If your Instagram feed these days includes people belting out pop songs in Minionese (case in point: ‘Bohemian Minionsy’, which goes ‘Poopaye, ba dooi? Labba duka duka? Bello tu la banya, na bable na foon-ya...’) to celebrate Minions & Monsters, you are not alone. We’ve seen the yellow, chaotic, and absolutely adorable yellow fellows conspire against supervillains and aid in plots to steal everything from the Queen’s crown to the moon. After keeping us waiting for dul tagrep (two years in Minionese), Gru’s little fellows are back with a new adventure. And this time, you can expect more than just a good laugh.
Here, the Minions are in search of a new master to serve. After a series of mishaps (which involve toilet paper and a spell book), they find themselves in 1920s Hollywood. They soon become the toast of town, until the arrival of the talkies renders them obsolete—’coz, of course, no one understands Minionese. They then decide to make a movie, and, in the process, do the most Hollywood thing: revisit nuggets of Hollywood history, from classic slapstick references like Charlie Chaplin to early film history, when colour and sound were off the table. Below, some old Hollywood trivia you may or may not have missed:
1. The first reference hits right at the beginning of the movie. On screen, a bunch of Minions riding horses race towards you, an ode to Eadweard Muybridge’s The Horse in Motion, which marked a big technological leap in shooting motion pictures.
2. The Minions crash a silent movie set while chasing an apparent bank robber who can be their next Big Boss. When his accent slips, it is revealed that he’s an actor on the set of a Western, old Hollywood’s beloved genre. Yee-haw!
3. The first of many train chase sequences that the Minions find themselves entangled in shows a train barrelling towards the camera. This is a reference to the French silent film The Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat by the Lumière brothers. Think it’s too much drama accompanying what is essentially the sight of a train engine chugging along? Well, according to cinema lore, those old folks watching the movie ducked for cover thinking the train would run them over.
4. Dort, the Minions’ robot buddy, looks suspiciously similar to Gort, a character from the classic 1951 sci-fi film The Day the Earth Stood Still.
5. Quentin, Steven, Ridley, Denis... Sound familiar? As director Max bids goodbye to a string of minions who go by these names, the movie slips in references to filmmaking greats from Tarantino to Villeneuve and Federico (Fellini).
6. Blink, and you’ll miss it! The Minions pass by slapstick comedy sweetheart Buster Keaton as he performs his famous stunt from the 1928 silent film Steamboat Bill, Jr. The house collapses, but Keaton stands unscathed, his signature deadpan look not slipping for a second.
7. After a short-lived meet-cute with Keaton, the little yellow beings step into a factory, knock over a man who looks a lot like Charlie Chaplin, and jump into the machine themselves. The Minions are stuck but still cruise through the giant gears of the machine, the scene reminiscent of the iconic assembly-line sequence in Chaplin’s Modern Times.
