Silent laughter

Lejink

I like Mel Brooks broad, slapsticky humour, although Woody Allen in the same mode ("Bananas", "Love and Death") has him beat. While I admire his conceit in launching an almost literally silent movie into a market place gorging on the likes of "Rocky", "The Omen" et. al. it just doesn't come off. Perhaps the problem here is Brooks straining too much to emulate the silent masters such as Chaplin or Keaton or just failing to come to terms with the unique idiom of silent movie production. The silents were never vulgar for one thing. Surely the film should have been in B & W for a start and there are just too many word boards interrupting the flow. It's very hard to come up with original sight gags and while some made me smile, others are just very clunky and overlong. I also detected a fair degree of cronyism with appearances by Mel's wife Anne Bancroft, old boss Sid Caesar and stock players like Bernadette Peters and Dom Deluise. An old British comedy hero of mine, the gifted and sadly short - lived Marty Feldman fails to shine either - of the celeb turns possibly Burt Reynolds hams it up most convincingly. Overall though the film drags with much overacting and dud set-pieces. This movie started Brooks' decline (c.f. "History of the World" and "Spaceballs"). Proof that they really don't make 'em like they used to!

score 3/10

Lejink 4 July 2007

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw1686435/