Having been a big fan of movies my whole life, there are certain classic films that I inevitably saw and grew very fond of as a child. My father showed me many films and one that stuck with me in particular was Airplane. Most of you have probably seen it, but if you haven’t, I suggest you get on it, seeing that we’re all enrolled in an American Film course, and as far as American Comedy’s go, this thing is up there with the best of ‘em.
Anyway, the reason why I bring up Airplane in a post about Gregory La Cava’s 1936 film, My Man Godfrey, is because I recently realized that an exchange of dialogue in Airplane I have always loved dearly was actually done, years before, in My Man Godfrey.
Now I know this is all kind of an anecdotal rant, but bare with me for a second. I was thinking about it through the entire film, and left the viewing severely traumatized, knowing that something that had caused me so many (seemingly) sincere laughs, had actually been done about thirty-five years before.
Rumack: Can you fly this plane, and land it?
Ted Striker: Surely you can't be serious.
Rumack: I am serious... and don't call me Shirley.
Now that may seem like a mildly amusing throwaway line, but for a young Matt Wisniewski, that was straight belly laughs with Grandma in the overheated living room. So you can imagine my surprise, about eight years later, sitting in American Film class hearing the following exchange:
Godfrey: May I be frank?
Molly: Is that your name?
Godfrey: No, my name is Godfrey.
Molly: All right, be frank.
I mean, that’s like the exact same thing! I know it’s just this little, dumb line, but it meant a lot to me, damnit.
So, it’s obvious, at this point, that I thought a lot about the similarity of these lines throughout the film, and in hindsight of the film. Consequently, I concluded that in the context of this course, the only thing that gives this whole rant any sort of historical or cultural significance is the fact that nothing is new and everybody borrows from everybody.
I guess what I’m getting at (and I know this is a bit of a stretch) is that the history repeats itself in all aspects of life… even something as simple as a line in a film. You just have to wait thirty-five years so it’s not stealing.
Good observation!
ReplyDeletePart of the fun of movies--especially ones from the '70s on, is how they reference older movies. Airplane was full of them.
But yeah, screwball comedies are notoriously talky like that. Goofy twisty dialog and non-sequiturs are part of what they are. I'd have liked to see you bring the reading into this.
Haha, yea I noticed that too. Airplane and the Naked Gun movies, pretty much every Leslie Neilson film uses that similar dumb humor. "What's your vector Victor? Searching for clearance Clarence. Roger...Roger." haha , great stuff. But that is also why I enjoyed some of the comedy in Godfrey, just because it used that stupid humor.
ReplyDeleteClassic's will always be referenced in movies, even in the ones that we consider classics in our time. For me, that's what makes watching older films to great, because everyone gets the chance to see where original ideas stemmed from. I didn't notice your observation while watching the film, but hopefully next time when I watch it again I will catch it!
ReplyDeleteThat's a really interesting observation. Despite the use of a similar line or play on words, I think this only implies that some ideas (or forms of humor I guess in this case) are universal, and I don't think it necessarily means that films just "borrow" from each other for lack of creativity or new material. I think these seemingly insignificant phrases that have been regurgitated throughout the history of film can be worked into the larger framework of a completely original piece without coming off as an imitation, but rather as a way of adding more dimensions or adding an air of humor to the flim. Am I making sense? I only got an hour of sleep last night..
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