The Director's Oeuvre: Mel Brooks - High Anxiety

1977 was a watershed year for filmmaking.  George Lucas was reshaping the way we viewed popcorn entertainment with Star Wars and Woody Allen was elevating comedy with a newfound maturity with Annie Hall.  The same year, Mel Brooks dug his heels in deep and declared himself for what he has always been, a parodist.  And with that, we have 'High Anxiety.'

Dr. Richard Thorndyke is a psychoanalyst who suffers from a severe case of acrophobia, a fear of heights.  He arrives at the Psychoneurotic Institute for the Very, Very Nervous (great name) where he is to serve as the new administrator.  Slowly, Thorndyke begins to suspect that things are not as they seem.  People are framed for murder, the lunatics have taken over the asylum, excreting pigeons occupy jungle gyms, bellboys accost hotel patrons, and normal people act like cocker spaniels.  In other words, a normal day in LA.

If it feels like something you've seen before, that's because it is.  High Anxiety is a take down of suspense thrillers, namely the oeuvre of the master of suspense, Alfred Hitchcock.  The script reads like someone dropped all of Alfred Hitchcock's screenplays and hastily reassembled them, and from a stylistic standpoint, it totally works.

Mel Brooks stars once again as Dr. Thorndyke and while his introduction begins with a subtly amusing gag, I can never shake the feeling that his movies would be better with a different actor.  Apparently, this role was originally offered to Gene Wilder but scheduling conflicts forced him to step away.  What a shame.

But never fear! Harvey Korman and Cloris Leachmen return as Dr. Charles Montague and Nurse Diesel.  Leachman plays "Stern German Mistress" like nobody's business and Korman thrives at playing frustrated villains who aren't nearly as dangerous as they think they are.  The two get to work together here and their perverse, sadomasochistic love affair is a thing to behold.  All their work with Mel Brooks has led to this moment, as though Young Frankenstein's Frau Blücher and Blazing Saddles' Hedley Lamarr and his Froggy were destined to be together.  Its beautiful.

Madeline Kahn continues her Brooks alum winning streak as Victoria Brisbane, a breathy, busty blonde a la Tippi Hedren and Kim Novak.  I'm frequently impressed with how gracefully she slides into these movies and, just like most of her appearances so far, she is underused but memorable.

The big achievement in this movie is the way Brooks pokes fun at the Hitchcock style.  At times, the stylistic replication of Universal Horror films in 'Young Frankenstein' was a detriment to the films overall pacing but here it works undeniably to the film's advantage, with insert shots, transitional shots, and extreme close-ups skewed just enough to make it recognizable and comical.  Its not haha funny, just clever.

The film is, after all, a satire.  Half the jokes are straight up gags and the other half are exaggerating Hitchcock's most distinctive elements.  Where the film truly excels is when the two meet, like when Brooks hears that the person he is replacing was... MURDERED.  Familiar Bernard Herman strings take over.  Dramatic dutch angles of our horrified hero, looking every which way.  Then we reveal a symphony practicing in the tour bus driving next to them.  Its ludicrous, but it works.

The score, by Brooks' frequent collaborator, John Morris mimics Bernard Herman's compositions so well its almost creepy.  Morris also wrote the music for another comedy whodunit, CLUE.  He's a musical chameleon, a Michael Giacchino before Michael Giacchino.

When the film is at its weakest, it tries to make jokes that have nothing to do with the subject its spoofing.  At one point the movie comes to a screeching halt for a musical number.  The song in question, "High Anxiety" is written, composed, and performed by Brooks as well.  One can only assume that he was paid less than scale and could only make a living by wearing as many hats as humanly possible.  The scene simply doesn't work.  Is it a parody of a Hitchcock film?  I don't think so.  Its a weak five minutes that would have been on the Cutting Room floor if not for Brooks' vanity.  I'm pretty sure its just Mel playing Sinatra for five minutes.  Mel Brooks does in the real world what most of us only do in the shower.  And he's getting paid for it!

The single greatest moment in the entire film is the payoff to a drawn out joke involving Dr. Thorndyke pestering a lobby boy for a newspaper.  "I'll get it!" he shrieks.  The joke falls completely flat.  Surely the actor just overplayed it for a lame joke.  Then it keeps going.  Still overacting.  Still lame.  A few minutes later, Thorndyke is in the shower.  A familiar shadow looms beyond the curtain before they are yanked aside to reveal the bellboy with curled newspaper in hand.  "HERE! HERE! HERE!" he shouts, his high pitched screeches replacing the iconic score.  Brooks falls to the ground, bringing the curtain down with him.  The Bellhop exits.  The newspaper ink bleeds into the drain.  Genius.

The references are all clear as day, THE BIRDS, PSYCHO, NORTH BY NORTHWEST, THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH, SHADOW OF A DOUBT, REAR WINDOW, and VERTIGO, only here they call it "high anxiety."  As Groundskeeper Willie once asked, "you want to get sued?"

While Silent Movie felt masturbatory, self-congratulatory, and smug, High Anxiety shows an evolution to Brooks.  The film is a devotion to craft and it shows that the filmmaker is more than just a joke teller.  He loves the films he's lambasting and what's more, he understands why they work and how to make it work for him.  This film may not be the game changer that Annie Hall was but shows effort and originality and that's good enough for me.