Of Pranks And Cranks-Steve Martin And John Candy’s Planes, Trains And Automobiles

 

 

 

DVD Review

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman

Planes, Trains and Automobiles, starring Steve Martin, John Candy, 1987

There are lots of ways that Hollywood has played the male-bonding buddy film from the deep fog into the mist alliance to fight the bad guys of World War II Rick of Rick’s American Café (played by Humphrey Bogart in fine fettle) and the seemingly corrupt policeman (played by Claude Rains) in the classic Casablanca to the over the cliff bravado of Butch (played by Paul Newman) and Sundance (played by Robert Redford) in the classic cowboy film Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. In the film under review we get a comedic, cloud puff sent-up of the genre when dead pan comic Steve Martin joins up with over-the-top maniacal John Candy in Planes, Trains and Automobiles. And while their performances and the plotline of the story will not have future auteurs cribbing from the film it was a film that provided more than a few chuckles in this quarter.

Here’s the mix. Take everybody’s, well, everybody in modern society’s fear of not being able to get home for the holidays, or just get home in one piece if you are depending on modern transportation, modern transportation that has gone berserk all at one time add in two very different guys, Neal (played by Martin) a by the book straight arrow executive and Del a salesman (played by Candy) a cukoo bird loose cannon of a guy who if you saw such a character in real life you would run from, run very fast the other way. But here is the dilemma Neal is trying to get from a useless conference in New York to sweet home Chicago for Thanksgiving. Now even under the best of circumstances getting home for that holiday is a dicey matter, a matter that according the numerous horror stories I have heard from others and a couple of my own is fraught with peril even with all the breaks.

What happens when you are connected (via a “stolen” cab grab by Del) to that cuckoo bird for the duration. Through hassles getting to the airport, through flights delays, through the dreaded snowed-in O’Hare Airport and you are switched off to Wichita with no motel in sight, your best laid plan to take the train turns to ashes when the damn thing conks out, and your rented automobile turns into a heap of rubble all because you are tied by some mythical umbilical cord to a genuine mad man who is barely sane. Turn yourself into Bellevue? Not a bad idea but wrong. No, you learn through adversary that here was your long lost buddy. See what I mean about Hollywood and the male-bonding genre.