Movie review: ‘Top Secret!’

FloridaGator80

The often forgotten gem from the Zucker-Abrahams team is “Top Secret!,” which spoofs the espionage genre, and you don’t have to know the Z-A partnership to immediately recognize their filmmaking style in it. Surely you’ve seen “Airplane!” and its sequel and “Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!” and its pair of sequels … and don’t call me “Shirley!” The gags – both visual and verbal – fly faster than the speed of comedy here and as a bonus, you get Val Kilmer in his film debut.

‘Top Secret!’
(1984; 90 minutes; rated PG; directed by Jim Abrahams, David Zucker and Jerry Zucker; and starring Val Kilmer and Omar Sharif)

IT’S NO SECRET: THIS ONE’S FUNNY!

(NOTE: I expanded this review with some additional opinion and updated links on Feb. 18, 2016. I again expanded the review on March 24, 2020. I again expanded the review on Sept. 27, 2024. I updated the review on April 2, 2025, to note the death of Val Kilmer)

If you liked “Airplane!” in 1980 and “Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!” eight years later, then you most likely saw “Top Secret!” in 1984. All are from the fertile, frenetic comedy minds of the Zucker brothers Jerry and David and their partner in arms Jim Abrahams. All three feature visual and spoken jokes shot machine-gun style at the audience.

(CLICK here … for all my reviews of movies)
(CLICK here … for a chronological list of my reviews)
(CLICK here … for all my reviews of ‘007’ movies)
(CLICK here … for all my reviews of sports movies)
(CLICK here … for all my reviews of war movies)
(CLICK here … for all my reviews of Christmas movies)
(CLICK here … for all my reviews of horror movies)

If you blink in “Top Secret!” you’ll miss at least a couple of sight gags, such as the telegram with the heading “East Germany” and the below it “Better Government through Intimidation” or the motorcycle dispatch rider tying his motorcycle to a hitching post. OK, we’re not talking serious comedy here (serious comedy?) but we are talking belly-laughing, side-splitting and doubled-over jokes delivered like a sledge hammer on glass.

On the most interesting note, “Top Secret!” has possibly the strangest line ever uttered in cinema (look at the cast notes for the actual quote as I didn’t want to put it up this high in the review since it involves tampons).

As if you needed to know, “Top Secret!” is an espionage thriller set in East Germany with a tinge of World War II Nazi Germany thrown in. The East Germans are going to attack the Western powers’ submarines with a new weapon and the Resistance (insert WWII reference) is determined to stop it. Enter U.S. singer “Nick Rivers” and, while in East Germany for a cultural program, becomes embroiled in the plot.

So, now you have a bunch of information that is not really necessary to have fun with this film. Here’s a look at some of the principal cast:

  • Val Kilmer plays “Nick Rivers” in his big-screen debut and this highly kinetic actor, who would play a dissimilar yet similar character the next year in “Real Genius” (click here to read my review) blows the doors off with this debut character. Kilmer has to do it all in the “Nick Rivers” role: sing (yes, it’s him on the soundtrack), dance and, yes, act. He does a good job on all. Kilmer’s most notable roles include “Iceman” in “Top Gun,” a criminal in “Heat” (click here to read my review) and my favorite starring him as a brilliant college student in “Real Genius.” He was also in “The Doors” and “The Salton Sea” and has an iconic, oft-quoted line from “Tombstone” (“I’m your Huckleberry!” One film with him you’ll never remember but should is “Willow” – and director Ron Howard helped bring it back to TV in 2022 as a tee-vee series. It’s unfortunate, while Kilmer has never been nominated for an Oscar or a Golden Globe, he has been nominated four times for a “Razzie” for the worst in cinema. However, those are offset somewhat by his five nominations for a MTV Movie + TV award. Kilmer died at 65 of pneumonia on April 1, 2025.
  • An Oscar nominee (certainly not for this one), Omar Sharif is primarily known for dramatic roles in such dramatic classics as “Doctor Zhivago” and “Lawrence of Arabia” but does a delightfully droll turn as the spy “Agent Cedric” in this one. Sharif is surprisingly solid playing the straight man and I don’t believe he would have enjoyed knowing his legacy included “Top Secret!.” But there are those of us who give him high marks. He was nominated for “Lawrence of Arabia” and was in “Che!” and “The Tamarind Seed.” Sharif died at 83 in 2015 of a heart attack in his native Egypt. He had 118 acting credits spanning seven decades since his first in 1954.
  • Kilmer hooks up with Lucy Gutteridge, who plays Resistance member “Hillary Flammond,” whose father is being forced by the East Germans to build a secret weapon. The two have great interplay, but she never does much with her character. She doesn’t elevate it in any way and her expressions aren’t the best. Gutteridge had a brief career of 27 credits including the 1984 remake of “A Christmas Carol” with George C. Scott and she hasn’t worked in film since 1993.

