Mel Brooks Movies
Farce, satire, and parody come together with Vaudeville roots and manic energy to create the Mel Brooks style of comedy. Born Melvin Kaminsky to a Russian Jewish family in Brooklyn, NY, the writer/producer/director/actor was one of very few people to win an Oscar, Emmy, Grammy, and Tony award. After serving in the U.S. Army during World War II, he worked as a standup comic at resorts in the Catskills and started writing comedy. Along with Woody Allen, Neil Simon, and others, he wrote for Sid Caesar's Your Show of Shows, which later became Caesar's Hour. Teaming up with fellow staff writer Carl Reiner, he developed the award-winning "2000 Year Old Man" comedy skit, which led to several recordings, television appearances, and a 1998 Grammy. He and writer Buck Henry also created the spy-parody TV series Get Smart (1965-1970) starring Don Adams. During this time, he produced theater, married actress Anne Bancroft, and made his first film: an Oscar-winning animated short parody of modern art called The Critic. He then put together a screenplay based upon his experiences working with Broadway executives that led to his feature-length debut The Producers. He cast stage legend Zero Mostel in the lead role and got B-movie producer Joseph Levine to put up the funds, but the movie didn't get distributed until Peter Sellers saw it and encouraged its release. Brooks ended up winning an Oscar for Best Screenplay and, in 2000, adapted the film into a highly successful Broadway musical. By 1970, after the release of his next film The Twelve Chairs, Hollywood thought his work was "too Jewish." In 1974, Brooks made the marketable move toward parodies with the Western spoof Blazing Saddles, winning him a Writer's Guild award and introducing his stock actors Harvey Korman and Madeline Kahn. Finding his niche, he would continue to make parodies throughout his career by spoofing horror (Young Frankenstein), silent movies (Silent Movie), Hitchcock (High Anxiety), historical epics (History of the World -- Part I), and science fiction (Spaceballs).Working simultaneously as writer, director, and lead actor, Brooks started to generate negative press about his excessive style. In 1983, appearing opposite Bancroft, he concentrated on just acting for the remake of the Ernst Lubitch classic To Be or Not to Be. He continued working with his production company Brooksfilms during the '80s as an executive producer on projects as varied as The Fly, The Elephant Man, Solarbabies, and 84 Charing Cross Road (starring Bancroft). His brief stray into non-parody films in 1991 (Life Stinks) was universally dismissed, so he returned to form with Robin Hood: Men in Tights and Dracula: Dead and Loving It. Other than the occasional cameo or random appearance as voice talent, Brooks spent the late '90s winning awards and playing Uncle Phil on the NBC series Mad About You. In 2001, the Broadway musical version of The Producers (starring Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick) led to a successful national tour and broke a new record by winning one Grammy and 12 Tony awards. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- 1986
- PG13
A futuristic dystopia is the setting for this tale about good versus evil and a magical space-sphere out to reestablish a civilized society. An orphanage in a bleak and deserted landscape imprisons a large group of youngsters who have divided into good and bad groups. One day, while competing at roller-skate ball, the teams come across a bowling-ball-sized sphere named Bodhi (a Sanskrit word equivalent to "enlightened compassion"). Bodhi communicates with the good kids, but the bad ones cannot understand the sphere's electronic burbles. The nasty Darstar (Adrian Pasdar) steals Bodhi and heads out into the forbidden world beyond the orphanage. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Richard Jordan, Jami Gertz, (more)
Helene Hanff's book 84 Charing Cross Road had previously been a TV program and a stage play before it was converted into this 1986 film. The scene is New York, 1949: Anne Bancroft plays a struggling writer and passionate bibliophile, who answers an advertisement from a rare-volumes bookshop at 84 Charing Cross Road in London. Thus begins a two-decade romance by correspondence between Bancroft and Briton Anthony Hopkins, the man in charge of the overseas department of Marks and Company. Though several meetings are arranged, Bancroft and Hopkins never come face to face thanks to mitigating circumstances. But Anne finally makes it to London, and finds that much has changed. 84 Charing Cross Road was produced by Mel Brooks, the husband of star Anne Bancroft. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Anne Bancroft, Anthony Hopkins, (more)
- 1986
This video contains some of the most memorable moments from Steve Allen's long-running talk show. Featured guests include Mel Brooks, Jimmy Durante and Johnny Carson. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
