Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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23 of 24 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
"Where did I go right?", January 8, 2006
This is it! The source, THE PRODUCERS, the 1968 release with screenplay and direction by Mel Brooks, juicy parts by Zero Mostel, Gene Wilder, Kenneth Mars and others, and a well-deserved reputation as one of the funniest movie comedies ever. Filmed on a pittance (less than $1 million, cheap even by Sixties standards), THE PRODUCERS almost died unrecognized until it became a cult hit in New York, L.A., Chicago and then, everywhere.
SPOILER GRAF: The plot is brilliantly diabolical: a corrupt Broadway producer (Zero Mostel) and his nebbishy accountant assistant (Gene Wilder) deliberately oversell a play with the design to create a flop and keep the proceeds. They hire the worst possible playwright, director, and choreographer and deliberately insult the drama critics. But the play is so hilariously awful it becomes awfully hilarious. The essence of 1960s camp: It's good because it's so bad.
It's hard to overstate just how good Mel Brooks' first movie is. The low budget forced a lot of outside shooting in New York City, and as a result the movie looks fresh, not cosmetized. The premise of a play about "Adolf and Eva in a gay romp at Berchtesgaden" was, if anything, more offensive just 23 years after the end of the Second World War than it is today. A big gamble on Brooks' part, but it played.
This edition is well worth the extra couple of dollars over the "movie only" version. It includes a second CD, apparently put together about the time of the 2001 Broadway musical, and contains stills, bios, and an engaging documentary about the film's making and reception. The last is especially fun since all the principals involved (except the late Zero Mostel) are alive and active and possessed of strong memories of that "kooky" classic-in-the-making.
The 2005 movie with Broadway vets Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick is proving a disappointment to those who remember the original movie or the 2001 Broadway smash. The new movie took the Broadway book and set it in an imagined-and expensive--"indeterminate past" full of late 1950s cars and fashions. Unfortunately, what works on the stage doesn't always translate on film, and despite all the talent and money involved, the new movie comes across as stagey, self-absorbed and at times a bit labored. And LONG: half again as long as this original, which clocks in right at an hour and a half.
The verdict: All versions of THE PRODUCERS are funny, but the 1968 movie is the one to start with. Enjoy it now at a great price.
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43 of 49 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Mel Brooks' First-And Best, December 30, 2002
"The Producers", which has gained newfound fame due to the Musical Comedy that Mel Brooks created based on this, his first movie, is also the best thing Brooks has ever done. "Blazing Saddles" was a gag-a-minute take on the Western, and "Young Frankenstein" was Brooks' spoof on horror, but in "The Producers", Brooks' made something that was entirely his own: a madcap, hilarious, perfectly cast satire of life on the seedier side of Broadway.The late, great Zero Mostel stars as Max Bilalystock, a former big-time Broadway producer who has been reduced to seducing old ladies for checks to fund flops. Into his sad life comes accountant Leo Bloom(Gene Wilder in the first of several Brooks' collaborations). Bloom is a nebbishly high-strung auditor who offhandedly mentions to Max that a producer could make more money from a flop than a hit. This launches one of the most hilarious movies ever made, as Bloom and Bialystock scheme to find the worst sript, worst director, and worst actors to make the most tasteless and awful play ever. The humor here is some of Brooks' finest. He expertley skewers Broadway egos, Nazis's, and greed as he tells the tale of the production of "Springtime for Hitler", written by an ex-Nazi who still holds onto the idea that Hitler was a great man. What keeps it from becoming an offensive movie is that the play is so hopelessly miscast and directed that it is just a big joke, and the fact that the audience knows that the Nazi is being taken advantage of steers the film away from the dark aspects of that ideology and makes fun of everything Hitler was trying to create. Wilder shines as Bloom, in his first major role, as he moves from loser to producer to desperate criminal, and Mostel shows his fine gift for broad comedy in his portrayal of the morally bankrupt producer who prizes money above all else. The film's funniest scenes involve bizzare breakdowns from Wilder, the hilarious alegiance to the defunct Third Reich by the playright, played with utter conviction by Kenneth Mars, and of course the play itself. The opening musical number is a sight to behold, and manages to spoof every over the top broadway production ever in the sense that everyone involved in the production, save Wilder and Mostel, take it so damn seriously. The Producers has finally gotten the DVD release it deserves, and should delight anyone who loves Mel Brooks, and perhaps win a few converts who only know him from his latter day flops(Men in Tights, I'm looking at you). Brooks had 10 great years of moviemaking in him, and he starts it out with a bang in this film.
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45 of 52 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
You Can't Keep A Good Movie Down!, January 17, 2003
"The Producers" was a very bold movie for first time director Mel Brooks to tackle. Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder were not nationally known movie stars, and the subject matter was very controversial. To his credit, Mel stuck to his guns and made the movie exactly the way he envisioned it. The only concession he made was changing the original title "Springtime For Hitler," because no movie studio would promote a film and theater owners wouldn't show a movie with Hitler in the title. The first part of the movie is hysterical, especially watching Gene Wilder getting so agitated that he appears to actually be having a nervous breakdown! The scene at Lincoln Center is one of the most effective scenes ever filmed. Zero finally persuades Gene to go along with his crazy scheme, and Gene yells "I'll do it!" Just then, the water in the fountain majestically rises up. Gene giddily dances around the fountain as Zero smiles approvingly.The opening dance number of the play "Springtime For Hitler" is outrageously over the top, with the dancers wearing Nazi uniforms and goose-stepping across the stage. Especially offensive to some is when the overhead view shows the dancers below in the form of a swastika. As Mel said in his interview, if you've gone that far out, you might as well go all the way. The cult status of the film has grown over the years. Life imitated art when "The Producers" was turned into a real Broadway musical. The staggering success of the play led to the film finally being released on DVD. As a great man once wrote, you can't keep a good movie down!
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