Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #154364 in DVD
• Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: PAL
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: Serbian, Turkish, Arabic, Croatian, Czech, Greek, Danish, Dutch, Norwegian, Slovene, Hebrew, Spanish, Bulgarian, Polish, Swedish, Hungarian, Portuguese, Icelandic, Romanian, German, French, Italian, English
• Running time: 88 minutes

Amazon.com
For anyone who's wallowed in the inanities of 1970s disaster movies, The Big Bus is not only witty but downright endearing. Instead of an endangered airliner or a capsized cruise ship, this dippily deadpan parody features a block-long, atomic-powered, luxury super-Greyhound setting off on its first transcontinental run with a garish cross section of humankind programmed for redemption, retribution, or just sublime ridiculousness as they roll toward Doom--or Denver, whichever comes first. Writers Fred Freeman and Lawrence J. Cohen, who penned the daffy historical spoof Start the Revolution Without Me (1970), twist the sententious ironies of disaster-movie dialogue into pretzels (priceless scene: Richard B. Shull, as a "terminal traveler" with six months to live, and Bob Dishy, a discredited veterinarian who fitted a rabbit for an IUD, debating who knows more about bitterness). James Frawley's direction is drolly cliché-savvy, but his touch proved too delicate for 1976 audiences; it remained for Airplane! to grab the disaster-spoof brass ring four years later. Still, it's not too late to climb aboard. --Richard T. Jameson

Customer Reviews

A Spoof that Should Have Worked
Like the "Airplane!" films that succeeded it, "The Big Bus" is hilarious parody of the oh-so-popular disaster flicks of the 1970's. It is really like a disaster film as seen through the eyes of Tex Avery, the master animator who threw everything into his 'toons, including the kitchen sink at the expense of some poor soul.

"Bus" features a superb cast of movie and television performers who mimic every big name actor featured in bigger budgeted extravaganzas like "The Poseidon Adventure," "The Towering Inferno," and "Earthquake."

In the words of Spike Lee, one must "get on this bus" for a fun-filled ride.

Really, Really BIG!
Hop on the BIG BUS! You're in for a rare treat. Joseph Balogna and Stockard Channing star in the best movie parody since "Blazing Saddles" and "Young Frankenstein"! The big bus is a nuclear-powered monster of a thing, complete with bowling alley, swimming pool, and piano bar. It can change tires automatically, while still moving! It can wash itself! It can go 90mph around curves, with only minor internal chaos! The passenger list is a screwball dream-come-true! Ruth Gordon is the dirty old lady, quick on the draw with her perfectly rude remarks! Rene Auberjonois is the conflicted / doubting priest, who has a nasty streak as long as the bus! Lynn Redgrave is the celebrity on board, seducing any man she encounters. She's also got a secret score to settle! Sally Kellerman and Richard Mulligan are the battling couple, set to finalize their divorce, but unable to keep their hands off each other! Of course, let's not forget the washed-up veterinarian, the terminal guy with six months to live (which Lynn Redgrave helps him to overcome), and the narcoleptic co-driver who passes out at the wheel every few minutes! Did I mention Larry Hagman as the doctor who spends most of the movie in a parking lot, because his patient (Harold Gould) "can't be moved"? Or Ned Beatty and Howard Hesseman as technicians who must work together, but just don't get along? Oh yeah, I almost forgot, there's a bomb on board! Drop whatever you're doing and buy this right now...

Airplane Thiefs!!!
Airplane stole so many gags from this movie it isn't even funny. (No pun intended.)

What no reviewer has mentioned is that the movie is gorgeous to watch...beautifully designed and shot. Airplane, although perhaps the more consistently funny movie, seems to have tried to copy the production of The Big Bus, but it comes off as looking sadly cheap and bland. They did learn the lesson, though, that you never stop the jokes coming. The Big Bus loses one star for letting up here and there to attempt moments of drama that don't quite work. But Stockard Channing working feverishly in the kitchen, as the bus tilts to and fro on the road, gets seven stars.