Blazing Saddles (1974)

Director: Mel Brooks
Starring: Cleavon Little, Gene Wilder, Slim Pickens

Synopsis:
A scheming politician seeks to sow discord in a town by sending them a black sheriff so he can take the land for himself.

Impressions:
Some people call this the funniest movie of all time. I wouldn't go that far myself. I honestly think the humor is rather scattershot. Some of it works very well and some of it falls flat. However, there's a wide variety of jokes, so there's actually a good chance that at least some of it will click with you. I imagine a lot of younger viewers are going to be too thin-skinned for the racial humor, but so it goes. It came out at tense period in terms of race relations in the US, but as they say, laughter is the best medicine. Cleavon Little brings a lot of charisma and comedic range to the main character and he plays off well with Gene Wilder as the Waco Kid. Harvey Korman makes for a delightfully hammy villain and Slim Pickens is entertaining as always as his right hand man Taggart. I also want to credit Madeline Kahn for Marlene Dietrich parody Lili von Shtupp. As I said in the beginning, I find this to be a bit of a mixed bag, but what works works well enough that I recommend giving it a watch.

Rating:
Watch It