We’ve got a big problem — we’re thinking. Hellzapoppin’, 1941 Like Airplane!, this is madness. Outrageous physical gags and meta-film jokes make whole swaths of film history seem strange (how unusual a garden party, a gathering of rich heiresses, a Philadelphia Story-type love triangle become here) and the mot unusual of film conventions (breaking into song and dance) seem normal and sane. Best scene: dandy/n’er do well playboy demonstrates his prowess with a bow and arrow (“and that is how you shoot a bow and arrow” … Or something) while the party guests admire him, nod, look as if they just learned something they could then apply to their own target practice … and then everyone just walks off to have drinks by the pool (“shall we?”) with no regard for anything in the world. (The tone is very Simpsons: and this, children, is a mailbox.) As if to say, “here’s the scene, folks,” and then who cares. Three leads begin to gather arrows and narrowly miss being shot by a crazed fourth lead character who is still busy target practicing. It’s all very cool and postured: a giant wink. But it’s not cloying or oh-so clever because that’s part of the point: this high-minded absent-mindedness filling out the texture and story of a film becomes as entertaining, as difficult to maintain, as touching for its humanity. These brilliant talented people filling a play-within-a-play-within-a-play with the shenanigans seem as real as any other kind of movie characters: though blessed with self-awareness, they’re just as lost, just as desperate for assistance.

We’ve got a big problem — we’re thinking.

Hellzapoppin’, 1941

Like Airplane!, this is madness.

Outrageous physical gags and meta-film jokes make whole swaths of film history seem strange (how unusual a garden party, a gathering of rich heiresses, a Philadelphia Story-type love triangle become here) and the mot unusual of film conventions (breaking into song and dance) seem normal and sane.

Best scene: dandy/n’er do well playboy demonstrates his prowess with a bow and arrow (“and that is how you shoot a bow and arrow” … Or something) while the party guests admire him, nod, look as if they just learned something they could then apply to their own target practice … and then everyone just walks off to have drinks by the pool (“shall we?”) with no regard for anything in the world. (The tone is very Simpsons: and this, children, is a mailbox.) As if to say, “here’s the scene, folks,” and then who cares. Three leads begin to gather arrows and narrowly miss being shot by a crazed fourth lead character who is still busy target practicing.

It’s all very cool and postured: a giant wink. But it’s not cloying or oh-so clever because that’s part of the point: this high-minded absent-mindedness filling out the texture and story of a film becomes as entertaining, as difficult to maintain, as touching for its humanity. These brilliant talented people filling a play-within-a-play-within-a-play with the shenanigans seem as real as any other kind of movie characters: though blessed with self-awareness, they’re just as lost, just as desperate for assistance.