Jeanskynebu
the audience applauded
Jonah Abbott
There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.
Ginger
Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.
J Besser
Wow, "The Big Bus" is so funny! I remember I wanted to see this when it came out when I was a kid but it didn't work out. It took many years before I was able to watch this in one viewing. It's great. A great '70s comedy,. A great comedy "period". It's played perfectly. It's played straight but not too straight, kind of. The balance everybody achieved is incredible. The great Joe Bologna is excellent. The rest of the cast is almost as good. It came out four years before "Airplane" but right in the middle of Mel Brooks' films. I need to watch it more often.
moonspinner55
A double-decker, nuclear-powered super-bus called the Cyclops One makes its maiden voyage from New York City to Denver, but immediately there are problems: the scientist behind Cyclops One was almost killed before the bus even left the terminal, while the lead driver is under duress from a recent bus crash in which he was accused of eating the passengers...oh and, yes, there's a bomb on-board. In 1976, disaster movies hadn't yet outlived their usefulness as "dramatic entertainment", so "The Big Bus" came off as cynical (it was really just two or three years ahead of its time). There are some big laughs, mostly early on: René Auberjonois is dryly funny as a frustrated priest, Lynn Redgrave as a fashionista has a great bit dressing the passengers in her new Fall line, Ruth Gordon is a hoot as always playing a mouthy old lady (what else?) and Murphy Dunne is terrific as lounge pianist Tommy Joyce. The screenplay by Lawrence J. Cohen and Fred Freeman flirts with outrageousness without ever getting us there. The movie, filled with familiar goof-offs from television, is too middle-of-the-road to provide the kind of lunatic highs David and Jerry Zucker and Jim Abraham would eventually deliver with 1980's "Airplane!" This plays more like a Mel Brooks clone, something along the lines of "Silent Movie". ** from ****
BA_Harrison
Four years before the successful take off of Zucker and Abraham's smash hit spoof Airplane! (1980), director James Frawley's The Big Bus explored remarkably similar territory, lampooning the popular disaster genre in a crazy scatter-shot style. The film's titular vehicle is the world's first nuclear powered bus, a giant, luxury, 32-wheeled metallic titan called Cyclops embarking on its maiden journey travelling non-stop from New York to Denver; unfortunately for the passengers and crew, a crazed oil magnate is out to discredit the bus by putting it permanently out of service by any means necessary.Like Airplane, the absurd goof-ball gags come thick and fast, but The Big Bus's batting average isn't quite as high, a lot of the humour falling rather flat. The film's best bits are its more subtle, throw-away humorous moments, although I imagine that a lot of these might easily be missed on the first viewing. As the film thunders towards its conclusion, the bus loses its brakes and picks up speed, careening round perilous mountain roads; when the bus eventually grinds to a halt (over the edge of a precipice) so do the film's laughs, the remainder of the action being dull and predictable.
MartinHafer
This is a stupid film. I admit it. The acting is very broad, the script is dopey as can be and every element of the film says "DUMB" but it all works because the film never takes itself seriously and makes no pretense. Yes, it is meant to be stupid! I mean, just think about the plot--an air or sea disaster movie that instead occurs on a bus! And, this is no ordinary bus, but seems about 25,000 square feet (minimum) inside--complete with a huge lounge, seating for a huge number of passengers and even a bowling alley!! Plus, you add other plot ideas like a co-driver named "Shoulders" because he keeps driving over the shoulders of the road, a bomb planted aboard and the bus is actually NUCLEAR-POWERED!!! This movie is pure escapist fun. If you want something deep or really enjoy the films or Fellini or Truffaut and hate anything else, then this movie is not for you. If you like pure dopiness and could use a laugh, then this film is exactly what you need.
