Planes, Trains & Automobiles

A man must struggle to travel home for Thanksgiving, with an obnoxious slob of a shower ring salesman his only companion.

• Director:John Hughes
• Genre:Adventure / Comedy / Drama
• Runtime:89 minutes

Cast

Steve Martin : Neal Page
John Candy : Del Griffith
Laila Robins : Susan Page
Michael McKean : State Trooper
Kevin Bacon : Taxi Racer

Steve Martin plays the tightly wound Neal Page, a bundle-of-nerves advertising executive. John Candy portrays the innocent and well-meaning, but accident-prone, overly talkative and somewhat reckless, Del Griffith (Director of Sales, American Light and Fixture, Shower Curtain Ring Division), a shower curtain ring salesman who seems to live in a world governed by a different set of rules from those governing Neal Page’s marketing life.

The film follows the story of Neal Page as he tries to return to his family for Thanksgiving in Chicago after being on a business trip in New York. The journey is doomed from the outset, with Del Griffith interfering by inadvertently snatching the taxi cab that Mr. Page had hailed for himself. The two inevitably pair up later and begin an absurdly error-prone adventure to help Page get back to his home. Their flight from LaGuardia Airport to O’Hare is diverted to Wichita due to a blizzard in Chicago, which ends up dissipating only a few hours after touchdown in Kansas. When every mode of transport (including a train and a rental car) fails them, what should have been a 1 hour and 45 minute New York-to-Chicago flight turns into a three-day adventure. To complicate matters even further, on the first night in Wichita, an unidentified thief breaks into the poorly-locked hotel and steals almost $1000 aggregate from the two men and is not seen subsequently.

Neal frequently blows up at Del, blaming him for much of their misfortunes, including the robbery of the first night. These ravings are not all unjustified, as Del’s carelessly discarded cigarette had ruined the rental car, melting all but the radio. Del in turn regards Neal as pretentious and uptight, while Del is less afraid to be himself. After much heated argument between the two men, a bond between them forms, and Neal finally manages to overcome his self-centeredness and both men pull together to finally make their way home, and Del acts like a more serious businessman to raise money by selling off his entire inventory of shower curtain rings, mainly to punks who think they make good earrings. Read more

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