laugh and movies like these never get old to me and watching Airplane was even more enjoyable after having spent some time on a flight simulator for the MV-22 Osprey on Thursday afternoon. I was able to take off and land without crashing. I want to go to flight school.
I love Foul Play and I think a lot is because that it was filmed in San Francisco. Airplane though is special because of all the one liners, puns and parodies of things that I grew up with in the 1970s that make it so funny to me.
After I watched the movie once I went back and watched it with the commentary by Jim Abrahams and David and Jerry Zucker. Watching the movie with their comments made it even funnier because as many times as I have seen it I noticed more things that I had missed in previous viewings. Likewise I found out things that I never knew. I guess that the most interesting was that the part of Roger Murdock played by Kareem Abdul Jabbar was originally written for Pete Rose but Rose had to turn it down because it was filmed in the summer.
So I guess that means that I watched Airplane twice tonight and because of that I am not going to watch Smokey and the Bandit. Oh well it was fun and I am still laughing.
Horror and comedy, like peanut butter cups they are two great tastes that go great together. I think that the funniest of this genre are those based on the classics such as Frankenstein and Dracula. There are other films that fit this category such as Love at First Bite a Dracula film set in the late 1970s staring George Hamilton, Jill St. John and Arte Johnson. Other twists on the Dracula story is Mel Brooks Dracula Dead and Loving It which starred Leslie Nielsen, Peter McNichol, Harvey Korman and Amy Yasbeck and Once Bitten starring Lauren Hutton. I also like some that are new creations in their own right such as Ghostbusters. However, for me the film that is the real classic among all of them is Young Frankenstein. So in the spirit of Halloween I submit to you Padre Steve’s favorite all-time Horror Comedy Young Frankenstein.
Of course the first on my list is Mel Brooks classic Young Frankenstein which came out in 1974, the same year as Brooks’ other classic of Western filmography Brazing Saddles. Young Frankenstein is the classic humorous take on the Mary Beth Shelley Frankenstein novel and subsequent films. It starred Gene Wilder, Madeline Kahn, Marty Feldman, Terry Garr, Cloris Leachman and the late Peter Boyle as the Monster Brooks. Brooks used the original set from the original Frankenstein and brought the Frankenstein saga a hilarious twist. It is hard to forget some of the great scenes such as when Dr. Frankenstein discovers that he has implanted an abnormal brain in the monster, and the subsequent game of charades as Inga and Igor try to guess what the Doctor wants as he struggles in the grasp of the Monster “give him a sedagive.”
Of course after a “sedative” has been administered the conversation between the Dr. Frankenstein and Igor is classic. The Doctor sits down and questions Igor about the brain about the brain and Igor tells the Doctor that the brain belonged to “Abby someone, Abby Normal.”
There is the scene where the Monster escapes and comes to a small house where a blind monk played by Gene Hackman awaits. The monk offers the Monster hospitality which turns into a horror story with the Monster as the victim. The Monster has hot soup spilled on his lap, his mug of wine shattered and finger set afire by the well meaning monk and runs out in terror.
Of course there all of the one-liners and gags interspersed through the film at a cyclic rate which leave the audience laughing. I remember seeing the film for the first time when it came out in 1974 in Stockton California. The opening scene where someone opens the crypt of the elder Dr. Frankenstein to retrieve his diary and has to fight the skeleton is just the beginning of the fun. The fun continues with the young Dr. Frankenstein, a neurosurgeon saying that his name was pronounced “Fronkensteen” rather than Frankenstein when questioned by a medical student about his grandfather’s experiments. One can’t forget the scene in the graveyard when the Doctor and Igor are digging up the body of the monster. When the Doctor complains Igor utters the immortal line “it could be worse it could be raining” which of course was followed by a thunderclap and downpour.
Of course we cannot leave out Cloris Leachman as Frau Blucher and every time that her name was said that the horses would “whiney.”
Then there is the sequence after Doctor Frankenstein’s arrival in Transylvania and rides to his castle with Igor and Inga. The Doctor hears a wolf howling in the distance and asks “Werewolf” and Igor answers “there wolf.”
This sequence of course includes the part where Inga asks Doctor Frankenstein about having a “roll in the hay”
and their arrival at the castle. Dr. Frankenstein sees a large set of door knockers as he is lifting Inga off the wagon saying “what knockers” and Inga answering “well thank you Doctor.”
Likewise there is the segment where Madeline Kahn playing Dr. Frankenstein’s fiancé Elizabeth is abducted by the Monster. The Monster has fallen in love with her as he takes her she discovers something that leaves her singing “oh sweet mystery of life at last I’ve found you.”
Of course this is followed at the end of the film when the newlywed Doctor and Inga are in their bedroom and she asks him what he received from the Monster and then begins to sing “oh sweet mystery of life at last I’ve found you” when she discovers exactly what her husband received from the Monster.
This has to be one of the greatest horror-comedies of all time if not the very best. Everything from the sets to the gags and great interactions among the characters makes this one of the greatest if not the greatest film of its genre ever made. The film is so stocked with great lines and scenes that there are too many to mention here, so if you never have seen this comedy classic go get it.
So Happy Halloween my friends and in the midst of all the blood and gore films, have a good laugh with Young Frankenstein.
