Oeuvre: Mel Brooks Retrospective

As I said in my first review, the Oeuvre project was just something that I started with a friend to keep in touch, as well as keeping our critical minds sharp, and to give us a chance to explore and revisit films we might never have watched otherwise.  

For the past month and a half or so, I've been watching and reviewing the films of Mel Brooks.  I had heard of almost all of his work but I had never seen most of them and exploring unknown decades of his career was intriguing.

Its always interesting to watch a director change over time.  Whether they evolve or stagnate.  As long as I've known about Mel Brooks, I've known him as a comic legend.  The common man equivalent to Woody Allen.  There was even a debate over which of these New York Jewish comedians was "better" on 'Siskel and Ebert.'  (http://siskelandebert.org/video/8R52X9UUUHXO/Sneak-Previews--Mel-Brooks-or-Woody-Allen-1980)

Is that reputation justified?  Somewhat.  Do I think he's worthy of his iconic status?  Sort of.  After watching all of his films, I can definitively say, he's more visual than Allen.  In fact, his visual flair may be Brooks' greatest asset.  He's not a auteur but he has an eye for the sight gag and his passion for meta humor must have been revolutionary.  He had a talent for surrounding himself with and reusing talented performers such as Gene Wilder, Madeline Kahn, Cloris Leachman, Harvey Korman, Marty Feldman, and Dom DeLuise.  These casting favorites, along with a long career as a parodist gave Brooks a brand he would live by for the rest of his career.  I don't think he integrated himself as a star of his own films as successfully as Allen, in fact I think it was often a detriment to his material.  Perhaps his films would have been stronger with someone else in front of the camera.  And unfortunately, that self-imposed label as a parodist would haunt him.  I firmly believe that the only reason 'Life Stinks' is treated with such vehement disregard is because it is such a radical departure for him. 

When I think of Mel Brooks at his best, I think of self-referential comedy, broad slapstick, gross-out jokes, social commentary, and a love of the absurd.  Of all his films, I think 'Blazing Saddles' is the one that best encapsulates his career.  It deftly blends satire of the Western genre with an undercurrent of racisms and general prejudice.  Its climax is the most self-aware Mel Brooks has ever gotten without tripping over himself, and the screenplay sparkles with line after line of quotable material.

Its hard to watch his career from beginning to end without thinking about his influence but also about how time seemed to pass him by.  While he was making 'High Anxiety', the Zucker Brothers were about to hit it big with the absurdist parody 'Airplane!'  A year after he retired with 'Dracula: Dead and Loving It', Wes Craven released one of my favorite horror/self-aware comedies, 'Scream' and only a few years after that, Keenen Wayans released 'Scary Movie' which itself felt like a Brooks style parody of Scream.  We reached a whirlpool of parody circling parody, a snake eating its own tale.  I can't help but think of Brooks as one of the grandfathers of that style of comedy.

Brooks had a legendary rise to stardom as a comedic filmmaker with The Producers, winning best original screenplay for his first film.  How many can claim that?  Diablo Cody is the only name that comes to mind.  Though his star dwindled and faded away with flops towards the end, its clear how numerous films of his wind up on multiple Greatest Comedies of All Time lists.

For good or ill, hilarious or mind-numbingly terrible, his films were consistently his.  And that's one of the greatest compliments I can pay any director.

***

Up Next!

Oeuvre: Mel Brooks - Life Stinks

After almost a quarter of a century making parody after parody, Brooks attempted something truly revolutionary; an original idea.

Life Stinks is the story and eventual mantra of coldhearted CEO, Goddard Bolt,  a man with nothing but contempt for anyone whose net worth is less than seven figures.  His greatest ambition is to tear down a crummy neighborhood and build a monument to his own hubris.  Unfortunately, that land is owned by a business rival who agrees to sell the property for next to nothing if Bolt can survive one month on said streets.  A wager is struck, hands are shaken, and the countdown begins.

Immediately, Brooks realizes that being homeless is a daily struggle, one which he is not capable of confronting.  He loses his hairpiece and mustache, his suit is torn, and he spends the first night sleeping amongst the rats.  Out of desperation, he befriends a colorful cast of kind, well-meaning bums with Dickensian names like Sailor, played with innocent charm by Howard Morris and his watchful protector, Fumes, played by Theodore Wilson.  They christen him "Pepto" after the Pepto-Bismol box in which Bolt spends his first night.

There comes a point in every filmmaker's life where they attempt a Frank Capra story.  Frank Darabont had 'The Majestic' and Steven Spielberg had 'The Terminal.'  One thing that all these stories have in common is a lack of any anger or sarcasm and most importantly, open sincerity and sentimentality.  Brooks is walking down a familiar trail here but for the most part, he rarely stumbles.

Brooks is surprisingly solid as Bolt.  He's so clueless without his money that he doesn't even think about soup kitchens and he really sells the desperation.  Lesley Ann Warren, as exceptional as she is underrated, plays Molly, a Broadway dancer with a tragic past.  She plays the part with tremendous bite and when she tells Brooks what happened to her, your heart will break.

Easily my favorite part of the movie is the perpetually pouty Jeffrey Tambor as Vance Crasswell, Bolt's sincerely insincere competitor who walks into every room like he's interrupting something important and isn't sure if he should leave or not.

One of the issues this movie faces is that its stylistically inconsistent.  We start off with a strong, visually amusing beginning that reminds me of 'The Hudsucker Proxy' by the Coen Brothers.  However, that heightened atmosphere is abandoned once Bolt winds up on the streets.  The problem is that, while the slums are a fantasy of what homeless life is like, its only a slight fantasy.  As a result, the two worlds, and Goddard Bolt's entire character arc don't gel.  The whole last act needs to be rewritten too.  It feels like Brooks didn't know how to resolve the story and since he has followed convention at every turn up to this point, he went with the most obvious choices for a finale.  He pursues a go-big-or-go-home ending when the story felt so much more intimate than that.  This leads to a climax that is clumsy, contrived, and ineffective.

That said, this movie has a good heart at its center.  Brooks is really stretching himself here both as an actor and a filmmaker as a whole.  Its not a strong film but it shows growth and maturity.  The way Annie Hall showed confidence in Allen's storytelling ability, Brooks is trying to tell a true story where the jokes come from the characters and not movie references.  Its clear that Brooks has something to say here, possibly out of the guilt that comes with being successful in LA where the dichotomy between the rich and poor is extreme.  He attacks the one percent, lawyers, hospital workers, and most importantly, the viewer, for how we turn away and do nothing.

Life Stinks is constantly referred to as one of Brooks' weakest films.  I honestly don't know why.  I've seen Brooks' worst and we'll get to that momentarily.  The transition from the first act to the inciting incident is jarring and the last act needs to change completely but the middle hits a consistent stride that Brooks has never had the courage to try before.  Its not a great film but it is by no means a bad one.  I assume one of the reason Brooks fans don't like this movie is the same reason I think that its so interesting.  Its original.

Sadly, the film was a both a critical and financial flop and so, Brooks returned to his comfort zone, but one can't help but wonder, if this story were a little tighter, the writing a little sharper, and the reviews a little more positive, what might have been.