Release Date: August 10, 1977
Director: John Landis
Starring: Too many people to even TRY to mention!
Favorite quote: “Big Jim has satisfied women throughout the world, and the capital of Nebraska is Lincoln!”– Announcer
Remember that John Landis movie I teased at the end of An American Werewolf in London? Well, The Kentucky Fried Movie is that movie. To me, this is more than just a movie that I absolutely love. Apart from being a landmark sketch comedy movie, it is my go-to movie whenever I want to shock first-timers insensate!
Whenever I try to coherently discuss this movie, I just break out in juvenile laughter! Whenever I break out the VHS for this movie to someone unfamiliar with it, I have to place newspaper pages on the floor just in case! And whenever someone looks back at me while watching this movie, fire in their eyes, saying the movie is insensitive and vulgar, I shrug my shoulders and say, “Hey! It was the 70s!”
This is not a real movie. Rather, it’s a series of sketch comedy skits, one of which is stretched to “feature presentation” status. Every single one of them is something that will offend, confuse, or trigger modern-day viewers. And every single one of them is hilarious. Even the ones that may not score nowadays will still elicit a smirk.
The reason why this movie, irreverent as it may be, scores so many laughs can be found in the credits. Yes, John Landis is the director, but this is only the second movie he directed. His deft touches from behind the camera are present, but nowhere near as much as his later works. So the presence of Mr. Landis doesn’t explain it all.
No, the REAL stars of this wonderful train wreck are its writers. The main ones, Jim Abrahams, Jerry Zucker, and David Zucker, were absolute nobodies in 1977. Today, we know them as the comedic geniuses responsible for such classics as Airplane!, Top Secret!, and The Naked Gun. But The Kentucky Fried Movie was their first writing credit. And, holy shit, is this a crazy start!
All the sketches in the movie are takes on TV shows, commercials and news broadcasts. Some of the skits are quick-fire bits with only one line (Newscaster: “The popcorn you are eating has been pissed in. Film at eleven.”) Other skits are set pieces that spoof things like sex-help programs, talking-head news, and even 60s and 70s sexploitation movies (“Catholic High School Girls in Trouble” being an excellent example).
Each of the skits showcase the deadpan, silly slapstick humor than typified the heyday of Zucker, Abrahams, and Zucker. There is also tons of toilet humor; exploitative and insensitive jokes; double entendre lines; and plenty of exposed breasts. You know, the kind of stuff that was considered “edgy” in the 70s and cannot, under any circumstances, fly today without being called sophomoric and immature. This movie fully earned its R rating back then!
And it is some of the greatest comedy I have ever seen despite its obvious crassness.
Thing is, sensibilities were way different back then than they are today. It’s easy to look back now and say that comedy in that era was just childish or insensitive. But it’s actually incredible to think of the kinds of chances taken by movie writers in the 70s when they wanted to shock an audience, even if it seems childish now.
Truth is, yes. The absolute majority of the jokes in The Kentucky Fried Movie are childish, sexist, misogynistic, even flat-out racist. In today’s society, we’re supposed to be more “sophisticated.”
But every time Big Jim Slade busts into the couples’ bedroom, I crack a huge smile. When the woman tells a young Stephen Bishop, “Show me your nuts,” I’m not thinking childish humor; I’m ready to recite the next stupid line. Every time I hear Evan C. Kim butcher the English language as an insensitive Asian stereotype (“We need total concentwation!”) I’m just laughing at the ridiculousness of it.
I’m not sure what that seems to say about me. Am I childish, sexist, misogynistic, or racist? Well, maybe the first one at times, but I don’t feel I am either of the last three. Yet as I’m writing this, I feel like I almost have to apologize for loving The Kentucky Fried Movie so much out of fear of being seen as all of those things.
That’s a pretty interesting thought exercise. Am I a deplorable person in 2016 because I still love a raunchy sketch comedy movie from 1977? I say no; others would love to disagree with me.
Despite its blue subject matter, I feel I should still recommend that old-school comedy fans watch The Kentucky Fried Movie. It’s filled with crazy cameos from that era’s big and upcoming stars (Bill Bixby, Donald Sutherland, Henry Gibson, George Lazenby, Shadoe Stevens), it presents some very interesting social commentary of the time, and the jokes are rapid-fire and ceaseless. I watched it before writing this, just so I could get into the proper frame of mind. Seeing Stephen Stucker – good ol’ Johnny from Airplane! – making an appearance as a court stenographer for the Courtroom segment made me smile. Watching the Dating Game spoof during “A Fistful of Yen” made me laugh out loud. And Big Jim Slade…I mean, how is this man not in more memes???
As an aside, this movie’s comedic direction landed John Landis a more lucrative movie, one that would help launch his career into the stratosphere. That movie is also childish and irreverent today, but it is considered by many to be an absolute classic comedy. That movie is 1978’s National Lampoon’s Animal House. Not too shabby, eh?
I stand by my declaration that this movie does not make me a deplorable person. It makes me a person with a sense of humor, who knows how to laugh at a joke. Even if the jokes are crass, insensitive, and a product of a less socially-aware time. They are time-appropriate, they are funny, and I love every last one of them!
