Hal's 2010 Horror Marathon Reviews

[hal9g]

Young Frankenstein: Special Edition (1974/United States) Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment (United States) Director: Mel Brooks Writing: Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley [Mary Shelley] (Original Material By), Gene Wilder (Screenwriter), Mel Brooks (Screenwriter) Length: 106 min. Video: Widescreen 1.85:1 Audio: English: Dolby Digital: Mono, French: Dolby Digital: Mono, Spanish: Dolby Digital: Mono, Commentary: Dolby Digital: Mono Subtitles: English

Stars:
Gene Wilder as Dr. Frederick Frankenstein
Peter Boyle as The Monster
Marty Feldman as Igor
Madeline Kahn as Elizabeth
Cloris Leachman as Frau Blücher

Plot:
Mel Brooks' monstrously crazy tribute to Mary Shelley's classic pokes hilarious fun at just about every Frankenstein movie ever made. Summoned by a will to his late grandfather's castle in Transylvania, young Dr. Frankenstein (GENE WILDER) soon discovers the scientist's step-by-step manual explaining how to bring a corpse to life. Assisted by the hunchbacked Igor (MARTY FELDMAN) and the curvaceous Inga (TERI GARR), he creates a monster (PETER BOYLE) who only wants to be loved. CLORIS LEACHMAN, MADELINE KAHN, KENNETH MARS and GENE HACKMAN co-star in this inspired vision of lunacy.

Extras:

• Scene Access
• Audio Commentary
• Feature Trailers
• Deleted Scenes
• Featurettes
• Gallery
• Production Notes
• Closed Captioned
• Interviews

My Thoughts:

With the exception of this film and Blazing Saddles I've never been a big Mel Brooks fan, but this movie is absolutely hysterical at times.
Although the humor is a bit silly at times, the acting is just tremendous and the comedic timing, especially of Wilder and Feldman, is simply marvelous.  With many familiar scenes from the original 1931 film, Brooks has built on the story adding new and hilarious moments.  The scene where Madeleine Kahn breaks out in song with "Oh sweet mystery of life, at last I've found you..." had me laughing my ass off!  Very funny stuff!

Rating: [mr]5[/mr]

[Kathy]

I agree Hal - I love this movie. My youngest niece and nephews have watched it so many times they have a lot of it memorized. Their favorite...when the freshly dead Marty Feldman sings "I ain't got no body...".