A movie version of the stage play The Doctor and the Devils, written in the 1950s by Welsh poet/playwright Dylan Thomas, had been planned and shelved by several filmmakers before producer Mel Brooks and director Freddie Francis finally brought the project to fruition in 1985. Essentially, the story is the old one about grave robbers Burke and Hare and Scottish surgeon Dr. Robert Knox (which also yielded the 1945 Val Lewton classic The Body Snatcher). Timothy Dalton plays 18th century doctor Thomas Rock, who must rely upon the disreputable Robert Fallon (Jonathan Pryce) and Timothy Broom (Stephen Rea) to provide fresh cadavers for Dr. Rock's teaching hospital. When they can't dig up corpses fast enough to suit Dr. Rock, Fallon and Broom decide to streamline their methods via murder. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Timothy Dalton, Jonathan Pryce, (more)
- 1984
This live appearance by Mel Brooks includes songs, skits and jokes. ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide
- 1983
- PG
Mel Brooks and his real-life wife Anne Bancroft play Frederick and Anna Bronski, musical comedy stars in 1939 Poland. The highlight of the Bronskis' act is Frederick's imitation of Adolf Hitler, but he is forced to eliminate this turn for fear of offending the Nazis. Meanwhile, Anna enters into a harmless flirtation with Polish bomber pilot Andre Sobinski (Tim Matheson). The pilot's nightly signal to visit Anna in her dressing room is "To Be or Not to Be," spoken by Bronski during the Shakespearean portion of his act. When the Germans march into Warsaw, the Bronskis and the rest of their troupe are forced into hiding (notably the homosexual Lupinski, played by Lewis J. Stadlen, who is forced to endure the humiliation of wearing a pink star). Flying for the Polish resistance in England, Sobinski asks kindly Professor Seletzky (Jose Ferrer) to deliver his "To Be or Not to Be" message to Anna. When Seletzky doesn't seem to recognize the name of Anne Bronski, Warsaw's biggest star, Sobinski suspects that something is amiss. Sure enough, Seletzky is a Nazi spy, heading to Warsaw to help Col. "Concentration Camp" Ehrhardt (Oscar-nominated Charles Durning) destroy the underground movement. Parachuting into Poland, Sobinski enlists the aid of the Bronski troupe to foil the Nazis. What follows is an uproarious series of disguises and deceptions, capped by Bronski's impersonation of Der Fuhrer. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Mel Brooks, Anne Bancroft, (more)
As played by Jessica Lange, Frances Farmer is a rebel from the word go, winning a high school essay award by writing a piece in defense of Communism. Determining to become an actress, Frances is equally determined not to play the Hollywood game: she refuses to acquiesce to idiotic publicity stunts, and insists upon appearing on screen sans makeup. Her defiance attracts the attention of Broadway playwright Clifford Odets, who convinces Frances that her future rests with the Group Theatre. But once she leaves Hollywood for New York, Frances learns to her chagrin that the Group intends to exploit her movie fame in order to draw in customers. Her desperate attempts to restart her movie career, combined with her increasing dependence on alcohol and the pressures brought to bear by her monster mother (Kim Stanley), result in a complete mental breakdown. Even while institutionalized, Frances is abused by the powers-that-be; she is forced to undergo an injurious brain operation, is treated like a mad animal, and periodically raped by the inmates. Frances is released in the custody of her mother, who persists in browbeating her tortured daughter until Frances discovers the legal means to break away. The real-life Frances spent her last years as host of a local Indianapolis TV program, dying in 1970 at age 57; the film comes to a climax when Frances is feted on the smarmy network program This is Your Life. Other actual personages depicted herein include Clifford Odets (played by Jeffrey DeMunn), Harold Clurman (Jordan Charney) and Ralph Edwards (Donald Craig). Frances' first husband Leif Erickson is fictionalized as "Jeffrey York", and played by Lange's real-life inamorata Sam Shepard. And if you listen closely, you'll hear the voice of Kevin Costner, whose minor role was whittled down to one line when he, like Frances Farmer, had the temerity to argue with the director. The unhappy life of actress Frances Farmer was also covered in Farmer's autobiography, Will There Ever Be a Morning? While the film rights for that book were sold to a TV-movie concern, the producers of the theatrical feature Frances were able to ship their production out to the public first. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jessica Lange, Kim Stanley, (more)
- 1982
