Something you’d expect from Minions & Monsters, the latest film featuring everyone’s favorite yellow creatures: it’s funny and pitch-perfect family entertainment. Something you might not expect: it’s an ode to Classic Hollywood.

The latest movie from Illumination Studios and the Despicable Me franchise takes place in 1927, and follows the Minions as they stumble upon Hollywood and become major film stars. Yes, really! Their journey to the top of tinseltown is a pure delight, and its rapid pacing and joke-a-minute structure is in the vein of the classic silent comedies that provided the very foundation of cinema. It’s also jam packed with delightful nods to film history.

Here, we break down every movie reference in Minions & Monsters.

Starting with the silent film era

From the jump, Minions & Monsters shows it is firmly rooted in film history, as the opening titles are a montage of minions interacting with classic early silent films, including the work of Eadweard Muybridge, George Méliès and the Lumière brothers. The Minions gallop on a horse in The Horse in Motion (1878) or run alongside a dog in Dog Running (1887). They also trick a gardner in L’Arroseur Arrosé (1895), and leave a long day of work in Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory (1895). That’s not all: the minions are at the train station for Train Pulling Into a Station (1896), and in perhaps the most famous silent movie, A Trip to the Moon (1902), one of the minions becomes the moon, and the shuttle lands right in his eye, just as Méliès intended.

E.T., Kirk Douglas, and the rest of a movie museum 

After the montage, the references come thick and fast as the film beings in a movie museum. A tour guide (voiced by Allison Janney) takes a group through the exhibits, which include displays of Neo in The Matrix (1999), Elliot and E.T. from E.T. The Extra Terrestrial (1982), Kirk Douglas in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954), and Rick Blaine in Casablanca (1942). There’s also the robot from Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927), the titular Mummy from The Mummy (1932) and even The Creature from the Black Lagoon (1953). There’s also an inflatable globe, a witty reference to Charlie Chaplin’s The Great Dictator (1940).

That’s not all you can find in the museum: it also has statues of Orson Welles, Bruce Lee, and Alfred Hitchcock, the latter surrounded by birds in a nod to The Birds (1963). There’s even a living, talking George Lucas, standing in a display case (voiced by Lucas himself).

A journey to the Island

The Minions continue their tradition of searching for a big bad to lead them in Minions & Monsters. They row to (and from) a cyclops island, in an homage to Ben-Hur (1959). The cyclops feels like a reference to Clash of the Titans (1981).

A familiar sorcerer

During their journey to find a new leader, they come across a familiar looking sorcerer, whose beard, outfit, and even home will be familiar to fans of Disney’s Fantasia (1940).

An epic chase 

The Minions make their way to Hollywood, but not before getting inadvertently involved in a high-stakes train heist that pays tribute to both The Great Train Robbery (1903) and The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906). The train leads them straight to the city, where they run under a building that has a man hanging for his life on a clock, just as Harold Lloyd did in Safety Last! (1923). As a result of the chase, they prove themselves in an audition with a fight against vikings, referencing The Viking (1928).

Buster Keaton x2

The Minions wind up on the front of the train as they careen from one street to the next, referencing Buster Keaton’s The General (1927). There’s another Keaton movie reference just moments later, when the minions pass a man whose house falls on him—though he escapes intact, just like Keaton did in his film Steamboat Bill, Jr. (1928).

Singin’ in the Rain

The film borrows generously from the classic musical Singin’ in the Rain (1952), from its story beats about the transition from the silent to sound eras, to a scene where they explore a film studio lot, which also has nods to Cleopatra (1934) and the first best picture winner Wings (1927). 

Play it Again

Though Orson Welles and Casablanca were referenced in the museum, they get a second dose later in the film. For Casablanca, a movie studio executive asks Sam, a piano player, to “play it again,” and he starts playing the theme from Casablanca, in a nod to one of the film’s most famous scenes. And Welles gets a second reference when the opening scene of his film Citizen Kane (1941) gets a very funny shot-for-shot remake in Minions and Monsters.

A cog in the machine

In one chase, the Minions run through a factory, knocking a man who looks like Charlie Chaplin into a machine, in reference to Chaplin’s Modern Times (1936). In an extra fun beat, dozens of minions jump into the machine, too, clogging it with yellow-y goodness.

A party with elephants

The Minions go to an exceptionally elaborate Hollywood party featuring loud music, frantic dancing—and a pair of elephants, referencing the Damien Chazelle movie Babylon (2022), the newest and perhaps the most surprising movie that Minions and Monsters references.

Noir gets a spotlight

There’s also a tribute to the Noir genre, and particularly The Maltese Falcon (1941). The woman in the black-and-white movie scene is named Mary (Mary Astor starred in the ‘41 classic), who addresses the man (well, a minion) as Humphrey (aka Humphrey Bogart, who co-starred), and he wears Sam Spade’s familiar trenchcoat.

Posters galore

There are lots of film posters throughout Hollywood in Minions & Monsters. While some are fake movies, some are clear tributes to movies like The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly (1966) and It Came From Outer Space (1953).

Getting hungry?

While on a boat, the minions encounter a shark, referencing Jaws (1975), made extra obvious by a music cue channeling John Williams’ memorable score.

A robot with meaning

A potential leader for the minions is Dort (Jesse Eisenberg), a friendly and surprisingly strong robot. The name probably sounds familiar, as the humanoid in The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) is named Gort. 

A final battle 

The film’s climax is chock-full of clever references. We won’t spoil it all, but the ultimate monster is clearly inspired by The Blob (1958). In the chaos, the minions eat some spaghetti just like in Lady and the Tramp (1955). A pivotal battle features plenty of fighter jets that serve as a nod to Star Wars (1977). 

It’s in the music

While the film has a great original score from John Powell, Minions & Monsters also includes several musical references, including a song from The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985), another film about a love of cinema. There’s the instrumental from “Hooray for Hollywood,” from Hollywood Hotel (1937)—and not Guys and Dolls (1955), like The Simpsons would have you believe. And there’s the song “The Gold Diggers’ Song (We’re in the Money)” from the musical Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933).