Product Details

• Actors: Mel Brooks, Cleavon Little, Gene Wilder, Madeline Kahn, Marty Feldman
• Directors: Mel Brooks, Alan Johnson
• Writers: Alan Uger, Andrew Bergman, Barry Levinson, Doris Mudie, Edwin Justus Mayer
• Format: Box set, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
• Language: English (Stereo), French (Stereo), Spanish (Stereo)
• Subtitles: English, French, Spanish
• Dubbed: English, French, Spanish
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
• Number of discs: 8
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: 20th Century Fox
• DVD Release Date: April 4, 2006
• Run Time: 772 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (520 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000E6ESIK
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,322 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
  • #7 in Movies & TV > DVD > Westerns
  • #10 in Movies & TV > DVD > Military & War
  • #12 in Movies & TV > DVD > Musicals
• Learn more about "The Mel Brooks Collection (Blazing Saddles / Young Frankenstein / Silent Movie / Robin Hood: Men in Tights / To Be or Not to Be / History of the World, Part 1 / The Twelve Chairs / High Anxiety)" on IMDb

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

There are plenty of belly laughs in The Mel Brooks Collection, an eight-disc set of most of the director-writer-actor's best-known films. Four of them--Silent Movie, High Anxiety, To Be or Not to Be, and Robin Hood: Men with Tights--are making their debut on DVD, while a fifth, The Twelve Chairs, was briefly available as a non-anamorphic DVD from Image Entertainment (all the DVDs in this set are anamorphically enhanced for widescreen TVs). That means you can sample a 23-year stretch of Brooks's outrageous and affectionate spoofing of everything from movies to popular legends to movies to historical figures to, hey! more movies.

The earliest film, The Twelve Chairs (1970), is the least known, but is one of the funniest, helped greatly by a good story (adapted from a 1920s Russian tale) and the casting of Ron Moody and Frank Langella as treasure hunters. Young Frankenstein and Blazing Saddles followed in 1974. The former, a spoof of horror films, is easily one of the top two or three funniest movies of all time, and the latter is justly famous for its often-tasteless send-up of Western cliches. Silent Movie (1976) is just what the title describes, with its only word of dialogue spoken from the least-likely source, and High Anxiety (1977) pays tribute to the work of Alfred Hitchcock. History of the World, Part 1 (1981) mocks historical events and epics, and To Be or Not to Be (1983) is a remake of Ernst Lubitsch's 1942 classic of the same name (it's also the only film in the set for which Brooks didn't receive writing and directing credit). By this time, Brooks was more actively taking the leading roles himself (rather than the bit parts), and unfortunately relying less on his topnotch ensemble of recurring players, which included Gene Wilder, Madeline Kahn, Cloris Leachman, Harvey Korman, and Dom DeLuise. But he does use a new ensemble (including Cary Elwes and, in his film debut, Dave Chappelle), for Robin Hood: Men in Tights (1993), the feature-length spin on the same hero Brooks had spoofed in his short-lived 1975 television series When Things Were Rotten.

Bonus features are minor. In addition to an HBO featurette on Men in Tights, there's a featurette and interviews on To Be or Not to Be and all the features (Brooks commentary, deleted scenes, interviews, etc.) that were on the original release of Young Frankenstein. Note that while rights issues kept The Producers, Spaceballs, and other films out of this set, 20th Century Fox was able to use Warner Bros.' Blazing Saddles. The features on that disc, however, are the ones that were on the 1997 DVD release, not the 2004 anniversary reissue. Regardless, the set's price for this many films is low, and because it has so many films new to DVD, Brooks fans will want to pick this up faster than they can say... "Frau Blücher!" --David Horiuchi

Product Description

This 8 disc boxset includes Blazing Saddles, High Anxiety, History of the World Part I, Robinhood Men in Tights, Silent Movie, To Be or Not to Be, Twelve Chairs, Young Frankenstein.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

167 of 179 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Movies are classic, but if you have the DVD's rethink your purchase June 9, 2012

By J. Gustafson

Format:Blu-ray

I am a huge Mel Brooks fan, so I already had 7 of these movies on DVD. I was really excited to watch these in the splendor of 1080 but alas I am on my fourth movie and it absolutely feels like these are up-converted films. The quality looks no different then a standard DVD running through the blu-ray player. I have watched Robin Hood, Spaceballs and Blazing Saddles. I just put in To Be or Not To Be which prompted this review. I get the films are between 20 and 40 years old, but my assumption was these would be taken from the original negatives. Anyway, great films but I wouldn't buy this if you already have the DVD's, I am not sure that you will see any difference from what you already have...

