The Path of "Planes, Trains, and Automobiles" Quiz

Neal Page (played by Steve Martin) is a New York City executive running out of time to make his Thanksgiving flight back home to Chicago. The man across the street (as was only pointed out to me on my umpteenth rewatch) is a minuscule cameo by Kevin Bacon.

They get into a footrace on opposite sides of the street, but it's Neal who lands face-first on the street, and Bacon nabs the cab. Next, Neal tries to buy a cab off of a lawyer. While he's paying out, a man carelessly stows his trunk in the back and rides away. Neal only catches a glimpse of the cab thief, but it won't be the last...

"The last thing I want to be remembered as is an annoying blabbermouth. [beat] Nothing grinds my gears worse than some chowderhead who can't keep his trap shut. [beat] Catch me running off at the mouth, give me a poke."

As he's waiting for the plane, Neal happens to sit across from someone familiar. It's the guy who stole his cab! The clueless guy offers Neal a hot dog and a beer... or a just a hot dog... or coffee, milk, soda, tea, Lifesavers, or a slushie for his troubles. Then, when the Chicago flight finally takes off, Neal happens to be seated next to... the guy who stole his cab! He introduces himself as Del Griffith, played by John Candy. Del is a salt-of-the-earth traveling shower curtain ring salesman with a Midwestern gift of gab - not the kind of guy the polished, cynical New Yorker gets along with.

Due to heavy snowfall at O'Hare, the plane reroutes to Wichita, Kansas. Getting out of the Wichita airport full of dislocated passengers proves to be an impossibility. Del tells Neal: "We'd have more luck playing pick-up sticks with our buttcheeks." "You're saying I could be stuck in Wichita?" "I'm saying you are stuck in Wichita."

They get to the motel via Doobby's Taxiola, a 1983 Pontiac Bonneville tricked out with a paint job and low-rider hydraulics, owned by a friend of Del's. Doobby takes the long way so Neal can take in all Wichita has to offer - about the last thing Neal's interested in following his exhausting flight. It's the first time we see how well-liked Del is most places he goes, and how far outside his element Neal is. That conflict boils over when they get to their motel room. They bicker, Neal gets as insulting as he can, and Del responds: "I like me. My wife likes me. My customers like me. 'Cause I'm the real article. What you see is what you get."

(The character is called "Doobie" in the script, but his car clearly says "Doobby." I trust the car more in this regard.)

Del calls on a friend in Wichita, who sends his backwoods son Owen out to pick them up. Owen snorts like a pig when he breathes: "Train don't run out of Wichita. 'Less'n you're a hog, or a cattle. People train run out of Stubbville. Snort, snort, snooort..." By the time they arrive in Stubbville, the two men and the pooch are all popsicles.

Thawed out at the train station, Neal's grown cordial towards Del, but he still wants to get as far from him as possible as soon as possible. He tells Del there are no seats next to each other on the train, so they have to ride separately. Then Neal hastens to get on - not even stopping to give Del his address to send money for the tickets.

The train is labeled a "Contrack" (a made-up combination of "Conrail" and "Amtrak"), and it breaks down a little outside Jefferson City, Missouri. Seeming to feel bad about ditching Del, Neal helps Del carry his trunk through a field, and they end up sitting next to each other on the bus.

Del asks Neal, "You're in a pretty lousy mood. You ever travel by bus before? ...Your mood's not gonna improve much." The crammed bus has kids running up and down the aisle, young strangers necking and smoking a seat over, and Del leading a bus-wide singalong. The singing isn't what annoys Neal, actually: it's the dagger glares he gets from the rest of the bus when he belts out an unknown Frank Sinatra tune. But Del starts singing "The Flintstones," and even the kids know that one!

A bus shuttles Neal to his rental car spot, but he finds the car he rented isn't there. Incensed, he has to walk across a busy highway, down an embankment, and across an airport runway. Waterlogged with snowmelt, he approaches the rental car clerk to politely explain his difficulty.

She politely acknowledges his frustration, but regrets to say she is unable to provide further assistance. Meanwhile, coincidence of coincidences, Del just happens to be zooming out of the rental place, and lets Neal ride along in his car. To Chicago at last?

Accident report: Driver was distracted by a cigarette and a spirited air-piano solo (to Ray Charles' "Mess Around"). Driver veered onto snow-covered shoulder for several miles. While distracted, driver threw cigarette into back seat of vehicle. Still distracted, driver then entered the wrong lane of a divided highway. Car scraped between two oncoming semitrucks. Driver and passenger briefly turned into skeletons, then Satan, then back to normal. And then the car caught fire. Total loss, except for working radio. Recommend denial of coverage.

The torched car is actually good enough to get the pair to a motel, then a good distance down the rest of the road home. Eventually, with a few hours left to Chicago, they're finally pulled over by a cop, played by Michael McKean. As the cop notes, they have no mirrors, dashboard gauges, lack most of the roof and windows, and are driving long-distance on the spare tire.

The car gets impounded, but the cop lets the two ride in the tow. The police then arrange for a truck driver to pick up our heroes. Too bad for them, the trucker is "a little freaky" about people riding in the cab with him. Guess it'll be the trailer, then!

Spoiler alert if you've never seen the movie. On the ride home, images of the feast to come flash through Neal's mind. Then, revealing he's a truly changed guy, he reflects fondly on his travels with Del. Finally, a strange thought comes to him: didn't Del say he "hasn't been home in years"? Has he really not seen his wife in years? Unless his wife is...

This, friends, is why it pays to be a good listener. Only now realizing that Del's wife is long dead, Neal races back to catch Del. Del, who has nowhere to go, is still lingering at the station. Evidently, there's no more trains leaving the station for Neal to get home. Which leaves one way home...

And at long last, Neal makes it home, happy to introduce his friend Del. Here's a fun oddity for you: when "Mr. Griffith" arrives at home, an extremely emotional Mrs. Page greets him by name, before she's told what his name is. I have enjoyed the theories I've heard explaining this, including that the traveling salesman had made a "stop" at the Page house before, and that Del is a Tyler Durdenesque schism in Neal's personality (this almost makes more sense than their half-dozen chance meetings, by the way).

The reality is sadly pedestrian: a generic subplot was cut from the film in which Susan suspects Neal's secretly with another woman during his days-long absence.