Whoops Apocalypse | |
---|---|
Directed by | Tom Bussmann |
Written by | Andrew Marshall & David Renwick |
Produced by | Brian Eastman |
Starring | Loretta Swit Herbert Lom Peter Cook |
Distributed by | ITC Entertainment |
Release dates | |
Running time | 93 min |
Country | United Kingdom |
Language | English |
Whoops Apocalypse is a 1986 British comedy film directed by Tom Bussmann and starring Loretta Swit, Herbert Lom, and Peter Cook. The film shares the same title as the TV series Whoops Apocalypse , but uses an almost completely different plot from the series.
The beginning of the film parodies the Falklands War when a small British colony is invaded by its neighbour, the fictional country of Maguadora, whose dictator General Mosquera is played by Herbert Lom. The new president of the United States, Barbara Adams, tries to sort out the mess, but the peace talks are sabotaged by Lacrobat (Michael Richards), the world's leading terrorist. The British, under the leadership of PM Sir Mortimer Chris, send in a task force to seize the islands back. For revenge, Mosquera hires Lacrobat to kidnap the British Princess Wendy, to hold her ransom to get the British out. Sir Mortimer then threatens that unless she is returned within 48 hours, he will launch a nuclear strike. Now President Adams not only has to deal with Mosquera and Lacrobat, but also Sir Mortimer, and also with the fact that Mosquera aligns himself with Russia, and this whole thing could start World War III.
Loretta Swit is Barbara Adams, the first female U.S. president. She was only sworn into office when the previous president, a former circus clown (parodying Ronald Reagan's entertainment career), died after asking a journalist to hit him in the stomach with a crowbar as a test of physical strength (a take on the death of Harry Houdini). To satirise the situation further, Swit plays the role straight. Adams, while trying to maintain the peace, is shown to be incompetent, especially when dealing with questions from the press. Her husband runs a weapons company which hired Lacrobat to start the war in the first place.
The film also features Peter Cook playing Sir Mortimer, an insane conservative British prime minister (an insane PM being one of the few similarities between the film and the series), who claims that unemployment is caused by evil invisible pixies. Later, he hands out Union Flag umbrellas to Conservative voters to protect them from nuclear bombs, and plans to reduce unemployment by pushing employed people off cliffs, creating new jobs. Despite the fact he is clearly insane, the public adore him and follow him blindly. The rest of his party attempt to assassinate him, but he only loses his hand, getting a hook instead. He then takes up a new policy of crucifying disloyal party members in Wembley Stadium.
Princess Wendy is a parody of Princess Diana, who was at the height of her popularity when the film was made. When kidnapped by Lacrobat, Wendy is placed in increasingly odd disguises, including a King Kong outfit. Rik Mayall is featured playing the commanding officer of an inept SAS squad, most of whom are massacred in a shootout in a wax museum when attempting to rescue Wendy, who has been disguised as an exhibit. (Mayall had a small role in the original as Biff, a guitar player.) Michael Richards plays Lacrobat, the only character from the original series to appear. Lacrobat is partly responsible for the outbreak of war between the two countries, and is seemingly the only intelligent character in the film; he dies when a tiger, which the SAS keep for no reason, rips his throat out. Alexei Sayle, who also appeared in the original series, has a different role in the movie as a Soviet soldier who is hiding nuclear weapons on a Caribbean holiday island. Ed Bishop, who appears as a newsreader in the original series, plays an interviewer in the movie.
Other characters include two tabloid journalists who discover the Communist weapons, but are killed; a rear admiral who is openly homosexual (appropriately enough, since "rear admiral" is also apparently slang for a man who practises anal sex), two security guards who accompany President Adams everywhere (even when she is going swimming), and a former president (a parody of Richard Nixon), who is now in prison and authored the book Commie Bastards I Have Known.
Although Wendy is rescued, Sir Mortimer ignores Adams's pleas to call off the nuclear strike. She then calls the rear admiral, who was previously hypnotised to believe he was in a burning building when fingers are snapped. He ponders calling off the strike, but when a sailor snaps his fingers, he calls "Fire!", the strike is launched, and the film ends.
The film reuses jokes from the series, such as Lacrobat's absurd disguises (at one time going by the name Dr. Thesius Lyndon Penis), a dying Soviet leader, a crucifixion sight gag, the president being unable to decipher other people's technobabble, an insane prime minister, and an absurdly macho CIA agent with ludicrously complicated plans. An SAS sequence is also in the series, and another gay military character. The following mock news story was also used in both: "A woman who secured a lock of Frank Sinatra's hair twenty years ago today sold it back to him for an undisclosed sum."
In Credits order:
Loretta Jane Swit is an American stage and television actress known for her character roles. Swit is best known for her portrayal of Major Margaret "Hot Lips" Houlihan on M*A*S*H, for which she won two Emmy Awards.
The Young Ones is a British sitcom written by Rik Mayall, Ben Elton, and Lise Mayer, starring Adrian Edmondson, Mayall, Nigel Planer, Christopher Ryan, and Alexei Sayle, and broadcast on BBC Two for two series, first shown in 1982 and 1984. The show focused on the lives of four dissimilar students and their landlord's family on different plots that often included anarchic, offbeat, surreal humour. The show often included slapstick gags, visual humour and surreal jokes sometimes acted out by puppets, with each episode also featuring a notable selection of guest stars and musical numbers from various performers.
The Comic Strip are a group of British comedians who came to prominence in the 1980s. They are known for their television series The Comic Strip Presents..., which was labelled as a pioneering example of the alternative comedy scene. The core members are Adrian Edmondson, Dawn French, Rik Mayall, Nigel Planer, Peter Richardson and Jennifer Saunders, with appearances by Keith Allen, Robbie Coltrane, Alexei Sayle and others.