202 of 218 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Good set but I'd wait for the individual releases--phone # for Fox Cust. Svc April 13, 2006

By Wayne Klein HALL OF FAMETOP 100 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:DVD

Most of the movies here are classics which makes it a problem if you don't want all the movies. The version of "Blazing Saddles" is the earlier release from Warner which doesn't look as good as the 30th Anniversary re-release and the extras aren't any great shakes. The transfer looks so-so and lacks the sharper look of the later 30th Anniversary Edition. "Young Frankenstein" resembles the first DVD release of the film from Fox with the same extras. Reportedly "Young Frankenstein" was supposed to be remastered in anamorphic widescreen but the wrong master used or the wrong discs shipped with this set. For those that care it's not anamorphic. The film looks extremely good but if you already have these classic films, I'd suggest waiting for these to be released individually.

Fans of Brooks will be buying this for the previously unreleased films "Silent Movie", "Robin Hood:Men in Tights", "To Be or Not to Be" (which Brooks didn't direct but stars in) and "High Anxiety". All these films look pretty good here (although "The Twelve Chairs" is probably going to be of the least interest to fans that grew up on Brooks other classic films). "Robin Hood" comes with an featurette produced for HBO on the film. Most of the others come only with theatrical trailer(s). "To Be or Not To Be" comes with a short featurette and some profiles of Brooks, the late Anne Bancroft and Charles Durning. Clearly they weren't produced for the DVD but must be some sort of promotional bits for another format (you're guess is as good as mine)possibly for an Electtronic Press Book.

If you have problems with any of the discs you can contact Fox at their customer service phone number 1-888-223-2FOX.

43 of 45 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars What a Great Collection - Filled With Extras August 17, 2012

By Mr. David M. Marciniszyn

Format:Blu-ray|Amazon Verified Purchase

I was originally looking to only replace one DVD movie. However when I went looking on Amazon I saw that the collection was on a Timed Deal on Amazon. It had an extreme price cut and I could not pass it up. However even at the higher price it appears to be a value balancing both the content and price per disk in the set. I believe it to be worth the investment so as one would say the buy is not just a "Roll in the Hay" (pardon the Pun).

Here is the low down on the collection:

1) The Box and Packaging of the disks is very good. Includes a cover box and a plastic multi-disk case. (The disks did not shift out of their spot in shipping) Disks also go in and out of the case easily. The Silk Screening on the Box Art is well done. Great selection of Cover Art which is a picture of Mel Brooks as a "Director".
2) You receive quite a number of movies for the price. Silk Screening on the disks is clean and crisp.
3) The picture quality is better than DVD, but maybe not as good as I have seen with other box sets. But not to worry they do make good use of the extra room on the Blu-Ray with Extras.
4) I was impressed with the number of extras that were included, an Example of this is: In Young Frankenstein you get additional out-takes, interviews, bloopers, deleted Scenes, etc.
5) I would recommend exploring the extras - they are fun to watch and also give you some insight into the creative process and at times a bigger picture of the story. (I.E. in Young Frankenstein you get to view, as part of the deleted scenes, the reading of the Baron's Will)
6) Includes Trivia Tracks which are fun to play.
7) Downside is it does not contain all of his movies. It would be Nice to have a Volume 2 or 3 which would eventually bring all the features together under one consistently produced collection.
8) Makes a great gift!

I would recommend the collection. So start trading in your DVDs.

This Collection Includes the Following 9 Titles on a set of Blu-Ray Disks:

Blazing Saddles
Spaceballs
Young Frankenstein
High Anxiety
History of the World Part 1
Robin Hood: Men in Tights
Silent Movie
To Be or Not To Be
The Twelve Chairs
Blazing Saddles

Extras Include:

New Featurettes:
Trivia Games
Isolated Score Tracks
Deleted Scenes
Gag Reels
Commentaries
Interviews
Documentaries
Still Galleries