Jim Abrahams

Jim Abrahams (May 10, 1944 – November 26, 2024) was an American movie director and writer. Abrahams was born in Shorewood, Wisconsin, to a Jewish family, and attended Shorewood High School. He was known for the spoof movies that he co-wrote and produced with brothers Jerry Zucker and David Zucker, such as Airplane! (for which he was nominated for a BAFTA Award for Best Screenplay) and The Naked Gun series. The team of Zucker, Abrahams and Zucker (also referred to as "ZAZ") really began when the three men grew up together in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Abrahams later produced movies on his own such as Big Business, and further honed his skills in parody with Hot Shots! and its 1993 sequel Hot Shots! Part Deux.

Works

Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty

A fast-break series chronicling the professional and personal lives of the 1980s Los Angeles Lakers, one of sports’ most revered and dominant dynasties — a team that defined an era, both on and off the court.

Release Date:2022-03-06

Character:Jim Abrahams

Episode Count:1

Vote Count:147

FAT: A Documentary

Weight loss expert Vinnie Tortorich and award-winning filmmaker Peter Pardini want you to join their team to make a hard-hitting documentary film that exposes the widespread myths and lies around healthy eating, fat and weight loss and shows how, in spite of all our good intentions, we go on getting fatter and fatter.

Release Date:2019-07-19

Character:Self - Father / Founder, Charlie Foundation / Filmmaker

Vote Count:13

Kareem: Minority of One

This documentary charts the complexity and genius of the NBA's all-time leading scorer Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's legendary career, both on and off the court. Spotlighting a six-time MVP and six-time world champion, the film examines his controversial and landmark moments, his outspoken feelings about race and politics, and the evolution of the game.

Release Date:2015-11-03

Character:Self

Vote Count:25

Scary Movie 4

Cindy finds out the house she lives in is haunted by a little boy and goes on a quest to find out who killed him and why. Also, Alien "Tr-iPods" are invading the world and she has to uncover the secret in order to stop them.

Release Date:2006-04-12

Department:Writing

Job:Screenplay

Vote Count:3294

Jane Austen's Mafia!

Takeoff on the Godfather with the son of a mafia king taking over for his dying father.

Release Date:1998-07-24

Department:Writing

Job:Screenplay

Vote Count:192

...First Do No Harm

When Lori Reimuller learns that her young son Robbie has epilepsy, she first trusts the judgment of the hospital staff in how best to bring it under control. As Robbie's health slides radically downhill, however, she becomes frustrated and desperate, and so does her own research into the existing literature on treatments. When she decides to try an alternative treatment called the Ketogenic Diet, devised long ago by a doctor from Johns Hopkins, she is met with narrow-minded resistance from Robbie's doctor, who is prepared to take legal action to prevent Lori from removing him from the hospital.

Release Date:1997-02-16

Department:Directing

Job:Director

Vote Count:33

Naked Gun 33⅓: The Final Insult

Frank Drebin is persuaded out of retirement to go undercover in a state prison. There he has to find out what top terrorist, Rocco, has planned for when he escapes. Adding to his problems, Frank's wife, Jane, is desperate for a baby.

Release Date:1994-03-18

Department:Production

Job:Executive Producer

Vote Count:2104

An Introduction to the Ketogenic Diet

An introduction to the Ketogenic Diet, a special high-fat diet used to treat seizures, as a treatment for childhood epilepsy narrated by Meryl Streep. The video provides a step-by-step preparation of the meals, available options for the diet and discussions with parents and children about their dealings with the diet.

Release Date:1994-01-01

Department:Directing

Job:Director

Vote Count:1

Hot Shots! Part Deux

Topper Harley is found to be working as an odd-job-man in a monastery. The CIA want him to lead a rescue mission into Iraq, to rescue the last rescue team, who went in to rescue the last rescue team—who went in to rescue hostages left behind after Desert Storm.

Release Date:1993-05-21

Department:Writing

Job:Screenplay

Vote Count:1870

Hearts of Hot Shots! Part Deux—A Filmmaker's Apology

As part of the film's promotion, a mockumentary was aired on HBO. Titled Hearts of Hot Shots! Part Deux—A Filmmaker's Apology, the mockumentary parodied Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse, the 1991 documentary about the making of the film Apocalypse Now (which starred Charlie Sheen's father, Martin Sheen).

Release Date:1993-05-20

Vote Count:4

Brain Donors

Three manic idiots—a lawyer, a cab driver and a handyman—team up to run a ballet company to fulfil the will of a millionaire. Stooge-like antics result as the trio try to outwit the rich widow and her scheming big-shot lawyer, who also wants to run the ballet.

Release Date:1992-04-17

Department:Production

Job:Executive Producer

Vote Count:63

Hot Shots!