I have to go back to the gags since the best part of the Kilmer-Gutteridge dialogue usually goes something like this: “I’m sorry, I really don’t know any German,” he says to her at one point and she replies, “That’s all right, I know a little German. He’s sitting over there.” Of course, there’s a cut to a little person dressed in lederhosen waving at them. Bah, dum dum.

Or, in another great gag, Sharif is getting information from a novelty peddler, who is selling party tricks on a sidewalk (no, not those kind of tricks), at the end he reaches down, picks something up and says to the contact, “Wait, you dropped your phony dog poo.” Naturally, the contact replies, “What phony dog poo?”

I know this kind of dialogue isn’t anything Sharif would have ever considered part of true acting or would want as part of his legend in Hollywood, but he certainly showed a talent for being a straight man in “Top Secret!”

Continuing on with the vast silliness here … as for the main character, “Nick Rivers” is at the top of U.S. charts (the East German High Command even plays one of his records – yes, an LP album, remember this is 1984) with songs like “Skeet Surfin’” (surfers shooting skeet with double-barrel shotguns), “Skeet City” and, “Your Skeetin’ Heart” with Tammy Wynette (sadly, no cameo here for her, though). Click here for a YouTube.com link to the music video of “Skeet Surfin’” …

Kilmer and Gutteridge then have to save the day and go through various adventures to stop the East Germans, find her father and uncover the traitor in the Resistance. Along the way she’ll find an old lover who was stranded on a deserted island who later plays the part of a phony cow.

Kilmer also meets members of the Resistance who have memorable names including “Chocolate Mousse” (a black guy), “Détente,” “Avant Garde,” “Croissant,” “Souffle,” “Escargot,” and “Déjà vu” (“Have we met before, monsieur?”).

However, it is the sight gags that just keep you glued to the screen so as not to miss a single one such as:

  • The messenger who takes off his German helmet but the straps stay in place.
  • The group of East German female Olympians are played by a crew of male bodybuilders.
  • The backwards scene in a bookstore.
  • Kilmer’s attempted escape from a jail cell.
  • A Ford Pinto exploding into flames (a reference to the late 1970s controversy over the vehicle being fire-prone in a rear-end accident).

The most creative scene is a wild west bar fight … underwater. Well, it’s that kind of film. Go out of your way to find it. You won’t regret a single moment … but if you look away, you’ll surely miss a couple of gags.

And don’t call me Shirley!

“Top Secret!” was the 52nd ranked film at U.S. theaters with $20.4 million in ticket sales, according to Box Office Mojo. “Top Secret!” was made on a budget of $9 million and came in $1 million under that number, according to Wiki. The No. 1 film of the year was the classic Eddie Murphy now classic action-comedy “Beverly Hills Cop” with $234.7 million. Here are the other films from 1984 that I’ve reviewed:

Other cast and film notes (via IMDb.com):

  • John J. Carney plays “Klaus,” who is “a moron who knows only what he reads in the ‘New York Post.’” His better-known works include “A Clockwork Orange” and the “Shogun” TV mini-series. Carney died in 1995 at 54 of cancer.
  • The Zuckers and Abrahams all have uncredited roles as background soldiers. The Zuckers’ father also has a bit part, as does their mother.
  • The cow is played by Daisy. Yes, it’s in the credits.
  • A photo of Cher can be seen in Kilmer’s jail cell. He was dating her at the time of filming.
  • Veteran classical actor Peter Cushing, known for his role as “Grand Moff Tarkin” in “Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope,” plays the bookstore proprietor. It’s not much of a role in a scene that runs backward, but I guess he did OK.
  • Tony Award-winning actor Michael Gough plays “Dr. Paul Flammond.” When Kilmer finds out about the secret weapon, he delivers one of the strangest lines ever utter in cinema: “If they find out you’ve seen this, your life will be worth less than a truck load of dead rats in a tampon factory.” Strange line. Funny film.
  • Directly from IMDb.com: “The songs that Val Kilmer sings in the film are actually performed by Kilmer himself and were featured on the film’s soundtrack released in 1984 under Kilmer’s character’s name Nick Rivers.”
  • Click here for the impressive IMDb.com trivia page that includes a bunch of entries about the hilarious translation of a variety of Yiddish and German phrases used in the film.

© Chuck Curry and A Gator in Naples,
©2014, ©2016, ©2020, ©2024
Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without
express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner
is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that
full and clear credit is given to Chuck Curry and A Gator in Naples
with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Unknown's avatar

Published by FloridaGator80

1 Comment

  1. Pingback: Top Secret!: Movie Review

Leave a Reply