Sometimes even in movie theaters.
Top Secret!, the Z-A-Z (Zucker, Abrahams, Zucker) follow-up to their successful parody, Airplane! had a bit of a rocky start and wasn't a huge success at the box-office. It wasn't a send-up of an already existing movie (in the case of Airplane!, it was 1957's Zero Hour!), but a wholly original idea imagining a mash-up of an Elvis Presley movie with a wartime espionage film, with the same exuberance throwing jokes at the film and seeing how much sticks. Quite a lot, it seems.
But, at some point, the film just stops, re-caps the complications and then states the obvious—"it all sounds like some bad movie!" with the actors guiltily breaking the fourth wall and acknowledges that (indeed) it might just be a bad movie.
The surprise of the movie was Val Kilmer, who had previously been known for dating Cher, but made an all-singin', all-dancin' comedic debut as the Elvis imitator, Nick Rivers. This film and the next year's Real Genius established Kilmer as a superb comic actor, but it is his subsequent dramatic roles for which he is best known. This Summer his scene with Tom Cruise in Top Gun: Maverick was a nostalgically emotional highlight.
The Set-Up: Pop-rock phenom' Nick Rivers (Val Kilmer, in his film debut) is on an extensive European tour, when he is swept up in international intrigue in East Germany surrounding the disappearance of a prominent scientist. There are complications...oh, we'll just let him describe them.
Action.
NICK RIVERS Look...
NICK RIVERS Forget it.
Words by Jim Abrahams, David Zucker, Jerry Zucker
Top Secret! is available on DVD and Blu-Ray from Paramount Home Video.
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