Young Frankenstein (1974/Fox Blu-ray)
Picture:
B Sound: C+ Extras: B- Film: B-
In recent
years, the Universal Horror Film of the 1930s and 1940s have had a great
revival thanks to the marketing of the classics by the studio, but the films have
always been loved and had a loyal audience.
One of those longtime fans was Mel Brooks and when he and Gene Wilder
wrote the screenplay for Young
Frankenstein, they created a labor of love comedy classic that was a big
hit in its time, part of a great cycle of Horror cinema (despite being a
comedy) and proof a black and white film could still be a hit. This was in 1974.
Wilder
plays the disgraced grandson of the doctor who created the legendary monster
and paid with his life. Though Universal
itself had sent the original films up a few times by pairing the monsters with
Abbott and Costello, Brooks and Wilder decided for forget those films and pick
up where the last serious films left off.
Then they make fun of and lovingly mock every single great nuance,
detail and memorable moment they could in this rich 105 minutes.
Though it
has some brief moments of obvious gags, the film belongs on the shelf with all
those original classics and has become valuable in a whole new way with its wit
and comic timing as impressive as ever. At
the time, Universal was licensing their Horror catalog all over syndicated TV,
so audiences who could get the in-jokes were out there in droves, which
propelled the film. Without seeing those
films, this is still very funny, but its true genius can only be appreciated by
seeing those classics and their sequels, which Universal has issued on popular
DVDs and need to issue on Blu-ray soon.
With that said, Wilder gives pone of his greatest performances, Marty
Feldman steals several scenes and the amazing cast additionally includes Peter
Boyle, Madeline Kahn, Cloris Leachman, Kenneth Mars, Liam Dunn, Oscar Beregi
Jr., Gene Hackman, Teri Garr and Brooks himself in multiple roles.
Sadly,
this film could not get made today because the comic talent to write it, shoot
it and act in it is just not out there and that the very idea is funny, only
for the film to constantly deliver could only come from the Hollywood that used
to be willing to try something new. Of
course, Brooks’ amazing blockbuster success Blazing Saddles (reviewed elsewhere on this site) gave him the
clout to get films like this made, but he was also on a creative hot streak few
comic writer/directors ever have been (add Woody Allen and Billy Wilder to that
very short list) and he did everything to make this look and feel like one of
Universal’s classics, even if it was made at a rival studio. He even got some of the original set pieces!
If you
have never seen the film before or for a long time, seeing it on Blu-ray is fun
and a nice early back catalog treat for film fans. Few monochrome films have hit Blu-ray (and
the now defunct HD-DVD format) to date and those have been a mixed bag,
including some good (Casablanca, Jailhouse Rock) and some not so hot (Longest Day, BCI’s Bob Hope films) but
the 1080p 1.85 X 1 AVC @ 26 MBPS digital High Definition image is not
everything it could be. Though the Video
Black is a big improvement over the DVDs, detail and depth can be foiled by
some softness Brooks and his Director of Photography Gerald Hirschfeld (the
original Fail-Safe, The Ultimate Warrior, The Car) intended. You can see the hard work involved in making
this uncanny in its similarity to the originals, but not as vividly as a good
film print would all the time. Some
shots are filmed to look almost like footage with silent-era fidelity, so some
grain is intended, leaving this transfer falling in between what we have seen
so far in black & white titles. This
aspect of the film is worthy of a separate essay.
The film
was originally a monophonic theatrical release and though the DTS HD Master
Audio (MA) lossless 5.1 remix is not bad, it only reveals how intentionally
monophonic Brooks wanted the film to be, including John Morris’ underrated
music score which is available as an isolate music track. The DTS is a nice option, but don’t expect
much, though I liked it better than the Dolby Mono options.
That
leaves other nice extras besides the isolated music including a trivia feature
dubbed The Franken-Track, a great
feature length audio commentary by Brooks, two making of featurettes, piece on
Morris’ score called Transylvania Lullaby,
outtakes, deleted scenes, stills and an interview piece with Feldman, Leachman
and Wilder. Now that is a nice set of
extras.
Of
course, many of you may know that the film was recently made into a stage
musical by Brooks himself, hoping to recapture the phenomenal success of doing
the same with The Producers, but it
did not work out. I would still love to
see that (as well as Cronenberg’s similar attempt with The Fly) as to why neither Horror Musical clicked. Too bad Brooks and Fox did not do a new HD
featurette on the musical, but in the meantime, we have the original Young Frankenstein film and no outright
satire of the genre has ever worked better before or since.
- Nicholas Sheffo
