Blazing Saddles (1974)

Blazing Saddles is a comedy, within a comedy, within a comedy.

An all star cast of Slim Pickens, Cleavon Little, Gene Wilder and of course funny man Mel Brooks.

Blazing Saddles an uproarious film about a railroad worker who becomes the sheriff of Rock Ridge as a joke by Hedley Lamar. Black Bart they call him. He is not welcomed at first because of his race but the arrival of bully Mongo whom Black Bart arrests, puts the citizens of Rock Ridge at ease and they start to respect Black Bart.

Mel Brooks is a genius. I have also seen his Star Wars spoof Spaceballs. He makes no apologies in keeping all the racist jokes in the film only cutting out a small line in the middle of the film.

I am sure there are people out there who don't care for this film. Whoever they are I am sure that they are missing a funny bone because Blazing Saddles is one of the funniest movies I have seen in my life. There is no way you could make this kind of movie today and get away with it because too many people out there don't have a sense of humor about racism even when it comes to a movie that is poking fun at it.

On a side note I am a tad disappointed that Richard Pryor wasn't able to play Black Bart but he was still able to write some jokes in and work on the movie.

A wonderful western classic. Blazing Saddles never gets old.

Fmovies: Quality. many people who love this film may feel that the negative comments from others are inoffensive as this is such a funny film, I will say this. They are entitled to their opinions ...even if they are wrong. This is one of the best comedies ever made.

Firstly it's not just Mel Brooks as scriptwriter which seems to make a big difference to the quality of the film he produces (Yung Frankestein is co-written by Gene Wilder) but then you have a cast in fine form, especially Harvey Corman as the fantastic Hedley Lamarr (Not Hedy, It's Hedley!) add to that a fantastic series of sight gags and word play, with a good dose of racism ridicule thrown in for good measure (...and they is so DUMB!)and it all makes for a brilliant mix of inspired film-making.

There are numerous scenes of note, but the scene of the townsfolk looking at their work and Bart chasing after the bad guy still makes my skin cold as they are genuinely moving moments.

best visual gag though has got to be the Wako Kid versus the goons at the railroad top drawer Much Love Mike

Mel Brooks made several very popular and memorable films in the '70s but I doubt any was more popular than this one. Made just several years after the morals' code had been lifted in Hollywood, it was able to provide humor in a new and shocking way. People could fart, swear, have old ladies use the n- word, men could punch horses in the face, make fun of any religion, creed, race or whatever was there to make fun of ...in other words, no holds barred when it came to trying to get a laugh. Nothing was sacred at this time in Hollywood history and few capitalized on this as well as Brooks, especially with this film.

The film doesn't have much shock value anymore but it's still fun to watch and probably always will be, thanks to the outrageous characterizations in here.

On the negative side, especially if don't know Brooks does whatever he can to get a laugh and isn't all that political, this film might be too politically-correct with its reverse racism, bias against religion and overly crude situations.

But - a big but - there are so many funny lines in here, so many funny scenes you never forget and never fail to laugh no matter how many times you see it (the campfire scene alone has made men cry in laughter for 30 years) that you can overlook about anything in here.

In summary, a true "classic" guaranteed to entertain for many more years to come.

Blazing Saddles fmovies. I keep hoping that one of these times, AMC will show an un-edited version of this film. It is really disturbing and disheartening that the PC crowd is able to get this once superb movie channel to censor the films it runs. If I were Mel Brooks I'd be more than a little upset over this wanton editing of an otherwise classic movie. If AMC does this to Blazing Saddles, how many other films are facing the censor's knife or edit button so that AMC can safely assure itself that, by bowing to the beast of political correctness it isn't offending anyone. It makes one wonder how the decision to edit this film was made; was it just some folks sitting around and decided, "hey, we can't show this stuff?"

Howling comedy from Mel Brooks about the Old West with a script that keeps you laughing all the way through and a cast of characters right up there with the Marx Brothers. Kahn is especially tempting as a Marlene Dietrich-like performer, while director Brooks has a fine little cameo as a befuddled and distracted governor. The skits and sight gags are constant. One of the funniest films ever made!

1974 was a very good year for the team of Mel Brooks and Gene Wilder; their "Young Frankenstein" (which came out in 1974) is one of the funniest movies ever made, and "Blazing Saddles" (same year) is almost just behind it. It's a bit overrated (but just a bit); I know a lot of people look on this as the funniest movie of all time, but I can't go THAT far. But it is ONE of the funniest movies of all time, and for two such movies by the same director, with the same star, to come out the same year, to be on that list is quite an achievement.

The residents of Rock Ridge (all named Johnson) need a new sheriff. They get one... Bart, played by Cleavon Little, who happens to be black. It's all planned out by Hedley Lamarr (don't call him Heddy!), an employee of the governor (Mel Brooks), in a plot to run the residents out of town so he can have a railroad run through it. At first, the townsfolk aren't happy about this development, but when Bart endeavors to save them from the evil Lamarr, who's played to slimy perfection by Harvey Korman, they warm up to him. Also thrown into the mix is Wilder as "The Waco Kid", a gunslinger who's lost his knack for shooting, Alex Karras as a huge idiot named Mongo , and Madeline Khan as Lily von Schtupp, a parody of Marlene Dietrich, complete with ridiculous German accent. She stands out heads and shoulders above everybody else in this movie, I think, and her song "I'm Tired" ("I'm not a wabbit! I need some west!") is possibly the funniest song ever to appear in a film. This is no doubt the funniest part Madeline Khan has ever had (and she ALSO appeared in "Young Frankenstein"!). It's also a kick to see a pre-"Magnum PI" John Hillerman as Howard Johnson, with an ice cream shop with a sign that screams "1 Flavor"; and Slim Pickens (Taggart, another bad guy) is always a hoot.

The plot is just an excuse to make fun of westerns, racism, and movie-making in general, as demonstrated in the extremely wacky, fourth-wall breaking finale (Watch for Dom DeLuise in these scenes). None of this is really supposed to make sense or be realistic, it's just supposed to be funny, and for the most part it is. It's one of the crassest and crudest mainstream movies in history, and that's it's strength; it often plays just like a Mad movie parody. One example of this that really sticks out is the famous farting scene, which somehow manages to be one of the funniest scenes in the movie, and probably the funniest fart scene ever. But the focus is on the way blacks were treated in the post-Civil War old west, and the movie is merciless in the way it has its ignorant white characters treat the black characters, throwing the n-word around without abandon and giving them the dirty work (at one point, a character says "We can't afford to lose any horses! Send a couple of n****rs!"). The movie finds its heart in the way the initially racist townspeople of Rock Ridge become fond of their black sheriff.

Its spirit, however, is in the hilarious and crude jokes that are thrown all through. This is one funny movie, and with Mel Brooks, that's what's really important.