“Hey! It’s Enrico Pallazzo!”
Quick! In less than three seconds, identify the 37-year-old comedy from which that movie line spawned. How about this line from a 38-year-old flick: “Those aren’t pillows!” Here’s an easy one that’s almost as old as me (50): “Bring out your dead!”
If you named the original Naked Gun; Planes, Trains, and Automobiles (PTA); and Monty Python and the Holy Grail, you’ve identified excellent — not just good — comedies.
Name any comedy since 2010 ... that comes close to being remembered for generations.
Unsurprisingly, nobody will remember a shred of dialogue from the Naked Gun reboot. I swore off seeing it after the trailer dropped. Nothing against Liam Neeson, who spoofs his gruff-talking Taken character as bumbling Police Lt. Frank Drebin Jr., but seeing him eating chili-dogs, and then driving around and farting while desperately seeking a bathroom, declaring, “I’m gonna ruin another suit!”? No, thanks.
The film premiered earlier this month and has garnered positive Rotten Tomatoes scores. YouTube movie reviewers praised it as laugh-out-loud hilarious. Against my better judgment, I walked into the theater thinking, hoping, maybe I was wrong. (I wasn’t.) One line stood out not because of its wit, but its crudeness: Drebin says Pamela Anderson’s bottom “would make any toilet beg for the brown.” Worse, scenes depicting faux oral sex and bestiality may have garnered chuckles (humor’s as subjective as anything else), but represent the lowest form of lazy comedy.
Movie comedies aren’t dead; they’re dying due to terrible writing and directing.
David Zucker, Jim Abrahams, and Jerry Zucker, the writers behind Airplane!, and the first two Naked Gun movies, would never have penned such dreck. The Zuckers had nothing to do with this new Naked Gun, and it shows. But writing alone doesn’t account for the original film’s longevity. Direction and camerawork helped considerably, like when Leslie Nielsen’s Frank Drebin unwittingly walks onto a baseball field ...