The genuine love felt by the people of France for American comedian Jerry Lewis has become something of a topic for incredulous humor in the United States over the years, but if there was any doubt as to whether the many jokes overstated the case, this exhaustive six-hour hagiography from director Robert Benayoun quickly erases it. Nothing less than an adoring outpouring of idolatry, Bonjour Monsieur Lewis is simultaneously affectionate and reverential toward its subject, presenting hundreds of rare clips, outtakes, interviews, and tributes from Lewis' estimated six million feet of tape and film housed in his obsessively complete basement library, a collection of nearly everything he has ever done. In between highlights of his film career, there are talks with Martin Scorsese (who directed Lewis in 1982's The King of Comedy), Steven Spielberg, John Landis, Mel Brooks, and Louis Malle, among others. There are also a number of rare films of Lewis on-stage at French venues, singing "Sonny Boy" with his own father and son, reuniting with Dean Martin at a Muscular Dystrophy telethon, and engaging in some raunchy ad libs cut from his early films. The film clips are varied and fairly thorough, even excerpting Lewis' rare TV version of The Jazz Singer, but, alas, virtually ignoring the Holy Grail among Lewis completists, his aborted concentration-camp project The Day the Clown Cried. Other segments deal with his highly praised charitable efforts and relationship with children. More of a tribute than a real documentary, the film is nevertheless a treasure trove for anyone remotely interested in this talented and enigmatic comedy legend. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jerry Lewis, Dean Martin, (more)
- 1981
- R
- Add History of the World -- Part I to QueueAdd History of the World -- Part I to top of Queue
Mel Brooks produced, directed, wrote, and starred in this episodic comedy in the spirit of Monty Python and the 1957 studio travesty The Story of Mankind. The film is divided into five sequences that play like blue-toned Eddie Cantor vaudeville sketches -- "The Dawn of Man," "The Stone Age," The Spanish Inquisition," "The Bible," and "The Future." Also included is a Brooksian depiction of The Last Supper and a long-winded sequence about the French Revolution. The film starts with a 2001: A Space Odyssey parody, narrated by Orson Welles, in which a collection of ape-men learn to stand erect (in more ways than one). The Stone Age reveals the origins of both the first homo sapien and homosexual marriages. Brooks then appears in an Old Testament sequence as Moses, descending from Mount Sinai with three heavy stone tablets bearing the 15 Commandments; after he drops one of these tablets, the laws of God become 10 Commandments. The Roman period picks up with Brooks as Comicus, attempting to get a gig as a "stand-up philosopher" at Caesar's Palace. The Spanish Inquisition is a musical production number with monks torturing Jews to lively Broadway musical strains. The final French revolution section is a broad parody of The Man in the Iron Mask story. The film closes with coming attractions of "History of the World, Part II" that features a rousing Star Wars parody (anticipating Space Balls) called "Jews in Space" that includes a jaunty theme song. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Mel Brooks, Dom DeLuise, (more)
John Hurt stars as John Merrick, the hideously deformed 19th century Londoner known as "The Elephant Man". Treated as a sideshow freak, Merrick is assumed to be retarded as well as misshapen because of his inability to speak coherently. In fact, he is highly intelligent and sensitive, a fact made public when one Dr. Frederick Treves (Anthony Hopkins) rescues Merrick from a carnival and brings him to a hospital for analysis. Alas, even after being recognized as a man of advanced intellect, Merrick is still treated like a freak; no matter his station in life, he will forever be a prisoner of his own malformed body. Unable to secure rights for the famous stage play The Elephant Man, producer Mel Brooks based his film on the memoirs of Frederick Treves and a much later account of Merrick's life by Ashley Montagu. The film is lensed in black and white by British master cinematographer Freddie Francis. Though nominated for eight Academy Awards, the film was ultimately shut out in every category. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Anthony Hopkins, John Hurt, (more)
Kermit the Frog and Fozzie Bear, from of the large crew of loveably fuzzy characters created by puppetmaster Jim Henson, have embarked on a quest for stardom. They take a trip to Hollywood, riding in or on a wide variety of vehicles along the way. They begin their journey on a bicycle pedalled by Kermit, but friends accumulate along the way, and they change vehicles to accomodate them. They have the additional challenge of fending off the entreaties of the heartless Doc Hopper (Charles Durning), who wants Kermit to make some advertisements promoting fried frog legs. Kermit must also cope with his amorous feelings for Miss Piggy, and hers for him. This appealing children's adventure movie has numerous scenes which do homage to classic films, and features a huge cast of Hollywood greats, from Edgar Bergen to Orson Welles, in cameo roles. A great box-office success, this movie paved the way for a number of sequels. One of the film's many songs, The Rainbow Connection, was nominated for an Oscar. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jim Henson, Frank Oz, (more)
