The Top 5 Airplane Movies Of All Time!

#5 – Flight of the Phoenix
This interesting action/drama was released in 1965 and stars Jimmy Stewart and Richard Attenborough. A crash landing in the African desert forces the survivors to rescue themselves in a truly imaginative way.

#4 – Airplane!
One of the funniest comedies ever, and easily the funniest airplane movie is the appropriately titled Airplane! This movie stars Robert Hayes, Julia Hagerty, and Lloyd Bridges. It features many other cameos of notable people too. It was released in 1980 and would be followed two years later by Airplane 2: The Sequel.

#3 – The Great Waldo Pepper
Robert Redford stars with Susan Sarandon in this 1975 film about barnstormer and early flying daredevil Waldo Pepper. A very nice drama that does a good job portraying many facets of the early days of flight.

#2 – The Dawn Patrol
The oldest film to make our list of greatest airplane movies is The Dawn Patrol which was released in 1938. This movie depicts the early days of military aircraft featuring a British fighting squadron during World War I. The stars of the film are Errol Flynn and David Niven as Captain Courtney and Lieutenant Scott, respectively. The movie details the lives of these two airmen who don’t always tackle their jobs the way the higher ups in the military would like them too. Other notable names in the cast include the great Basil Rathbone and Donald Crisp.

#1 – Top Gun
The best, and probably most popular, airplane movie ever though is the 1985 film Top Gun. This film starred Tom Cruise as a United States Navy fighter pilot who is going through training with some of the best airmen and flight instructors in the world. It also stars Kelly McGillis as his love interest and Anthony Edwards as his partner. Val Kilmer and Meg Ryan also play integral roles in this true classic from the 1980s.

1. Tim Matheson, who played Otter in National Lampoon’s Animal House, would later go on to own the National Lampoon magazine when he and a business partner purchased it in the late 1980s.

2. Bravo TV puts Animal House first overall on their list of 100 Funniest Movies.

3. During the filming of Animal House, John Belusi would spend Monday through Wednesday working on the filming of the movie and then fly across country to New York City to work on Saturday Night Live from Thursday through Saturday.

4. The character of Otter was originally offered to Chevy Chase who turned it down.

5. The original filming location of Animal House was supposed to be the University of Missouri, but when officials there read the script they backed off and the University of Oregon accepted the offer.

6. Denver, Colorado was home to the first preview screening of Animal House.

7. A script was written for a sequel to Animal House, it wasn’t received well and after John Belushi’s death it was set aside indefinitely.

Animal House is truly one of the funniest movies ever and was revolutionary at the time of its release. Many subsequent films have followed a similar formula trying to capitalize on its popularity, but there is nothing like the original… there is nothing like Animal House.

1. The Simpsons debuted as an animated short production on the Fox television series The Tracey Ullman show. After its success as its own series, Tracey Ullman sued Fox saying that a large part of The Simpsons success was due to her show and she deserved some of the profits. The suit was dismissed by the courts.

2. Famous singer Tony Bennett was the first guest star to appear on The Simpsons as himself.

3. In the December issue of Time Magazine, The Simpsons was named the 20th century’s best television program.

4. The initial drawings of The Simpsons characters were issued by creator Matt Groening as sketches that he assumed would be “cleaned up” in production. Animators assumed this was the desired style and this is the reason for the characters’ even more crude appearance in the initial short episodes.

5. Homer Simpson’s famous “D’oh” has since been added to most dictionaries.

6. The first celebrity to both guest star and write an episode of The Simpsons was English comedian and actor Ricky Gervais.

7. Famous late night talk show host Conan O’Brien was a writer for The Simpsons during its early years.

The Simpsons have built up a huge following over their more than 20 years on television, and nothing appears to be slowing them down anytime soon.

1. The first Monday Night Football game happened in 1970 and had the Cleveland Browns defeating the New York Jets.

2. There has only been one tie game in Monday Night Football history, it happened in 1984 and was between the St. Louis Cardinals and the New York Giants.

3. The fewest points ever scored in a Monday Night Football game in history happened in 2007 when the Pittsburgh Steelers defeated the Miami Dolphins by a score of 3-0.

4. The team holding the record for the most shutouts in Monday Night Football history is the Seattle Seahawks who have shutout their opponents five times.

5. The news that John Lennon had been murdered was broken to the nation by Monday Night Football announcer Howard Cosell during a football game in 1980.

6. The first female broadcaster to join the Monday Night Football broadcast team was Lesley Visser who became a sideline reporter in 1998.

7. The first sponsor that Monday Night Football had was Marlboro Cigarettes.

Monday Night Football has recently moved to the ESPN network after a very long run on ABC. Many people questioned the decision to put professional football on television during primetime on a weekday, but the decision really paid off and will continue to do so.

1. The Family Guy was the first show to be resurrected based on its high DVD sales after it had been canceled. This actually happened twice, it was first canceled in 2000 and then again in 2002.

2. Lacey Chabert, famous for her role as Claudia in the drama Party of Five, was the original voice of Meg (first 15 episodes), but was never credited due to contractual problems.

3. During The Writers Guild of America strike of 2007-2008, Fox continued producing The Family Guy episodes without creator Seth MacFarlane’s approval of scripts or production.

4. Famous comedian Carol Burnett once sued 20th Century Fox and the producers of The Family Guy over copyright infringement for their use of her Charwoman cleaning character. The judge ruled it to be a parody which was protected under the First Amendment.

5. The character of Death has been voiced by two different actors. In Death’s first appearance he was voiced by comedian Norm McDonald, subsequent appearances have had comedian Adam Corrola doing the voice work.

6. There was a controversy involving the opening title sequence and theme song. Stewie has a line where he sings “Laugh and cry”, but many people thought he was singing “Effin’ Cry”. For a time the song was censored in the UK so that only the word “cry” was heard. During season 3 the song was rerecorded to more clearly sound like the intended words. The original recording has returned to the show since then though.

7. Seth MacFarlane not only created The Family Guy series, he also voiced many of the main characters: Peter Griffin, Stewie Griffin, Brian Griffin, and Glenn Quagmire.

The Family Guy continues to entertain and offend many viewers on a weekly basis… one can only think that this is the exact intent of its creators.