Alexei David Sayle is an English actor, author, stand-up comedian, television presenter and former recording artist. He was a leading figure in the British alternative comedy movement in the 1980s. He was voted the 18th greatest stand-up comic of all time on Channel 4's 100 Greatest Stand-Ups in 2007. In an updated 2010 poll he came 72nd.
Christopher Ryan is a British actor best known for his roles as Mike The Cool Person in the BBC comedy series The Young Ones, Dave Hedgehog in the BBC comedy series Bottom, Tony Driscoll in the BBC comedy series Only Fools and Horses, and as Edina Monsoon's ex-husband Marshall Turtle in the BBC sitcom Absolutely Fabulous. He has also appeared as the McKendrick twins in One Foot in the Grave, and played Sontaran General Staal in Doctor Who in 2008.
Alternative comedy is a term coined in the 1980s for a style of comedy that makes a conscious break with the mainstream comedic style of an era. The phrase has had different connotations in different contexts: in the UK, it was used to describe content that was an "alternative" to the mainstream stand-up of the day which took place in working men's clubs, and was characterised by unoriginal gags often containing elements of sexism and racism. In other contexts, it is the nature of the form that is "alternative", avoiding reliance on a standardised structure of a sequence of jokes with punch lines. Patton Oswalt has defined it as "comedy where the audience has no pre-set expectations about the crowd, and vice versa. In comedy clubs, there tends to be a certain vibe—alternative comedy explores different types of material."
Richard Michael Mayall known professionally as Rik Mayall, was an English comedian, actor and writer. He formed a close partnership with Ade Edmondson while they were students at Manchester University, and was a pioneer of alternative comedy in the 1980s.
Herbert Charles Angelo Kuchačevič ze Schluderpacheru, known professionally as Herbert Lom, was a Czech-British actor with a career spanning over 60 years. His cool demeanour and precise, elegant elocution saw him cast as criminals or suave villains in his younger years, and professional men and nobles as he aged. Highly versatile, he also proved a skilled comic actor in The Pink Panther franchise, playing the beleaguered Chief Inspector Charles Dreyfus in seven films.
Andrew Paul Marshall is a British comedy screenwriter, most noted for the domestic sitcom 2point4 children. He was also the inspiration for Marvin the Paranoid Android in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Although he had also previously adapted stories for Agatha Christie's Poirot, in 2002 he made a further move into writing "straight" drama, with the fantasy horror series Strange. He has also written several screenplays.
David Peter Renwick is an English author, television writer, actor, director and executive producer. He created the sitcom One Foot in the Grave and the mystery series Jonathan Creek. He was awarded the Writers Guild Ronnie Barker Award at the 2008 British Comedy Awards.
Whoops Apocalypse is a six-part 1982 television sitcom by Andrew Marshall and David Renwick, made by London Weekend Television for ITV. Marshall and Renwick later reworked the concept as a 1986 film of the same name from ITC Entertainment, with almost completely different characters and plot, although one or two of the original actors returned in different roles.
Lenin of the Rovers was a BBC Radio 4 comedy series from 1988 written by Marcus Berkmann, produced by Harry Thompson and starring comedian Alexei Sayle as Ricky Lenin, Russian captain of Felchester Rovers - Britain's only communist football team. Other regular players in the team were Stevie Stalin and Terry Trotsky. The team was managed by Ray Royce and Colonel Brace-Cartwright who were frequently interviewed by Frank Lee Brian. John Sessions and Jim Broadbent made character appearances in Series 2. The title is a parody of the long-running football-themed comic strip, Roy of the Rovers.
Alexei Sayle's Stuff is a British television comedy sketch show which ran on BBC2 for a total of 18 episodes over 3 series from 1988 to 1991.
"Boring" is the third episode of The Young Ones, a British sitcom. It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall, and Lise Mayer, and directed by Paul Jackson. It was first aired on BBC2 on 23 November 1982.
"Bomb" is the fourth episode of British sitcom The Young Ones. It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall and Lise Mayer, and directed by Paul Jackson. It was first aired on BBC2 on 30 November 1982. The episode notably satirises the then-current anxieties of a potential nuclear war, and features references to the Protect and Survive pamphlets intended to be distributed in the UK in the event of such a conflict.
"Bambi" is the seventh episode of British sitcom The Young Ones. It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall and Lise Mayer, and directed by Paul Jackson. It was broadcast on BBC2 on 8 May 1984, as the first episode of the show's second series. It parodies University Challenge. This scene also showcased the two emerging sides of British comedy at the time: The Young Ones, representative of the new British 'Punk' Alternative Comedy scene, against comedians who represented the new "Oxbridge" Comedy Scene.
"Sick" is the eleventh episode of British sitcom The Young Ones. It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall and Lise Mayer, and directed by Paul Jackson. It was first aired on BBC2 on 12 June 1984. The episode features the song "Our House", performed by Madness, the only band to appear on the show twice.
The Strike is one of the short comedy films – written by Peter Richardson and Pete Richens, and directed by Richardson – which made up the long-running Channel 4 television series The Comic Strip Presents.... First aired in January 1988, it also received a limited theatrical release, and won the Golden Rose of Montreux for the same year.
"'Ullo John! Gotta New Motor?" is a song written by British comedian Alexei Sayle, originally released as a single in the UK in 1982. The single eventually achieved UK Top Twenty success in 1984, following a reissue.
Where the Bullets Fly is a 1966 British comedy spy film directed by John Gilling and starring Tom Adams, John Arnatt, Dawn Addams, Tim Barrett and Michael Ripper.