The Poseidon Adventure (1972)
It might have taken the comedic genius of the Zucker, Abrahams and Zucker team to initially recognize the near-parodic level of screenwriting of the Irwin Allen disaster films, but nowadays it's undeniable even to those with only superficial knowledge of Leslie Nielsen's later-day career.
In this case it's clearly manifested in the early sequences before the disaster happens and where our main characters are broadly introduced and allowed to interact: the ex-hooker and the cop who married her; the clergyman with a 'controversial' attitude toward his faith; a couple of unaccompanied, underaged siblings; the elderly Jewish couple who plan on seeing their grandkids for the first time ever, etc. and the expository dialogue which presents the conditions that lead to their shared adventure.
Once the disaster strikes the spoof-like treatment is all but abandoned except for a few, brief moments of levity, and we are in for serious (or mostly serious) treatment.
Other than having kickstarted the disaster film as we know it today, possibly influential, even today are the one-dimensional, company-stooge, villainous character whose fault all this is, (first seen here in an easily recognizable form?), and most certainly the visuals of a group travelling thru an alien-seeming vessel, (in this case, because the normality of a cruise ship has been turned upside down, or is on fire, and/or flooded,) which easily brings to mind sequences in the Star Wars trash compactor scene and the Alien franchises (in virtually their full-length; and, in one case, where the underwater sequence is even replicated,) and all potential knock-offs, foreign or domestic.
Despite how seriously one may or may not wish to take any of this, the entertainment it provides is not to be denied.
Harlan Ellison famously proposed the logical sequel should have another tidal wave turn the ship right-side up, with the survivors retracing their way back to the ship's deck.
With Gene Hackman, Ernest Borgnine, Red Buttons, Carol Lynley, Roddy McDowall, Stella Stevens, Shelley Winters, and Jack Albertson.
It might have taken the comedic genius of the Zucker, Abrahams and Zucker team to initially recognize the near-parodic level of screenwriting of the Irwin Allen disaster films, but nowadays it's undeniable even to those with only superficial knowledge of Leslie Nielsen's later-day career.
In this case it's clearly manifested in the early sequences before the disaster happens and where our main characters are broadly introduced and allowed to interact: the ex-hooker and the cop who married her; the clergyman with a 'controversial' attitude toward his faith; a couple of unaccompanied, underaged siblings; the elderly Jewish couple who plan on seeing their grandkids for the first time ever, etc. and the expository dialogue which presents the conditions that lead to their shared adventure.
Once the disaster strikes the spoof-like treatment is all but abandoned except for a few, brief moments of levity, and we are in for serious (or mostly serious) treatment.
Other than having kickstarted the disaster film as we know it today, possibly influential, even today are the one-dimensional, company-stooge, villainous character whose fault all this is, (first seen here in an easily recognizable form?), and most certainly the visuals of a group travelling thru an alien-seeming vessel, (in this case, because the normality of a cruise ship has been turned upside down, or is on fire, and/or flooded,) which easily brings to mind sequences in the Star Wars trash compactor scene and the Alien franchises (in virtually their full-length; and, in one case, where the underwater sequence is even replicated,) and all potential knock-offs, foreign or domestic.
Despite how seriously one may or may not wish to take any of this, the entertainment it provides is not to be denied.
Harlan Ellison famously proposed the logical sequel should have another tidal wave turn the ship right-side up, with the survivors retracing their way back to the ship's deck.
With Gene Hackman, Ernest Borgnine, Red Buttons, Carol Lynley, Roddy McDowall, Stella Stevens, Shelley Winters, and Jack Albertson.
statistics: Posted by hermanthegerm — 10:41 PM - Nov 30 — Replies 10 — Views 370