SCFZ

Polling the films of director Mel Brooks

The rules:

- your list can include no more than half of the Brooks films you've seen, up to a maximum of 5. So if you've seen seven of his films, for example, you can list only a top 3. It's only if you've seen ten or more of his films than you can list the maximum of five.

- i'll assume ballots are ranked unless you tell me otherwise. unranked ballots are fine.

- deadline for ballots: next Friday, in seven days, whatever day that is

- if anyone is watching films for these polls, then i'll extend the deadline up to three days, if someone requests an extension

- next poll: whoever posts the first ballot in this thread is free to nominate the director we poll next, unless you've nominated in this round already (everyone should get a chance). Already nominated this round: greg x, wba, greennui, umbugbene, ofrene, mesnalty, john ryan, silga, mrcarmady, evelyn, nrh, roscoe, brian d, rischka, karl, holymanm

umbugbene created an index on letterboxd of all of our previous polls here: letterboxd.com/umbugbene/list/index-of-all-scfz-director-polls/

one rule for nominees: at least 3 scfzers need to have seen 10+ of a nominee's films, or at least 4 scfzers need to have seen at least 8 of the nom's films, so if it isn't clear if that will be the case, we'll confirm that's true before moving forward

if 24 hours pass after a poll opens, and no one eligible to nominate has posted a ballot, then i'll nominate someone, and then we'll start over, and everyone will be able to nominate again

The Producers
The Twelve Chairs
Young Frankenstein


turns out i've seen six, thought i'd only seen three... but i can see why i forgot about most of them, absolutely hated four of them and didn't like young frankenstein enough to want to vote for it. the producers is hilarious though. edit - now seen seven, the twelve chairs was pretty good, and i guess i'll vote for young frankenstein after all

Seen 4

The Producers


the other three films were terrible.

but The Producers is a lot of fun.

Haven't seen Young Frankenstein and Blazing Saddles, although not sure if I want to watch them in the upcoming week.

YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN
THE PRODUCERS

His two best works. The rest have intermittent moments of inspiration (a moment in the generally unendurable SPACEBALLS that takes the chest-bursting scene from ALIEN in another direction is pure fucking genius, where on earth did that come from), but without Gene Wilder the returns just diminish.

seen 6

young frankenstein
robin hood (liked it when i was younger anyway)
blazing saddles

there was a point when me and my brother could quote every single line of spaceballs. ditto my dad for blazing saddles. possibly one of the reasons i started watching older movies is that i want to know who the hell hedy lamarr actually was.

but those are the only two of his that i've seen, strangely.

anyway i will always love rick moranis in spaceballs

1. spaceballs

Seen 3.

1. Silent Movie (1976)

I absolutely hated THE PRODUCERS. And am also not a fan of the other three I've seen.
It's been a while, though: Robin Hood when it came out at the cinema, dito for Dracula... and the others also during the 1990s.

--

Brooks seen: 4

Seen 10.

1. The Producers
2. High Anxiety
3. Silent Movie
4. History of the World: Part I
5. Life Stinks

1. Young Frankenstein
2. The Twelve Chairs
3. The Producers
4. Blazing Saddles
5. Spaceballs

Seen 11

young frankenstein
robin hood: men in tights
blazing saddles

*seen six (young frank, i genuinely enjoy; and like bd, i think i enjoyed rhmit when i was young - either that, or i just had a crush on amy yasbeck's maid marian... can't really recall)

Seen 9:
1-The Producers (1967)
2-History of the World, Part I (1981)
3- Young Frankenstein (1974)
4- Silent Movie (1976)

sen 10

1. young frankenstein
2. blazing saddles
3. the twelve chairs
4. robin hood: men in tights
5. spaceballs

Seen 3, will watch another one.

The Producers
---
Blazing Saddles

Seen them all. Dracula and Life Stinks are his most underrated, but he peaked early.

The Producers
Young Frankenstein
Blazing Saddles
Spaceballs
Life Stinks

twodeadmagpies wrote: ↑Sat Jul 18, 2020 1:54 pm i want to know who the hell hedy lamarr actually was.

tdm, you can pick our next director if you like! i might wait until friday to start that poll, so there's no great rush to decide

Hedy Lamarr? She was a important inventor or something I think .

"along with co-inventor George Anthiel, developed a "Secret Communications System" to help combat the Nazis in World War II. By manipulating radio frequencies at irregular intervals between transmission and reception, the invention formed an unbreakable code to prevent classified messages from being intercepted by enemy personnel.

Lamarr and Anthiel received a patent in 1941, but the enormous significance of their invention was not realized until decades later. It was first implemented on naval ships during the Cuban Missile Crisis and subsequently emerged in numerous military applications. But most importantly, the "spread spectrum" technology that Lamarr helped to invent would galvanize the digital communications boom, forming the technical backbone that makes cellular phones, fax machines and other wireless operations possible."

I'm pretty sure she was from Algiers and had something to do with the creation of ecstasy too, if my memory serves, but I wasn't able to verify that.