I love music and there is something about the less serious of songs that make them really fun to listen to. Since I have written about my favorite songs of the 1970s and 1980s as well as my favorite love songs I started thinking about my favorite funny songs. Some are connected to movies but other were songs that somehow or someway that found their way into my life. So here they are in all their humorous glory.
The first on the list is Herman’s Hermits – I’m into Something Good
which came out in 1965 and the video from the movie The Naked Gun with Leslie Nielsen and Priscilla Presley
Manfred Mann Band
Another feel good song was Manfred Mann’s – Do Wah Diddywhich came out in 1965 and when it was used in the movie Stripes became a song that in some places was actually used as a marching “Jodie” in some Army units
The Stripes version is here
It is hard to believe now but this came out about the time I enlisted in the Army and the uniforms take me back to my ROTC pre-commissioning “advanced camp” at Fort Lewis Washington.
Since I grew up in the 1960s and 1970s the drug culture was a part of life. I never was part of that scene being a ROTC nerd but had many friends who dabbled in various types of drugs in that era. Ringo Starr’sNo No Song
was a classic of the era.
Not to be outdone by a Brit the American band Dr. Hook & the Medicine Show – produced a number of songs that dealt with all sorts of experimental behavior, many of which were written by children’s author Shel Silverstein. At the Freaker’s Ball
which came out in 1974 was one of the more outlandish of the mostly outlandish songs that they came out with in the early 1970’s.
One of the classic “feel good” songs ever produced was Three Dog Night’s – Joy to the Worldwhich came out in 1970
http://video.nate.com/209973994 I remember this one from back in 5th grade when I lived in Long Beach and it was on the AM radio.
Jim Croce’s Bad Bad Leroy Brown-
was a fun song which I remember on the radio as well when I was in junior high school.
One song which came out in my sophomore year of college when I first started dating Judy was Rupert Holmes – “Escape (The Piña Colada Song)”
This too was a fun song which in some ways epitomized the era.
is a very quirky song which I fell in love with the first time that I heard it. It is one of those songs that once I get it in my head it is frequently hours or days that I find myself singing it or humming it walking down the halls at work or in my car.
The Johnny Cash- A Boy Named Sue
came out when I was in grade school. I think I remember it from at least 5th grade but I am not sure. I think of this song every time North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Il hits the news, instead of a “Boy named Sue” I think of the “Boy named Kim.”
How can I not go without an Abba song? They had a number of quirky and fun songs to match many of their more serious ballads and love songs. The song When I Kissed the Teacher
is one of those that I thought about anytime I had a really good looking and nice teacher in high school or college. Somehow learning is easier when the teacher is a really hot lady with a nice personality. I don’t know why but it is.
Elton John’s – Crocodile Rock
hearkened back to the 1950s and was always a favorite fun song for me.
Since I am in the Navy and grew up in a Navy family the Village People’s In the Navy
has always been a favorite. The ship featured in the video is the USS Francis Hammond FF-1067 a Knox class frigate. The song still shows up on occasion in things dealing with the Navy. I can’t remember a funny song about the Army when I was in although we did use Do Wah Diddy on occasion.
The Monster Mash
was always a favorite at Halloween. This version was produced by the legendary Dr. Demento.
Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody
was a totally quirky song and was featured in the movieWayne’s World
The Go Go’s Vacation
was a great song of its era and is still fun to listen to even almost 30 years later.
Lindsey Buckingham’s – Holiday Road
was the into song to the movie National Lampoon’s Vacation and that version is featured here
Rocky Horror Picture Show’s Time Warp
was one of many fun songs from that cult classic.
The band Sha Na Na was a nostalgia type band which launched not long after the movie American Graffiti during the 1970’s nostalgia for the 1950s. The band was one of a number of acts including movies and the series Happy Days which helped introduce my generation to the music of the 1950s giving us something in common with our parents, imagine that? Their song Sha Na Na
is a classic of that genre.
The Bangles Manic Monday whichcame out in 1986
was yet another of the quirky classic 80’s feel good songs by a girls band.
Weird Al Yankovic produced many parody songs including Eat It
a parody of Michael Jackson’s Beat it.
My dad was transferred from Long Beach to the Bay Area in 1971. We moved to Stockton the birthplace of the “drive by shooting” which is about 8 miles from a little town called Lodi. John Fogerty and Creedence Clearwater Revival did this song about being stuck in Lodi California. The Song Lodi
is one of those songs that you really appreciate if you have ever been to Lodi.
Ray Parker Jr.’s song Ghostbustersbecame an iconic song from the 1980s when it was featured in the movie Ghostbusters starring Bill Murray, Dan Akroyd, Harold Ramis and Sigourney Weaver.
Of course when it comes to fun you can’t leave out theBlues Brothers – Everybody Needs Somebody to Love
was just one of many feel good songs in this classic which introduced many of my generation to the great blues artists and the songs Shake Your Tail Feather
and Aretha Franklin’s Think were classics from that movie.
The Monkey’s Daydream Believer
is one of those catchy songs that once you hear it is hard to get out of your mind.
Katrina & the Waves Walking on Sunshine
is a great feel good or happy song from the mid 1980s.
Of course no one can ever leave off Elvis Presley’s Jailhouse Rock
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