The gang that created Airplane and The Naked Gun sets its sights on Top Gun in this often hilarious spoof starring Charlie Sheen, who previously only inspired laughs with his personal life. He plays Topper Harley, a fighter pilot with an axe to grind: clearing the family name. He gets involved in a relationship with Valerie Golino, a woman with an unusually talented stomach. But his mission is to avenge his father. Lloyd Bridges, late in his career, revealed an aptitude for this kind of silliness, here as a commander who is both incredibly dim and delightfully accident prone. Directed by Jim Abrahams, the film makes fun of a variety of other films as well, from Dances with Wolves to The Fabulous Baker Boys. It was so successful that they all returned in the sequel, Hot Shots! Part Deux.

Release Date:1991-07-31

Department:Directing

Job:Director

Vote Count:2206

The Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear

Bumbling lieutenant Frank Drebin is out to foil the big boys in the energy industry, who intend to suppress technology that will put them out of business.

Release Date:1991-06-28

Department:Production

Job:Executive Producer

Vote Count:2271

Oscar

Angelo "Snaps" Provolone made his dying father a promise on his deathbed: he would leave the world of crime and become an honest businessman. Despite having no experience in making money in a legal fashion, Snaps sets about to keep his promise.

Release Date:1991-04-26

Character:Postman (uncredited)

Vote Count:513

Welcome Home, Roxy Carmichael

Movie star Roxy Carmichael is abandoning the bright lights of Hollywood, Calif. and returning to her small Ohio hometown -- at least long enough to dedicate a city building. And now the whole town of Clyde is bracing for Carmichael's return, most of all her now-married old flame Denton Webb and troubled teen Dinky Bossetti. An orphan with few friends, Dinky is convinced that Carmichael is her birth mother, and that the actress will reclaim her when she returns.

Release Date:1990-10-12

Department:Directing

Job:Director

Vote Count:102

Cry-Baby

A prim and proper schoolgirl goes against her society grandmother's wishes when she dates a motorcycle-riding juvenile delinquent.

Release Date:1990-04-06

Department:Production

Job:Executive Producer

Vote Count:1494

The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!

When the incompetent Lieutenant Frank Drebin seeks the ruthless killer of his partner, he stumbles upon an attempt to assassinate Queen Elizabeth II.

Release Date:1988-12-02

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Vote Count:3760

Coming to America

An African prince decides it’s time for him to find a princess... and his mission leads him and his most loyal friend to Queens, New York. In disguise as an impoverished immigrant, the pampered prince quickly finds himself a new job, new friends, new digs, new enemies and lots of trouble.

Release Date:1988-06-29

Character:Face on Cutting Room Floor

Vote Count:4401

Big Business

In the 1940s in the small town of Jupiter Hollow, two sets of identical twins are born in the same hospital on the same night. One set to a poor local family and the other to a rich family just passing through. The dizzy nurse on duty accidentally mixes the twins unbeknown to the parents. Our story flashes forward to the 1980s where the mismatched sets of twins are about to cross paths.

Release Date:1988-06-10

Department:Directing

Job:Director

Vote Count:271

Ruthless People

A couple, cheated by a vile businessman, kidnap his wife in retaliation—without knowing that their enemy is delighted they did.

Release Date:1986-06-26

Department:Directing

Job:Director

Vote Count:404

Top Secret!

Popular and dashing American singer Nick Rivers travels to East Germany to perform in a music festival. When he loses his heart to the gorgeous Hillary Flammond, he finds himself caught up in an underground resistance movement. Rivers joins forces with Agent Cedric and Flammond to attempt the rescue of her father, Dr. Paul, from the Germans, who have captured the scientist in hopes of coercing him into building a new naval mine.

Release Date:1984-06-08

Department:Directing

Job:Director

Character:German Soldier in Prop Room (uncredited)

Vote Count:1194

Cocaine Blues

A look at the problems associated with cocaine use, including the toll it takes, not only on the users themselves but on society in general.

Release Date:1983-01-02

Character:Himself

Police Squad!

In this cult parody of cop dramas, replete with farce and sight gags, Lieutenant Frank Drebin and his fellow officers from Police Squad bungle their way though crime investigations.

Release Date:1982-03-04

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:1

Vote Count:357

Airplane!

An ex-fighter pilot forced to take over the controls of an airliner when the flight crew succumbs to food poisoning.

Release Date:1980-07-02

Department:Production

Job:Executive Producer

Character:Religious Zealot #6

Vote Count:4564

The Kentucky Fried Movie

A series of loosely connected skits that spoof news programs, commercials, porno films, kung-fu films, disaster films, blaxploitation films, spy films, mafia films, and the fear that somebody is watching you on the other side of the TV.

Release Date:1977-08-10

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Character:Various

Vote Count:319