Anyway, for Brooks I'll go with

Young Frankenstein, which is maybe the best example from a fairly meager genre
High Anxiety, not quite as good but at least it seemed to come from a place of appreciation
The 12 Chairs an enjoyable enough take on a popular film story
The Producers, just for being its own thing
and really nothing else did much for me, but I'll throw in a vote for Silent Movie just to fill out the ballot since I didn't hate it or anything.

flip wrote: ↑Tue Jul 21, 2020 12:04 pm

twodeadmagpies wrote: ↑Sat Jul 18, 2020 1:54 pm i want to know who the hell hedy lamarr actually was.

tdm, you can pick our next director if you like! i might wait until friday to start that poll, so there's no great rush to decide

um. i have no idea. i'll think about it till tomorrow but i may have to capitulate, pls have some substitutes ready!

greg x wrote: ↑Tue Jul 21, 2020 12:58 pm Hedy Lamarr? She was a important inventor or something I think .

"along with co-inventor George Anthiel, developed a "Secret Communications System"

Antheil is approximately as interesting as Lamarr in that pairing -- he was the composer of Ballet Mécanique, intended to accompany Fernand Léger's film of the sane name, scored for multiple player pianos on amphetamines, airplane propellors, a siren, and a ton of percussion. Some consider it the first concert piece exclusively scored for percussion, but that distinction probably more properly belongs to Varèse's Ionisation. It's at least the first piece composed for a lot of mechanical instruments. As a publicity stunt to promote its premiere, Antheil planted stories in newspapers (with the help of a reporter friend) that said he had been eaten by lions while on a trip to North Africa (he was a bombastic self-promoter, it sounds like he'd declare his genius to anyone who would pay attention to him, and naturally he wrote a self-aggrandizing artist manifesto). The Paris premiere incited a bigger riot than The Rite of Spring had a decade previous, so the Paris premiere was a huge success. Trying for a repeat riot at the New York premiere, provocateurs were hired and inserted in the audience, to no result -- the NYC premiere was a complete disaster. The propellors were mistakenly pointed at the audience and blew everyone's programs around, and the siren didn't work. From reports at the time the NYC audience found it comically bad, and they just jeered and laughed instead of rioting in the streets. The piece wasn't performed again for seventy years.

Antheil also tried to write an opera with James Joyce based on part of Ulysses, and possibly most interesting here at SCFZ, he scored In a Lonely Place, Dementia, Specter of the Rose and several other films from the 1930s-1950s. And of course he invented that spectrum thing with Hedy Lamarr.

This video is worth watching for at least 30-60 seconds, imo (starting from the 0m45s mark after the titles) :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58H0hC96zDg

twodeadmagpies wrote: ↑Tue Jul 21, 2020 7:46 pm um. i have no idea. i'll think about it till tomorrow but i may have to capitulate, pls have some substitutes ready!

no pressure obviously, only if you want to! if you don't, it will be caracortada's turn, if they want to pick someone.

flip wrote: ↑Wed Jul 22, 2020 12:14 am

twodeadmagpies wrote: ↑Tue Jul 21, 2020 7:46 pm um. i have no idea. i'll think about it till tomorrow but i may have to capitulate, pls have some substitutes ready!

no pressure obviously, only if you want to! if you don't, it will be caracortada's turn, if they want to pick someone.

max linder! i have enough, pretty sure lencho does, and haven't seen evelyn pop up lately, so...???

linder should work, i think - i started a max linder poll a few minutes ago!

greg x wrote: ↑Tue Jul 21, 2020 1:12 pmYoung Frankenstein, which is maybe the best example from a fairly meager genre
High Anxiety, not quite as good but at least it seemed to come from a place of appreciation

Which is really what separates Brooks from 99% of his direct imitators and ones that came further down the line.

Apparently Hitch liked High Anxiety.

1. The Producers
2. Young Frankenstein

I've seen 5 movies directed by Brooks. I've been meaning to re-watch The Twelve Chairs after watching the Cuban version, but I doubt it would make my top 2 if I did.

ororama wrote: ↑Sat Jul 25, 2020 1:26 pm 1. The Producers
2. Young Frankenstein

I've seen 5 movies directed by Brooks. I've been meaning to re-watch The Twelve Chairs after watching the Cuban version, but I doubt it would make my top 2 if I did.

Yeah but would it make your top 3? If you've seen 6 you can vote for one more

brooks only has eleven directing credits, and fortunately we got to a top ten through regular voting -- only dracula: dead and loving it didn't get a vote in our poll:

results

1. Young Frankenstein (1974) -- 31 pts
2. The Producers (1967) -- 27 pts
3. The Twelve Chairs (1970) -- 12 pts
4. Blazing Saddles (1974) -- 11 pts
5. High Anxiety (1977) -- 8 pts
6. Silent Movie (1976) -- 6 pts
6. Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993) -- 6 pts
8. History of the World: Part I (1981) -- 5 pts
8. Spaceballs (1987) -- 5 pts
10. Life Stinks (1991) -- 2 pts

Holymanm wrote: ↑Sat Jul 25, 2020 5:53 pm Yeah but would it make your top 3? If you've seen 6 you can vote for one more

i watched the twelve chairs, and it became my second-favourite brooks movie, i think my new ballot elevated it from 4th to 3rd in the poll -- at this point, even if ororama decided to vote for it, the ranking wouldn't change, so it's a bit of a moot thing i guess

up at letterbox

https://letterboxd.com/fliptrotsky/list ... -poll-226/