I’ve seen this movie several dozen times but never on the big screen. My parents did and I vaguely recall that day, we (my brother and me) were ditched at Grandma’s house for the afternoon. Alamo’s copy had been played an awful lot, it was very faded. I figured with all the other theaters showing Gene Wilder stuff, it would be digital. Didn’t matter, it remains one of the funniest and most politically incorrect movies ever made. I hope Mel Brooks has something in his will to keep Adam Sandler and other unfunny hacks from trying to remake his masterpiece ridiculing old Westerns.
I also want to mention the wonderful Alamo management for silencing the dumbass next to us who thought she was in a quote-along. The people on the screen are funny, you lady, are not, so STFU.
What’s really hard to believe in our day is Warner Brothers’ executives being mostly concerned over the farting scene. Racial epithets? OK. Poking sore wounds on Germans? OK. Gay bashing? OK. Farting? Well, they tried to draw the line on Mel…but failed. Despite the usage of ethnic slurs, I think the joke is on the users, they’re the ones we laugh at because, even in the Seventies, their ignorance is funny in a pathetic way. Often, they’re also the villains of the story, namely Taggert. It’s similar to what we laugh at in Idiocracy. How could these people be so dumb?
Oh well, it was a great way to send off Gene Wilder. Alamo did it right with trailers for his other comedies before the show.