Parody has been around since cinema's beginning. The comic pioneer Mack Sennett was at his best when spoofing the melodramatic adventure pictures of his mentor, D. W. Griffith (1875–1948). Sennett's Teddy at the Throttle (1916) poked fun at Griffith's penchant for the last-minute rescue, as in the close of the controversial classic The Birth of a Nation (1915). While it usually has a specific target, the spoof film is peppered with eclectic references to other "texts." Although Airplane! (1980) makes parodic mincemeat of the Airport MOVIES of the 1970s, it also pricks films from other genres, as in the opening credit, which deflates Jaws (1977), and the lovers' beach scene, which skewers From Here to Eternity (1953).