The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!

The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	David Zucker
Produced by	Robert K. Weiss Executive Producers David Zucker Jim Abrahams Jerry Zucker
Written by	Jerry Zucker Jim Abrahams David Zucker Pat Proft
Based on	Police Squad by Jim Abrahams David Zucker Jerry Zucker
Starring	Leslie Nielsen Priscilla Presley Ricardo Montalbán George Kennedy O. J. Simpson Nancy Marchand
Music by	Ira Newborn
Cinematography	Robert M. Stevens
Editing by	Michael Jablow
Distributed by	Paramount Pictures
Release date(s)	December 2, 1988 (1988-12-02)
Running time	85 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$12 million
Box office	$78,756,177

The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! is a 1988 American comedy film that is the first in a The Naked Gun series of films starring Leslie Nielsen, Priscilla Presley, George Kennedy, and O. J. Simpson. The three films (the other two being The Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear, and Naked Gun 33⅓: The Final Insult) chronicle the adventures of Nielsen's character, the bumbling police Lieutenant Frank Drebin.

The film series is based on the character created by Nielsen in the television series Police Squad!. The core creative team behind Police Squad! and the movie series includes the team of David Zucker, Jim Abrahams, and Jerry Zucker as well as Pat Proft in varying combinations.

The films feature fast-paced slapstick comedy, including a lot of visual and verbal puns and gags.

Plot

The film begins in Beirut, Lebanon, where a gang of anti-American leaders including Ayatollah Khomeini, Mikhail Gorbachev, Yasser Arafat, Muammar Gaddafi, Fidel Castro, and Idi Amin meet to plan the ultimate terrorist act against the United States. The man who is later shown to be Pahpshmir is also present. Frank Drebin (Leslie Nielsen) has been posing undercover as a waiter; he beats up all the attendees, revealing that Gorbachev is an imposter and various other shocking facts about them in the process, and warns them that they will never attack America as long as he is on the job. In Los Angeles, Officer Nordberg (O.J. Simpson) unsuccessfully attempts to bust a heroin drug operation at the docks organized by Vincent Ludwig (Ricardo Montalban), and is shot numerous times by Ludwig's henchmen. After being briefed on the case by his colleague and friend Captain Ed Hocken (George Kennedy), Frank visits Nordberg in the hospital. The near-comatose Nordberg can provide only a few cryptic clues, including a picture of Ludwig's ship on which the deal had been organized. Frank later meets with wacky police scientist Ted Olsen (Ed Williams), who has invented a cufflink that shoots out a tiny dart which renders the victim unconscious, promptly testing it on Hocken. While discussing Nordberg's case, it is revealed that the police force suspects Nordberg to be corrupt and involved in drug dealings. Hocken gives Drebin 24 hours to clear Nordberg's name.

Pahpshmir meets with Ludwig, who announces that he will assassinate Queen Elizabeth II (Jeannette Charles) for $20 million. With his beeper used as an acoustic trigger, Ludwig demonstrates that he has a way of turning anyone into an unknowing assassin via the post-hypnotic suggestion. Later, Drebin visits Ludwig in his office and inadvertently lets slip the information that Nordberg is still alive, which results in an assassination attempt by a hypnotized physician. Frank chases the assassin in a commandeered teen driving school car until the luckless fugitive crashes the car into a gasoline truck, a U.S. Army missile transporter, and—riding astride the missile—a fireworks factory. As Drebin works on the case, he meets and falls in love with Ludwig's assistant Jane Spencer (Priscilla Presley). It is eventually revealed that she knows nothing about Ludwig's plot, and after Jane learns of her employer's villainy, she helps Frank with his investigation. However, things go awry as Frank breaks into Ludwig's office to get crucial information. In the process of finding that information, Frank ends up setting a fire that eventually destroys Ludwig's office. Later, to make things worse, after Frank accidentally sees Ludwig appear to make an outright assassination attempt on the Queen at a reception, Frank ends up causing more trouble and is removed from Police Squad.