- 1977
Produced and written by Dwight Brooks, Poco is a rank imitation of those Sunn International "four-waller" family flicks. Poco the dog is separated from his owner, a cute little crippled girl, in an auto accident. The faithful mutt treks across the desert, experiencing several moderately exciting adventures while searching for his mistress. Along the way, veteran character actor Chill Wills shows up, shamelessly slobbering his way through the requisite "goldhearted prospector" schtick. With Wills' aid, Poco is finally reunited with the little girl. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1977
- PG
This is Mel Brooks' spoof of over ten Alfred Hitchcock classics, including Psycho, Vertigo, and The Birds (Brooks actually used the bird trainer from that classic suspense movie in making his film). Brooks plays Dr. Richard H. Thorndyke, a renowned Harvard psychiatrist with a concealed fear of heights, or High Anxiety. Thorndyke takes over as the newest director of the PsychoNeurotic Institute for the Very, Very Nervous after the last director dies under suspicious circumstances. He soon finds himself to be in the company of some very strange colleagues, including longtime Brooks collaborators Cloris Leachman and Harvey Korman, with Madeline Kahn as Victoria Brisbane, the eccentric daughter of a patient at the institute and Thorndyke's love interest. Korman takes on the role of Dr. Charles Montague, a psychiatrist with a closeted habit of his own. Leachman plays Charlotte Diesel, a charge nurse with a dark sneer and tendency towards domination. As Thorndyke heads to a psychiatry conference, he is faced with saving the Institute, his reputation, and his own sanity. Although the film was not well-received by critics, it picked up a 1978 Golden Globe nomination for best picture (musical or comedy) and landed Brooks a nomination for best actor. The movie has a number of cameos, from a young Barry Levinson's spot as an unstable bellboy to a small part by Hitchcock's right-hand special effects man, Albert J. Whitlock, who plays Kahn's father. ~ Rachel Koetje, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Mel Brooks, Madeline Kahn, (more)
- 1976
- PG
Silent Movie is just that: a totally nonverbal comedy, save for one single line. Director Mel Brooks stars as a once-famous comedy director, who with his faithful assistants Dom DeLuise and Marty Feldman return to Hollywood with plans for a comeback. Brooks wants to return to the good old days by producing a silent movie (he explains this via subtitle). Producer Sid Caesar is agreeable, provided Brooks can line up top stars. In a series of vignettes better seen than described, Brooks persuades Burt Reynolds, Liza Minelli, Paul Newman, James Caan and Anne Bancroft (Brooks' real-life wife) to star in his project. The only holdout is mime Marcel Marceau, who after a few moments of walking against the wind shouts the film's solitary line: "No!" Meanwhile, the crooked executives of the Engulf and Devour conglomerate want to take over Caesar's studio and are worried that Brooks' film might be so huge a hit that Caesar won't be interested in selling. To prevent this, the conglomerate dispatches sexy Bernadette Peters to lure Brooks into drink and ruination. The film's climax is lifted from the 1943 Olsen and Johnson film Crazy House). Featured in brief comic cameos are Harry Ritz as the man with half a suit, Charlie Callas as the blind man, Dom DeLuise's wife, Carol Arthur, as the incredibly pregnant woman, Fritz Feld as the headwaiter (whose trademarked "Pop" is conveyed on a subtitle) and Henny Youngman as the diner with a fly in his soup. Co-writers Ron Clark, Rudy DeLuca and Barry Levinson also show up on screen as three of the Engulf & Devour minions. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Mel Brooks, Marty Feldman, (more)
In 1961, Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner cut a comedy record entitled The 2000 Year Old Man. Largely ad-libbed, the routine consisted of an interview, conducted by Reiner, of the world's oldest living man, played by Brooks. Their freewheeling conversation covers such topics as the earliest known language ("basic Rock"), the discovery of women, the invention of laughter, the creation of the Cross (it was easier to put together than the Star of David), and the 2,000-Year-Old Man's relationship with Robin Hood ("He stole from everybody and kept everything -- he just had a good press agent") and Joan of Arc ("Know her? I went with her!"). The routine was peppered with such observations as "I have 25,000 children...and not one of them ever writes!" At the height of Mel Brooks' Blazing Saddles-generated movie popularity, a half-hour animated cartoon utilizing the original "2000 Year Old Man" recording as its soundtrack was produced by Leo Salkin films and Crossbow/Acre Enterprises. This TV cartoon special first aired January 11, 1975. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1975
