Oeuvre: Mel Brooks - Robin Hood: Men in Tights

For the first time in over two decades, Mel Brooks made an original film.  Unfortunately, 'Life Stinks' was a flop in every sense of the word, so, Brooks returned hat in hand to his comfort zone of spoofs with 'Robin Hood: Men in Tights.'

The plot of the story will be familiar to you, even if you haven't seen the Kevin Costner film.  The dashing Robin of Loxley returns from the Crusades to find Rottingham under the tyrannical rule of the corrupt Prince John.  With the help of his Merry Men, Robin Hood must fight to restore order to the kingdom and win the heart of the fair Maid Marian.

Its impossible to ignore the feeling that Brooks is coasting on this one.  There is a constant feeling of "Fine! You like my older parodies?  Well here is exactly what you're expecting!" that never leaves the film.  He's constantly peppering in elements and even direct jokes from his pervious movies.  Prince John's ever-repositioning mole is just a retelling of Igor's hump.  He even exclaims, "I have a mole?!" like how Igor famously asked, "what hump?"  The Sheriff orders Robin Hood to "walk this way!" and they mimic his pompous strut.  The tune for "Men in Tights" is note for note the tune for "Jews in Space."  Mel looks directly at the camera and says, "It's good to be the King."  Dave Chapelle stares down the lens and name-drops Blazing Saddles.  A camera breaks through a glass window after a push in shot like in 'High Anxiety.' And a gaggle of disgruntled peasants scream, "Leave us alone, Mel Brooks!"

Maybe that's the key.  Maybe this is the ultimate parody.  Maybe Brooks isn't just lampooning 'Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves' but his own filmography, challenging the nature of parody, self-referential humor, and the separation of an artist from his content.  Nah, I think he's just lazy.

Brooks receives primary writing credit along with J. D. Shapiro and Evan Chandler.  The former went on to write 'Battlefield Earth' and the latter went on to write nothing else and then died.  You tell me which was the good career move.

And yet, everybody in the cast seems to be aware that the script is less-than-stellar and they counter by throwing themselves into their roles as broadly as possible, working their asses off to wring every drop of comedy they can out of this hot and cold screenplay.

Cary Elwes is Robin Hood and it is perfect casting.  He may be the most charismatic actor to play the part since Errol Flynn.  As 'The Princess Bride' showed, Elwes was born to play dashing, confident swashbucklers.  Unfortunately, Hollywood wasn't making that type of movie anymore, so he's stuck with this.

As Maid Marian, Amy Yasbek is torn between being the respectable maiden society demands and being horny as hell.  Her assistant, Broomhilde played by Megan Cavanagh is a retread of Joan River's character in 'Spaceballs' but with actual character and jokes.

While many play Prince John as a contemptuous, Prince Joffrey-esque prick or sniveling, thumb-sucking coward, Richard Lewis plays the part like the head of a Las Vegas casino.  Its a fresh take that gives his performance a classless texture.

Mark Blankfield gives Mr. Magoo a run for his money as the funniest blind character and Robin Hood's loyal servant.  Mel Brooks cameos as a Rabbi trying to sell the people on circumcisions (a few laughs there), Tracy Ullman is fun as a nasty witch/cook with the hots for the Sheriff.  Oh and Patrick Stewart shows up.

Roger Rees is tasked with playing the pathetically smarmy Sheriff of Rottingham and he commits fully.  There is no fear in this man.  He has the broadest range of emotions, from smug self-satisfaction, to spluttering exasperation, to red-faced fury, to perverted frustration, arousal, and disgust.  He probably comes out of the movie with the most laughs, and for good reason.  He's hilarious.

The real wild card of the bunch is Dave Chapelle in his big screen debut.  I can't tell if he's happy to be in this movie or not but he's definitely done with this Ahchoo joke.  He seems to have a special skill set which is making black jokes and anything outside of it, like a choreographed dance number, makes him visibly uncomfortable.

Its hard not to think of this as a step back for Mel's career after the original film 'Life Stinks' but the movie works more often than it doesn't and it terms of his previous parodies, it far outstrips 'Spaceballs.'  One of the reasons this movie is successful is that the story of Robin Hood lends itself to comedic interpretation far more easily than Star Wars.  The story and those in it have been passed down for centuries and retold dozens and dozens of times, in Errol Flynn's 1938 classic, Disney's 1973 family film, or Ridley Scott's 2010 catastrophe.  Nottingham, Merry Men, "steal from the rich and give to the needy" are all ingrained in cultural history.  Robin Hood is as well known as Darth Vader, but while Rick Moranis had to warp the icon to make him comedic, everyone in Men in Tights simply play heightened versions of their characters.  Lone Starr is just a generic hero but Robin Hood is well-defined by legend and so are his relationships.

In general, the writing is just sharper.  I'll never laugh at Pizza the Hutt.  But for every eye-rolling "your name sounds like another word" joke that Brooks is overly fond of telling, there is one of genuine cleverness.  When Rabbi Tuckman can't convince any of the Merry Men to partake in a ritual circumcision he sighs, "I've got to work on a younger crowd."  And a scene involving a metal glove will never fail to make me laugh.

In an ideal world, Brooks could have skipped all of his films in between and just made this right after 'Young Frankenstein.'  Its obviously a parody but it almost works as its own retelling of the Robin Hood myth.  Then he could have made 'Life Stinks' and moved on to wholly original films.  Alas.  Men in Tights has a cult following now but it was only a moderate success at the time.  Brooks thought a parody of Robin Hood was a safe bet, but the age of his particular brand of parody was coming to a close.  The noose was tightening and his next and final film was the nail in the coffin.