Airplane 2 : The Sequel (1982)

The 1980 movie Airplane is widely regarded as one of the funniest comedy movies ever made and it paved the way for dozens of equally silly spoof films - most of which seemed to feature Airplane star Leslie Nielsen. One such spoof film was the inevitable sequel to Airplane - imaginatively subtitles “The Sequel” - which reused many of the original cast, but sadly lacked Nielsen himself.

Inept former air force pilot Ted Stryker (Robert Hays) returns - this time starting the movie in a mental hospital before escaping and following his former girlfriend Elaine (Julie Haggerty) who is a stewardess on the first commercial shuttle flight to the Moon. Inevitably things go badly - the co-pilot turns to jelly, the ship’s computer goes insane and there’s a passenger with a bomb on board. It all has the consequence of numerous silly puns and one-liners and William Shatner sending himself up brilliantly as the commander of the Moon Base.

It has to be said that Airplane 2 is nowhere near as funny as it’s sublime predecessor - a larger proportion of the jokes just aren’t that funny although there are a few hilarious moments including some excellent spoofing of the movie 2001. It’s hard to shake the feeling that the movie would be better if Leslie Nielsen was somehow involved but the remaining actors do a competent job and Shatner’s self-parody is one of the highlights of the film.

After it’s genre-defining predecessor this is merely an average spoof comedy movie but it has enough jokes to be worth watching once at least.

Rating : 7 / 10

All content ©2003 William Marnoch.

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