In the '90s and 2000s, Mel Brooks enjoyed tremendous success resurrecting old ideas in new venues -- just witness his hit stage musicals The Producers and Young Frankenstein. So it might intrigue casual fans to learn that his broad cinematic farce Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993) also found its origins in an older project: a failed sitcom from the mid-'70s entitled When Things Were Rotten. The original series, like the movie, took place in the 12th century, with Robin Hood (Dick Gautier) presented as neither heroic nor impressive, but a complete buffoon. With his accomplices behind him, he only triumphed from episode to episode because his enemies -- led by Prince John and The Sheriff of Nottingham -- were twice as moronic as he was. Brooks packed the series with off-the-wall gags and gleeful anachronisms that had become trademarks of the creator/producer's big screen films by the mid-'70s. The series, which co-starred Bernie Kopell as Alan-a-Dale, Dick Van Patten as Friar Tuck, Henry Polic II as the Sheriff, and Misty Rowe as Maid Marian, drew high praise from critics who championed it as witty and inventive; unfortunately, audiences did not share the same level of admiration, and the series aired for the last time on Christmas Eve, 1975, three-and-a-half months after it premiered. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dick Gautier, Dick Van Patten, (more)
Lending his burlesque touch to 1970s genre revision, Mel Brooks followed his hit "western" Blazing Saddles with this parody of 1930s Universal horror movies. Determined to live down his family's reputation, Dr. Frederick Frankenstein (co-screenwriter Gene Wilder) insists on pronouncing his name "Fronckensteen" and denies interest in replicating his grandfather's experiments. But when he is lured by Frau Blucher (Cloris Leachman) to discover the tantalizingly titled journal "How I Did It" in his grandfather's castle, he cannot resist. With the help of voluptuous Inga (Teri Garr), wall-eyed assistant Igor (Marty Feldman), and a purloined brain, Frankenstein creates his monster (Peter Boyle). Igor, however, stole the wrong brain, and the monster tears off into the countryside, encountering a little girl and a blind hermit (Gene Hackman). Frankenstein finds the monster and trains him to do a little "Puttin' On the Ritz" soft-shoe, but the monster escapes again, this time seducing Frankenstein's uptight fiancée Elizabeth (Madeline Kahn) with his, ahem, sweet mystery. His love life and experiment in shambles, Frankenstein finally finds a way to create the being he had planned. Shooting in gleaming black-and-white, with sets and props from the 1930s and appropriate fright music by John Morris, Brooks' cheeky attitude towards the Hollywood past attracted a large audience, turning it into one of the most popular 1974 releases after (what else?) Blazing Saddles. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gene Wilder, Peter Boyle, (more)
Vulgar, crude, and occasionally scandalous in its racial humor, this hilarious bad-taste spoof of Westerns, co-written by Richard Pryor, features Cleavon Little as the first black sheriff of a stunned town scheduled for demolition by an encroaching railroad. Little and co-star Gene Wilder have great chemistry, and the delightful supporting cast includes Harvey Korman, Slim Pickens, and Madeline Kahn as a chanteuse modelled on Marlene Dietrich. As in Young Frankenstein (1974), Silent Movie (1976), and High Anxiety (1977), director/writer Mel Brooks gives a burlesque spin to a classic Hollywood movie genre; in his own manic, Borscht Belt way, Brooks was a central player in revising classic genres in light of Seventies values and attitudes, an effort most often associated with such directors as Robert Altman and Peter Bogdanovich . Some of this film's sequences, notably a gaseous bean dinner around a campfire, have become comedy classics. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Cleavon Little, Gene Wilder, (more)
Based on a Broadway musical by Mel Brooks and Joe Darion, the animated feature Shinbone Alley is an adaptation of the Don Marquis stories. The film is about a love-struck cockroach named Archy (voiced by Eddie Bracken) and the object of his affections, a carefree cat named Mehitabel (Carol Channing). The movie is arranged as a series of episodic adventures and though it never quite gels into something cohesive, it has a number of fine moments, particularly when it sticks to the music. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Bracken, Carol Channing, (more)
- 1970
- PG
One of several film versions of the 1928 Russian novel The Twelve Chairs (one of the better-known adaptations was the 1945 Fred Allen vehicle It's in the Bag), Mel Brooks' movie is set in the years following the Bolshevik revolution. Onetime aristocrat Vorobyaninov (Ron Moody), now reduced to a humdrum clerical job, discovers that his family's fortune still exists. To keep their riches from falling into the hands of the revolutionaries, Vorobyaninov's family hid the loot in one of twelve chairs. Taking a crafty beggar (Frank Langella) into his confidence, Vorobyaninov returns to the ruins of his ancestral mansion to reclaim his fortune. Also chasing after the twelve chairs is an Orthodox priest (Dom DeLuise), who tells himself that he only wants the money to replenish his church. Alas, the chairs have been scattered to the four winds, sparking a film-length race to retrieve the furniture and claim the gold. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Ron Moody, Frank Langella, (more)
