Curapedi I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.
AnhartLinkin This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.
Taraparain Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.
Isbel A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.
BA_Harrison Four years before the successful take off of Zucker and Abraham's smash hit spoof Airplane! (1980), director James Frawley's The Big Bus explored remarkably similar territory, lampooning the popular disaster genre in a crazy scatter-shot style. The film's titular vehicle is the world's first nuclear powered bus, a giant, luxury, 32-wheeled metallic titan called Cyclops embarking on its maiden journey travelling non-stop from New York to Denver; unfortunately for the engers and crew, a crazed oil magnate is out to discredit the bus by putting it permanently out of service by any means necessary.Like Airplane, the absurd goof-ball gags come thick and fast, but The Big Bus's batting average isn't quite as high, a lot of the humour falling rather flat. The film's best bits are its more subtle, throw-away humorous moments, although I imagine that a lot of these might easily be missed on the first viewing. As the film thunders towards its conclusion, the bus loses its brakes and picks up speed, careening round perilous mountain roads; when the bus eventually grinds to a halt (over the edge of a precipice) so do the film's laughs, the remainder of the action being dull and predictable.
virek213 Often compared to AIRPLANE!, that celebrated ultra-zany spoof that had people doubling (and even tripling) over in the aisles with laughter, the 1976 film THE BIG BUS, though it shares similarities with that film of four years later, is not so much a spoof of the disaster film genre that was so much the rage of the Seventies as it is a satire of both the genre's conventions and several real-life catastrophes of the past. As such, because it relies on sardonic one-liners and a few non-gross-out sight gags, THE BIG BUS is, ittedly, not the non-stop barrel of laughs that AIRPLANE! would be. In the end, however, it still has a lot to recommend.The film's humor derives from the sheer absurdity of its plot: a nuclear-powered bus the length of half a football field making a non-stop run from New York to Denver, all the while being the target of a pair of saboteurs from Big Oil (Jose Ferrer; Stuart Margolin), and at the mercy of a pair of drivers with past issues, one (Joseph Bologna) a foot-eater, the other (John Beck) a narcoleptic. Then, of course, you have that cast of engers: Richard B. Shull as a man who's got "Six Months To Live" (and maybe less, if that nutty cocktail pianist uproariously played by Murphy Dunne has his way); Rene Auberjonois as a priest who's lost his faith; Sally Kellerman and Richard Mulligan as the ultimate bickering couple; and Stockard Channing as the daughter of the bus's inventor (Harold Gould) who gets her old flame Bologna to drive the bus after Gould and the two original drivers are killed. Add to that a number of underhanded sight gags ("Flags Of All Nations"; "breaking wind at 90"; the climactic "soda pop" caper), and you have a rather crazy and successful film on your hands, under the guiding hands of journeyman director James Frawley (KID BLUE; THE MUPPET MOVIE).The performances of all concerned, including Bologna, Beck, and Channing, do a lot in making THE BIG BUS the kind of sardonic comedy that it is. Lynn Redgrave's performance as an overbearing movie star is also quite hilarious in its own way. There is, though, one point where the film is more reverential than anything else: as the bus is being pulled out of its hangar (barely clearing the door, by the way), there is on the soundtrack the unmistakable opening movement of Richard Strauss' "Also Sprach Zarathustra" (this, and the slow age of the bus in front of the camera)--a clear homage to director Stanley Kubrick's 1968 sci-fi masterpiece 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY.It's a bit of a disappointment to think that a film like this that earns its laughs in so underhanded a fashion should only have been a moderate success when it was originally released in June 1976. And Paramount Pictures sure didn't do the film any favors in the way it handled its release. But now, THE BIG BUS can be seen for the unique kind of cinematic satire that it is, and it can be appreciated just a bit more than before for its different way of eliciting laughs.
jim-henderson-2 I made the "mistake" of discussing this movie with my dent's's assistant under the influence of nitrous..she's never seen it..I suspect on my next visit she'll have a copy for my viewing enjoyment while I'm having my teeth pulled for dentures. She loves these movies (as do I)..I was "turned on" to the Big Bus by a radio talk show host many years ago and have loved it ever since. One of my 10 favorite movies. A former colleague and I (one of the few people i know who saw the film) and I used to love sharing quotes from the movie.Jim
RE Zuleta If you enjoyed (loved) those cult-favorite comedy classic from the early 80's, "Airplane!," "Get Crazy!" and "Bachelor Party" then you're in for a treat. "The Big Bus"(also known internationally as: "Cyclops, The World's Largest Bus") is a mid-70's comedy spoof. A bit similar to "Zucker/Abrahms" comedy "Airplane!," but perhaps not as funny. I watching this film as a kid (approx. 8 or 9) and could never forget the scene where they show a swimming pool enclosed in a dome on top of the bus, and the classic scene where a kitchen alley is filled cupboards high with soda pop.REZuleta
