Brilliant, controversial, classic comedy with top acting and catchy songs
- The Producers review by PV
If you're the sort of person who think dire modern Hollywood comedies with swearing and bodily function obsessions are funny, you probably won't like this.
If, however, you enjoy sharp satire and are bright enough to notice intelligent irony, then you'll love this film. The humour is Jewish, and also pitch dark for those who get the references. No wonder it was successfully revived recently.
True, it is a bit dated in patches - and those easily offended by dolly bird gags should probably cover their eyes.
But really, this is one of the best musical movies ever made - a classic. Mel Brooks at the top of his form.
Five stars.
4 out of 4 members found this review helpful.
A satirical masterpiece. Amazing stuff!
- The Producers review by RP
In today's politically correct society it makes a refreshing change to watch again a film so brim full of scathing satire, so deliberately and outrageously offensive - and so side splittingly funny - as this. Whenever I watch it, it never ceases to amaze me.
By now you'll know the plot - pair of dodgy theatrical producers plan scam to raise lots of money for a play so bad that it will immediately fail, upon which the producers keep the cash. But things go disastrously wrong...
And the reason they go wrong is that a musical so offensive as 'Springtime for Hitler' with jackbooted, goose-stepping chorus girls and lines like 'Don't be stupid, be a smarty. Come and join the Nazi party' is so outrageous and yet as funny today as it was for the audience within the film. This is a film that pokes fun at so very many segments of society, at so many socially unacceptable practices, and even at today's 'politically correct' attitudes - although the film was made almost 50 years ago.
Written and directed by Mel Brooks, it won an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay. Watch this for the first time and feel your jaw drop. Watch it again and rejoice in this satirical masterpiece. Superb stuff - 5/5 stars.
4 out of 4 members found this review helpful.
Awfull
- The Producers review by KL
Hysterical nonsense.
A great deal of noise and shouting which would appeal perhaps to a five year old mongoose with hearing problems. Grown up adults should be offended by this movie.
3 out of 10 members found this review helpful.
worth watching again!
- The Producers review by drwho
If you have already seen t his,it is worth getting the one from here ,it is the 50th Anniversary Edition,and the video and audio has been all updated,and has been stunningly restored in 4K. It has a load on extras too.The movie won an Oscar and Gene Wilder is superb.
Worth getting for sure
2 out of 2 members found this review helpful.
A Romp
- The Producers review by OM
Not for snowflakes.
A rompant farce, disrespectful to everything it touches. Huge fun. Great acting by Zero Mostel, Gene Wilder and particularly by a scuttle-helmeted Kenneth Mars as Hitler's last remaining fan.
Splendid in concept and execution. It should be compulsory viewing for all who take themselves too seriously. With luck they would suffer terminal meltdown.
Review by Hope Springs
1 out of 1 members found this review helpful.
Too crazed
- The Producers review by CP Customer
Had to switch off after 35mins cos it felt a bit too much like watching a lunatic asylum. I realise that's in many ways the point, but was just a bit too hyper for me
0 out of 1 members found this review helpful.
Accounting for Taste
- The Producers review by CH
Widely thought to have gone off with later work such as Spaceballs, Mel Brooks is often lauded for this, his first film. How much of it can one take? George Harrison often watched it but for some of us, a second viewing disappoints. No need to reiterate the plot here, and every reason to enjoy such moments as the Busby Berkeleyesque moment in which the camera pulls above the on-stage dancers to reveal them as a swirling swastika.
Nothing wrong with bad taste, and The Producers has plenty of it - from dolly birds to elderly dames and Zero Mostel's combover greased in place above those uniquely staring eyes. Trouble is that, short as the film is, there are many longeurs, such as the repetitive opening scenes.
It lacks the crass subtlety of Brooks's best, which is surely Young Frankenstein (and it is worth watching the under-rated parody of Hitchcock, High Anxiety). Also, Brooks himself appears in, but did not direct an effective re-make of To Be or Not To Be which again guys the Nazis from a show-business angle.
0 out of 0 members found this review helpful.