Young Frankenstein [40th Anniversary] [Blu-ray]

Director: Mel Brooks Mel Brooks

Overview

Lending his burlesque touch to 1970s genre revision, Mel Brooks followed his hit "western" Blazing Saddles with this parody of 1930s Universal horror movies. Determined to live down his family's reputation, Dr. Frederick Frankenstein (co-screenwriter Gene Wilder) insists on pronouncing his name "Fronckensteen" and denies interest in replicating his grandfather's experiments. But when he is lured by Frau Blucher (Cloris Leachman) to discover the tantalizingly titled journal "How I Did It" in his grandfather's castle, he cannot resist. With the help of voluptuous Inga (Teri Garr), wall-eyed assistant Igor (Marty Feldman), and a purloined brain, Frankenstein creates his monster (Peter Boyle). Igor, however, stole the wrong brain, and the monster tears off into the countryside, encountering a little girl and a blind hermit (Gene Hackman). Frankenstein finds the monster and trains him to do a little "Puttin' On the Ritz" soft-shoe, but the monster escapes again, this time seducing Frankenstein's uptight fiancée Elizabeth (Madeline Kahn) with his, ahem, sweet mystery. His love life and experiment in shambles, Frankenstein finally finds a way to create the being he had planned. Shooting in gleaming black-and-white, with sets and props from the 1930s and appropriate fright music by John Morris, Brooks' cheeky attitude towards the Hollywood past attracted a large audience, turning it into one of the most popular 1974 releases after (what else?) Blazing Saddles.

Product Details

Release Date:	09/09/2014
UPC:	0024543880066
Original Release:	1974
Rating:	PG
Source:	20Th Century Fox
Region Code:	A
Presentation:	[B&W]
Sound:	[Dolby Digital Mono]
Language:	English
Time:	1:45:00
Sales rank:	2,776

Special Features

Commentary by Mel Brooks; Interviews with Mary Feldman, Gene Wilder and Cloric Leachman; Inside the lab: Secret formula's in the making of Young Frankenstein; Blucher Button; It's Alive! Creating a monster classic featurette; Transylvanian lullaby: The music of John Morris; Making Frankensense of Young Frankenstein featurette; Deleted scenes; Outtakes; Production photo galleries

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Gene Wilder	Dr. Frederick Frankenstein
Peter Boyle	Monster
Marty Feldman	Igor
Madeline Kahn	Elizabeth
Cloris Leachman	Frau Blucher
Teri Garr	Inga
Kenneth Mars	Inspector Kemp
Gene Hackman	Blind Hermit
Richard Haydn	Herr Falkstein
Liam Dunn	Mr. Hilltop
Danny Goldman	Medical Student
Leon Askin	Herr Waldman
Oscar Beregi Jr.	Sadistic Jailer
Lou Cutell	Frightened Villager
Arthur Malet	Village Elder
Richard A. Roth	Kemp's Aide
Monte Landis	Gravedigger
Rusty Blitz	Actor
Gordon Mitchell	Dr. Otto Frankenstein
Xiro Papas	Mosaic - the Frankenstein Monster
Dalila Di Lazzaro	Sonia
Enrico Rossi	First Investigator
Fulvio Mingozzi	Second Investigator
Luigi Antonio Guerra	Agent
Renate Kasché	Redhead in the Car
Ann Odessa	Stripper
Oscar Beregi	Sadistic Jailer
Mel Brooks	Actor
John Dennis	Actor
Michael Fox	Actor
Lidia Kristen	Actor
Norbert Schiller	Actor
Rolfe Sedan	Actor
Daniele Patucchi	Composer
John Morris	Composer

Technical Credits

Mel Brooks

Gene Wilder

Mel Brooks	Director,Screenwriter
Gene Wilder	Screenwriter
Michael Gruskoff	Producer
Hal Millar	Special Effects
Henry Miller Jr.	Special Effects
Gene Cantamessa	Sound/Sound Designer
Richard Portman	Sound/Sound Designer
Jesse Wayne	Stunts
Jane Feinberg	Casting

Editorial Reviews

This completely hilarious horror spoof by the master of parody pulls out all the stops. Within the framework of director James Whale's classic film Frankenstein, writer/director Mel Brooks (Blazing Saddles, High Anxiety) and the marvelous Gene Wilder manage to out-camp Whale. Innumerable goofy sex jokes and visual gags exaggerate this already exaggerated tale of science gone very, very wrong. Young Frankenstein is replete with stellar comic performances by Wilder, Teri Garr, Cloris Leachman, Madeline Kahn, and Peter Boyle, as well as a memorable turn by bug-eyed Marty Feldman as Egor (pronounced Eye-gor), who spends much of the movie winking at the camera. Shot in black and white, complete with Transylvanian fog and spooky laboratories, Young Frankenstein proves that low humor, double entendres, and really cheesy accents can add up to high comic art.

Barnes & Noble - Regina Raiford

Few movies have offered up such satisfying parody and un-self-conscious wit as this Mel Brooks spoof, and all with the scatological flair that only Brooks can provide. When he's in top form, Brooks can make audiences feel as if they're simultaneously going to burst into tears, bust a gut, and pee in their pants with laughter. The great thing about Young Frankenstein, aside from this ability to make people lose all motor functions, is the reverence it pays to the films it parodies. Silly but always respectful, Brooks wants to honor the old Frankenstein films rather than skewer them, and as a result he serves up a film that is a cinematic achievement rather than a half-baked knock-off of better efforts. One of the funniest films of the 1970s, Young Frankenstein has lost none of its hilarity to the passing of time, serving as a reminder of how innovative parody can be.

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