Silent Movie (1976)

Strictly average movie

Better Late Then Never

It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

Hollywood loves to make movies about itself. Audiences love to watch them; it makes them think they're all secretly true stories. In Silent Movie, Mel Brooks plays a has-been director desperate for another hit. He pitches the idea of creating a silent film to his studio, and once given the green light, he has to recruit movie stars to act in it.The entire movie (except for one spoken word) is silent, but the gags get old fast. It really isn't Mel Brook's finest hour. I was so bored I kept fast-forwarding sections of the film. This is one of those Hollywood movies that seem like it actually happened. When Mel Brooks has a hard time getting studio approval and actor interest in his film, it feels painfully realistic. The only bright spots are the actors who play themselves in cameo roles: Paul Newman, Burt Reynolds, Liza Minnelli, James Caan, Marcel Marceau, and of course, Anne Bancroft.

This a great watch and worth it too. All this people who are giving this movie bad reviews are idiots who don't understand comedy. Mel Brooks, Marty Feldman, and Dom Bell are on their A game in this movie and so I recommend it anyone who loves comedy or Brooks Any ways it a movie worth watching mind there is a lot of reading because of course it a Silent Movie.

I first saw this film in the 80s during a Z Channel Mel Brooks 'retrospective', and I found it had neat and funny parts, and was a very enjoyable film to watch. I'm wiring this review now because I read so many who absolutely hated and canned this film. I disagree.Mel Brook's 'Silent Movie' was innovative in the time it was released, 1976, and it had a lot of 1975/1976 geared humor specifically for that audience. Even though there were some actors I didn't know that added to the jokes of this film of that time, it didn't matter, I still found it enjoyable. As the years went on and I found out more about them and it made more sense about watching film.This was a silent film released in a time where silent films were far from being considered to be financed or released by any studio. This was also the time of the studios realizing films could be "summer blockbusters", and Mel Brook's Silent Movie, DID out-perform to have a great opening weekend an a top summer box office run for 1976. Jaws opened to a $7M weekend just a year before($69.7 in its summer run) and 'Silent Movie' opened to a #1 opening weekend in 1976 with about $3.8M at the box office ($36M in its summer run). The very next weekend, 'The Omen' opened and unseated it with a $5.8M opening weekend ($60M in its summer run, I guess beating evil-horror in the 70s was hard!). Looking at any of these numbers today would be a laugh as we are conditioned to see those numbers during a summer release as a "flop". Back then, these were the blockbusters.Silent Movie is a film-within-a-film. Silent Movie tells the tale of a down and out director, Mel Funn, looking to score a big movie with big stars (of that time) to revitalize his career. He sets out on a trek with his studio support system (Dom Deluise and Marty Feldman. However a competing studio realizes that if he does this and gets the stars to do it, the film may be a 'blockbuster' so they go all out to stop him.This is a premise for many films, and is something I'm sure studios, directors and producers face when pitching films to be made. I find this type of premise was done better and funnier years later with Steve Martin's "Bowfinger"; but again Mel Brooks presented a "silent" film which relies on sight gags, double entendre names and titles, facial and body expressions--and years latter I figured out, if the actors didn't talk, they wouldn't have to pay them as much! If so, that made the film funnier to me as these were huge stars of that time, and them not speaking must have been quite a challenge. I can imagine those that turned him down because they couldn't speak.Much may not connect so easily with audiences of today, or a year or two ago as it did for those in 1975/1976, and if they were expecting something like Mel Brook's more brilliant fare like "Blazing Saddles", "Young Frankenstein" or "The Producers", it's not. It stands on its own as something fun, something different. Just a nice piece of slapstick that hits a great deal of the time, but for me, I like watching this and looking back on those days of the 70s and think about those days when silent movies were the thing too.

In Hollywood, director Mel Funn (Mel Brooks) is a recovering alcoholic trying to make a comeback. Along with his friends Dom Bell (Dom DeLuise) and Marty Eggs (Marty Feldman), he's trying to pitch a silent movie to Big Picture Studios chief (Sid Caesar). Facing a hostel takeover, he approves the project as long as they get the biggest stars to commit to the film. They are able to sign Burt Reynolds, James Caan, Liza Minnelli, Anne Bancroft and Paul Newman. Marcel Marceau says no. Mel falls completely in love with Vilma Kaplan (Bernadette Peters) but she turns out to be a spy trying to stop the film. This drives Mel back to the bottle.God bless Mel Brooks. I love that he's trying something unusual. The problem is that it doesn't make it funny. The story is simply an excuse to have one gag after another while the stars make cameos. I want this to be gut busting hilarity. I can only say that I like the characters and everybody's effort. The best silent comedians for me are Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin. Their comedies are much more physical and sometimes have great memorable stunts. I appreciate this attempt but not the result.