Silent Movie

PLOT (spoiler alert!!!):

Mel Funn, a great film director, is now recovering from a drinking problem and down on his luck. He sets out to Big Picture Studios to pitch a new script to the Chief, aided by his ever-present sidekicks Dom Bell and Marty Eggs.

His big idea: the first silent motion picture in forty years. At first the Chief, who is in danger of losing the studio to the (literally) rabid and greedy New York conglomerate Engulf & Devour, rejects the idea, but Funn convinces him that if he can get Hollywood’s biggest stars to be in the film, he could save the studio.

Funn, Eggs, and Bell proceed to recruit various people for the movie. First they attack Burt Reynolds in his shower, confront James Caan outside his trailer, impress Liza Minnelli at the commissary, and dance for Anne Bancroft at a night club. News breaks out that the Chief has had an accident and is sent to the hospital. While there, Mel phones Marcel Marceau in Paris who declines the offer, delivering the only line of dialogue in the film, in French: “Non!” When asked by the others what Marceau said, Funn explains he doesn’t understand French. Paul Newman is seen on the hospital grounds. After a chase in electric wheelchairs, he asks to be in the movie. Funn and company reply with the atypical Hollywood-esque “We’ll get back to you.”

Engulf and Devour, meanwhile, worry that Funn will save Big Picture Studios and they will be unable to buy it. They attempt to “stop Funn with sex” by sending voluptuous nightclub sensation Vilma Kaplan to seduce Funn and pretend to be in love with him.

Funn falls head over heels, but when Eggs and Bell reveal the truth to him on the day before filming begins, the director returns to drinking. He goes to pieces until discovering that Vilma has actually fallen for him. Several hundred cups of coffee sober him up.

Funn’s silent movie is filmed in the blink of an eye. Unfortunately, the only copy of it is stolen from the theater by Engulf & Devour just before its big premiere.

Vilma volunteers to stall the theater’s audience with her nightclub act while Funn and his associates go out to steal back their film. They succeed, but are chased by Engulf and Devour’s executives. Ultimately cornered, they defeat their foes by using a soda machine that launches cans of Coca-Cola like grenades. They hurry the film to the theater, where it is shown for the first time. After the movie is over, the audience leaps to its feet while balloons and streamers fill the air. “They seem to like it,” Funn says.

The film ends with a title card: “This is a true story.”

REVIEW:

It has been a while since I watched a Mel Brooks film. I think the last one was either Spaceballs, Robin Hood: Men in Tights, or Blazing Saddles, but I can’t be sure which one.

I’m a big fan of classic cinema, though I haven’t been able to really get into silent films that way I would like to, with the exception of Nosferatu. When I found out that Mel Brooks had made a spoof on the genre, I just had to see it, which is how I ended up watching Silent Movie.

Our plot revolves around 3 friends who are trying to get a picture made by a major movie studio. It turns out that one of them was a big shot director at one time, but turned to the bottle and more or less ruined his career. The guys go in for the meeting with the head of the studio, only to find out that it is about to be bought by an evil conglomerate if they can’t produce a hit. So, our fearless heroes take their idea (for a silent movie) and set out to bring in some of the biggest names in Hollywood, at the time, to star in it. Hilarity and hijinks ensue.

It has really been quite some time since I laughed so hard at a film. What really impresses me about this picture, though, is that it is as funny as can be using only sight gags, physical comedy, and slapstick noises. Simple, bt effective. Who says you need all those bells and whistles, right?

I have but one minor complaint about this picture. The cameos by famous stars such as Burt Reynolds, James Caan, Liza Minnelli, Anne Bancroft, Paul Newman, and Marcel Marceau were all great, but it seemed as if some were fleshed outa bit more. For instance, Reynolds, Newman, and Bancroft got extensive scenes while Minnelli, Caan, and Marceau got a couple seconds on screen before they were gone and never heard from agin until the end credits. It just seemed a bit unbalanced to me, is all.

If you’re going to make a silent movie in the day and age when those great films and techniques are forgotten in favor of the technological advent of sound, then you better do something that will make people want to sit and watch a silent movie. Mel Brooks, accomplishes just that with Silent Movie but incorporating slapstick, music, great writing, and of course the irony of the one line of dialogue that is spoken in the entire picture…I’ll let you watch and see what I mean by that one. This is a great picture to watch and have a good laugh. I highly recommend it!

4 1/2 out of 5 stars