 Tagline: Never Give a Saga an Even Break! "My name is Jim, but most people call me...Jim." And most people call Blazing Saddles deliriously funny. Filmmaker, star and paddle-ball whiz Mel Brooks goes way out West and way out of his mind with a spiffy spoof set in an 1874 Old West where 1974 Hollywood is just one soundstage away-and where nonstop fun blasts prejudices to the high comedy heavens. Cleavon Little, Gene Wilder, Slim Pickens, Harvey Korman, Madeline Kahn and more join for horseplay and horselaughs, making Blazing Saddles the #6 choice among the American Film Institute's Top 100 Comedies. Give these out to the boys in lieu of pay. And enjoy. The railroad's bound to run right through the sleepy town of Rock Ridge. Land there will be worth a fortune- but the townfolk already own their own land. How do you drive them out? Send in the roughest, toughest, meanest, leanest gang you've got...and appoint a new sheriff you figure will last about 24 hours. However, logic is lost in a blizzard of gags, jokes, and outrageous asssaults upon good taste- or any at all. Storyline: The Ultimate Western Spoof. A town where everyone seems to be named Johnson is in the way of the railroad. In order to grab their land, Hedley Lemar, a politically connected nasty person, sends in his henchmen to make the town unlivable. After the sheriff is killed, the town demands a new sheriff from the Governor. Hedley convinces him to send the town the first Black sheriff in the west. Bart is a sophisticated urbanite who will have some difficulty winning over the townspeople. Written by John Vogel Reviewer's Note: Reviewed by Casey Broadwater on June 16, 2009 -- I was about twelve the first time I caught a highly content-edited version of Blazing Saddles on television. A lot of the jokes obviously went whizzing through the then-blank space between my ears, but I remember laughing uproariously at Mongo sucker-punching the horse, the infamous campfire fart scene, and at the general Loony Toons level of insanity on display—complete with quicksand, fast-forward fight scenes, and an Acme-inspired exploding candy-gram. It wasn't until I was quite a bit older that I caught on to the film's subversive elements, the way it toys with staples of the Western genre, goes hog-wild in its unhinging of stereotypes and, as Gene Wilder puts it, "smashes racism in the face." On the surface, Blazing Saddles is many things—scatological, puerile, and just plain ridiculous—but it also knows precisely where it stands, and behind every slapstick moment there's a gleam of teeth and a not-so-subtle wink. This was a bold film in 1974, for many reasons, and in a few crucial ways it seems even more shocking today. If you've never seen Blazing Saddles (are there any of you out there?), the year is 1874, or 1974 in 1874, as Mel Brooks describes it, and an expanding railroad operation has run into quicksand. State Procurer Hedy, I mean, Hedley Lamarr (Harvey Korman) hatches a scheme to divert the railway through the podunk town of Rock Ridge, an inbred burg where everybody's last name is Johnson. Intending to scare off the townsfolk so he can buy up their land on the cheap, he convinces cross-eyed, doofus Governor William J. LePetomane (Mel Brooks) to hire the country's first black sheriff to police the town. Black Bart (a suave Cleavon Little) rides into Rock Ridge on a horse with Gucci saddlebags and, despite a heavy dose of race hate from its citizens, sets up shop in the town's sheriff office. Nearly comatose in the drunk tank is Jim (Gene Wilder), the one-time "Waco Kid," a former gunslinger who lost his steady hand in a bout with the bottle. When Hedley assembles a rag tag crew of "rustlers, cutthroats, murderers, bounty hunters, desperadoes, mugs, pugs, thugs, nitwits, half-wits, dimwits, vipers, snipers, con men, Indian agents, Mexican bandits, muggers, buggerers, bushwhackers, hornswagglers, horse thieves, bull dykes, train robbers, bank robbers, ass kickers, shit kickers and Methodists" to scare off the moronic townspeople, Bart and Jim devise a plan to save Rock Ridge. The film's climactic battle bursts quite literally through the fourth wall, and the two amigos obliterate one final cliché as they ride off into the sunset. None of this is important, and the skeletal plot only serves as a frame on which to hang the film's shaggy coat of comedy. Re-watching Blazing Saddles, I laughed more and harder than during just about all of the studio comedies I've seen in the past few years. While the farting scene wasn't nearly as funny as when I was twelve, keep in mind that Blazing Saddles was the first major movie to feature outright flatulence. It's easy to take that for granted in an age when gross-out humor is the norm. The performances—across the board—are zany, madcap takes on characters we've all seen before. Harvey Korman's Hedley is so devilish and conspiratorial you can practically envision him twirling a greasy mustache as a damsel lies tied before him to the tracks. Madeline Khan (in an Oscar-nominated performance) slumps across the screen as Lili Von Schtüp, the tired, Teutonic Titwillow, a sly parody of a de-sexed and disinterested Marlene Deitrich. And embodying every cowboy cliché imaginable, Slim Pickens and Burton Gilliam wrap their mouths around some seriously hate-filled dialogue with hammy, in-the- know showmanship. Blazing Saddles holds back very little, and some of the film's racially insensitive language may cause modern viewers to cringe. We're simply not used to hearing derogatory titles thrown about so carelessly, even in jest. The rightfully dreaded "N" word makes no less than 17 appearances in the film, and I can think of no contemporary productions that could get away with this, with the telling exception of The Dave Chappelle Show. As most of you remember, Dave Chappelle abruptly abandoned his massively successful sketch program after coming to the realization that some people were laughing at his racially charged skits for all the wrong reasons. Subversive comedy walks a fine line, and Blazing Saddles is no different. We're clearly meant to view the film's townsfolk as intolerant bigots and buffoons, but there will always be a minority of viewers who simply can't or won't understand how the film attempts to undercut racism. In some ways, Blazing Saddles seems like a precursor to the many multi-racial buddy movies we've seen in the years since—from Dawn of the Dead and Lethal Weapon, to Rush Hour and Harold and Kumar. Cleavon Little and Gene Wilder are my favorite pairing, though, mostly because their partnership seems grounded in genuine affection and understanding. Both actors deliver timeless, inimitable performances in what, to this day, is a timeless and inimitable film. There may be many comedies, but there's only one Blazing Saddles. Comedy is the most fickle and subjective of genres, where one man's ho-hum trash is another's hilarious treasure. If you've seen Blazing Saddles, you're sure to have an opinion of it, one way or another. Either way, Blazing Saddles has stood time's test and been vetted as a verifiable American classic. For the uninitiated (I'm sure there are one or two of you left), get out and rent it. But for fans, this Blu-ray release is a no-brainer, as I can't imagine Blazing Saddles looking or sounding any better for a long time to come. Cast Notes: Cleavon Little (Bart), Gene Wilder (Jim: The Waco Kid), Slim Pickens (Taggart), Harvey Korman (Hedley Lamarr, Attorney General/Assistant to the Governor/State Procurer), Madeline Kahn (Lili Von Shtupp), Mel Brooks (Governor William J. Le Petomane/Indian Chief/Aviator), Burton Gilliam (Lyle), Alex Karras (Mongo), David Huddleston (Olson Johnson), Liam Dunn (Reverend Johnson), John Hillerman (Howard Johnson), George Furth (Van Johnson), Claude Ennis Starrett Jr. (Gabby Johnson), Carol DeLuise (Harriett Van Johnson), Richard Collier (Dr. Sam Van Johnson). IMDb Rating (12/02/12): 7.7/10 from 60,797 users IMDb Rating (08/04/01): 7.6/10 from 7,141 users
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