Remembering Gene Wilder (2023)

Director: Ron Frank

Cast: Gene Wilder, Alan Alda, Carol Kane, Mel Brooks

Have I Seen It Before: Nope. Even went to go see it in the theater, and wouldn’t you know it? It gets released on Netflix the very next day. So there I am, sitting in the theater, surrounded by geriatrics occasionally muttering, “Oh, well, he’s dead now.” If I really wanted to do that, I’d just go to work. I love you, movie theaters, but you test me sometimes, ya know?

Did I Like It: The film is very entertaining, but that’s because Wilder himself was a genius. The film is filled with clips of his greatest moments. That’ll make a 90-minute runtime rush by. It also made me want to re-watch The Producers (1967), Young Frankenstein (1974), and Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971). I also spent more than a few minutes trying to track down copies of The Frisco Kid (1979), The World’s Greatest Lover (1977), and The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes’ Smarter Brother (1975). I’m probably willing to concede that means the film hits its target, but again that is because it is being propped up by other films.

But this is ultimately a competent, but not exceptional documentary. Talking heads abound. Mel Brooks is a delight as always, Harry Connick, Jr. doesn’t really have much to say. There is plenty of very good narration from Wilder himself, but all of it is taken from the audiobook of Wilder’s memoir, Kiss Me Like A Stranger… Which I’ve already listened to. The only sections where the film tries to go beyond the territory of a DVD special feature is when it focuses on Wilder’s final years and his struggle with Alzheimer’s. It’s a deeper look, but somehow manages to be both intimate to the point of being intrusive and reticent (perhaps rightly so) to say anything revelatory about the disease or people’s experience with it. Those sections are unusual, but they have too much of a home video quality to recommend.

Blazing Saddles (1974)

Director: Mel Brooks

Cast: Cleavon Little, Gene Wilder, Mel Brooks, Madeline Kahn

Have I Seen It Before: Yes? I’m pretty sure I have. I never liked it as much as Young Frankenstein (1974). Westerns were never central to me, and it always seemed like my father liked it a bit too much, if you know what I mean. That hardly covers the times when other family members would try to parenthetically try to quote the film and ruin Johnny Carino’s for everyone.

Maybe I only saw it on cable…

Did I Like It: The prospect of watching the movie with an audience in the year of our Lord 2024 presents are certain amount of dread, and yet I serve at the altar of the cinema. Indeed, the crowd was at least somewhat made up of people who bemoan that such a movie could never be made today, like an infant who wants to watch cartoons right now.

They all laughed a little too loud at the wrong spots—again, if you catch my meaning—but the mythology around the film makes it seem like those people are the ones who really appreciate the film, but the truth is that the film is making fun of them—nay, mocking them mercilessly—and they don’t know any better. The comedy isn’t in the idea of a black sheriff (Little, a paragon of perfectly calibrated charisma) coming to defend the town, it’s in the townspeople who would rather be terrorized by the goons at the employ of Hedley Lamar (Harvey Korman) than have a sheriff. Bart is—sometimes literally; I’m not sure what movie the rest of you are watching—Bugs Bunny, harnessing chaos from rubes to semi-heroic ends.

Speaking of chaos and the essential Bugs-ness of the proceedings… The final minutes of the film are undeniably the most enjoyable section of the film is when things completely fall apart and the movie is a real problem for the safety and security of the Warner Bros. lot. You can say a lot about Warners, but there really aren’t any studios that are willing to let filmmakers mock them while on their dime. The few that do experiment in the idea are just mimicking the shield.

Young Frankenstein (1974)

Director: Mel Brooks

Cast: Gene Wilder, Peter Boyle, Marty Feldman, Cloris Leachman

Have I Seen it Before: Indeed. It was the movie my wife and I had watched on our first date, although I had seen it several times before then. To the best of my memory, I don’t think I’ve watched it since then.

Which is so weird I can’t even begin to wrap my head around it.

Did I Like It: I’m not even sure where to begin this review. This is by far the best movie Mel Brooks ever made. I’ve never been able to get over myself long enough to get into Blazing Saddles (1974)*, and while you might think I would be a devotee of Spaceballs (1987), but I’m not. Brooks’ swing for the sci-fi has two major problems in my mind. First, there’s never a moment of the film that doesn’t groan from the fact that it was clearly made in the `80s. Second, I never once get the sense that Brooks is terribly fond of any science fiction movie. Thus, the spoofing never rises above a joke factory, and Spaceballs never becomes a legitimate science fiction movie in any measurable way. All of Brooks’ films are funny**, only a few of them are special.

It might seem like I am spending an inordinate amount of time in my Young Frankenstein review talking about how much I don’t like Spaceballs, but the contrast is key. Every moment of Young Frankenstein feels like it would fit in quite well with the upper echelon (read: the early ones) of Universal monster movies. This has James Whale written all over it, and I get the sense that Brooks enjoyed a James Whale movie once or twice in his life. This cast is perfect. You know it is perfect because it might very well be possible that Madeline Khan is the weak link in the chain, which means it may have the greatest cast ever assembled for a film, as Madeline Khan could keep otherwise underwhelming films aloft through sheer force of will and personality.

*Despite my relative antipathy toward his western opus, it’s hard to fault somebody for making such an indelible one-two punch in film comedy inside of one 12-month period.

**Well, not you Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995). Not all films are create equally, if I’m being honest.