Theatrical producer Max Bialystock (Zero Mostel) was once the toast of Broadway. Now he lives in his seedy office, cadging cash contributions from wealthy old ladies in exchange for sexual favors. Even worse, he's reduced to wearing a cardboard belt. Max's new accountant, Leo Bloom (Gene Wilder), the soul of honesty, suggests that Max produce a hit to try to recoup his losses, but Max knows that it's too late for that. Offhandedly, Leo muses that, if Max found investors for a flop, he could legally keep all the extra money. Suddenly, Max's eyes light up -- and in that moment, Leo Bloom is gloriously corruptible. "I want everything I've ever seen in the movies!" cries Leo as Max embraces him. Together, Max and Leo conspire to select the worst play, the worst playwright, the worst director, and the worst actor to collaborate on their guaranteed flop. That play is Springtime for Hitler, "a delightful romp...with Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun." The playwright is Franz Liebkind (Kenneth Mars), an unreconstructed Nazi who, in drunken delirium, insists that Hitler was a better painter than Churchill -- "He could paint an entire apartment in one afternoon, two coats!" The director is pompous transvestite Roger De Bris (Christopher Hewett), who is preparing to go to a costume party garbed as Marie Antoinette when Max and Leo come calling ("Max, Max, he's wearing a dress"). And the star, selected after extensive auditions, is hippie-freak Lorenzo St. DuBois (Dick Shawn) -- "L.S.D." for short.
At the end of several weeks, Max has sold 25,000 percent of the show; and, as a finishing touch, Max bribes the opening-night critics for a favorable review, knowing full well that such a gesture is the kiss of death. The curtains part, and Springtime for Hitler opens with perhaps the most tasteless production number in the history of films. At the end of this extravaganza, the audience sits in dumbfounded silence. Gleefully, Max and Leo repair to a corner bar to celebrate their failure. But then.... The first directorial effort of Mel Brooks, The Producers didn't do so well on its first release, but since that time it has taken its place as one of the all-time great movie comedies. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
At the end of several weeks, Max has sold 25,000 percent of the show; and, as a finishing touch, Max bribes the opening-night critics for a favorable review, knowing full well that such a gesture is the kiss of death. The curtains part, and Springtime for Hitler opens with perhaps the most tasteless production number in the history of films. At the end of this extravaganza, the audience sits in dumbfounded silence. Gleefully, Max and Leo repair to a corner bar to celebrate their failure. But then.... The first directorial effort of Mel Brooks, The Producers didn't do so well on its first release, but since that time it has taken its place as one of the all-time great movie comedies. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Zero Mostel, Gene Wilder, (more)
Producer Leonard Sillman's 1952 edition of his popular Broadway revue New Faces was filmed just as it was staged, save for a wraparound fictional romantic story. The newly grafted plotline involves the efforts of director Ronny Graham to stave off an angry creditor long enough to open his show. We occasionally cut away to the backstage intrigues, but never long enough to take anything away from Sillman's talented cast of newcomers. The cast includes Eartha Kitt, singing such standards-to-be as "C'est Ci Bon" and "Monotonous"; Robert Clary, doing a medley of his hit "I'm in Love With Miss Logan"; Alice Ghostley, belting forth a brace of satirical torch songs; Paul Lynde (heavier than we're used to seeing him), offering his "safari" monologue and later participating in a screamingly funny Death of a Salesman takeoff; and Ronny Graham, performing an extended lampoon of either Tennessee Williams or Truman Capote (we aren't too sure; judge for yourself). Carol Lawrence also makes her first film appearance herein. The Broadway production's biggest song hit, "Love Is a Simple Thing," is sung and danced to the oversaturation point. Among the many writers was a young fellow by the name of Melvin Brooks (that's how he's billed). Its production flaws and budget shortcomings notwithstanding, the widescreen, full-color New Faces offers a rare opportunity for a 1990s audience to see what a '50s-style musical revue really looked like to the opening-night crowd. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Ronny Graham, Eartha Kitt, (more)