During the Queen's visit to a California Angels baseball game, Jane tells Frank that one of the team's players will conduct the assassination. While hiding from his fellow policemen, who are now under orders to arrest him, Frank first attempts to disguise himself as the opera singer Enrico Pallazzo, brutally singing the U.S. national anthem along the way, and manages to secure the position of the home plate umpire and begins calling the game while simultaneously frisking all players for weapons. Finally, realizing that he is running out of time, Frank goes to great lengths to delay the game, ultimately resorting to interfering with the play to the ire of the managers of the Mariners and the Angels. Ludwig activates his 'sleeper', the right-fielder for the Angels, Reggie Jackson. Jane alerts Frank, who chases after Jackson. Jackson catches and tackles him, inadvertently triggering a bench-clearing brawl between the Angels and their opponent, the Seattle Mariners, while Ludwig takes Jane to the top of the stadium at gunpoint. During the brawl, Jackson emerges from the pile and points his gun at the Queen. However, Frank fires one of Ted's cufflink darts to incapacitate Jackson, but accidentally hits a fat woman in the upper mezzanine instead. Still, Frank manages to save the Queen's life, because the dazed fat woman falls on top of Jackson, knocking him out.

Frank later moves through the crowd to the top of the stadium, where Ludwig holds Jane hostage. Frank shot Ludwig with the other cufflink dart, causing Ludwig to stagger and fall several stories over the stadium's railing. The USC marching band tromps over Ludwig's steamroller-flattened body, triggering his beeper and thus activating Jane's own post-hypnotic suggestion, which compels her to kill Frank with Ludwig's gun. Frank uses his reverse psychology to try and break Jane's hypnotized state by openly professing his feelings for her, and gives her an engagement ring, after which Jane is freed from Ludwig's hypnosis and accepts Frank's marriage proposal. Frank's speech is broadcast on the stadium screen, causing the teams and the audience to burst into tears, fall into each other's arms and make up. Afterwards, Frank and Jane meet Mayor Barkley (Nancy Marchand), who reinstates Frank back to Police Squad, and Nordberg congratulates him. Nordberg, while still on wheelchair-bound, seems much better until Frank accidentally pats Nordberg on the back, sending him toppling down the aisle and up over the railing of the stadium's upper deck.

Cast

• Leslie Nielsen as Lt. Frank Drebin
• Priscilla Presley as Jane Spencer
• Ricardo Montalbán as Vincent Ludwig
• George Kennedy as Capt. Ed Hocken
• O. J. Simpson as Det. Nordberg
• Susan Beaubian as Wilma Nordberg
• Nancy Marchand as Mayor Barkley
• Raye Birk as Pahpshmir
• Jeannette Charles as HM Queen Elizabeth II
• Ed Williams as Ted Olsen
• Tiny Ron as Al, Tall Lab Tech
• "Weird Al" Yankovic as Himself
• Leslie Maier as Herself
• Winifred Freedman as Stephanie
• Joe Grifasi as Pier 32 Dockman

Major League Baseball players Reggie Jackson and Jay Johnstone have cameo roles as themselves, as do umpires Joe West, Doug Harvey, Hank Robinson, Kenny Kaiser and Ron Luciano. Professional announcers Curt Gowdy, Jim Palmer, Tim McCarver, Mel Allen, Dick Enberg and Dick Vitale appear as play-by-play commentators, as does Dr. Joyce Brothers.

Production

The film was shot at various locations in and around Los Angeles, California. The Queen's reception was filmed at the Ambassador Hotel, which closed almost exactly a month after this film opened, so this may have been the last film to feature scenes at the Hotel while it was still in business. The Ambassador is noteworthy for having been the location where Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated. Although the film's climax takes place at a California Angels home game, the baseball scenes were filmed in Los Angeles, at Dodger Stadium.

Reception

The Naked Gun was both a critical and box office success. In 2000, readers of Total Film magazine voted the first Naked Gun the 39th greatest comedy film of all time.^{[citation needed]} It was voted the 14th best comedy of all time in a Channel 4 poll. It currently holds an 89% "Fresh" rating on movie review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, based on 35 reviews. The film was selected by The New York Times as one of The Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made.

External links

• The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! at the Internet Movie Database
• The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! at AllRovi
• The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! at the TCM Movie Database
• The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad! at Rotten Tomatoes