Change Your Image
dave-f
Reviews
The Producers (2005)
Slow start but worth the wait
(THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS) The first time I watched this I found the hysterical rantings of Broderick & Lane a bit tedious. The pair of them, acting like they had both just escaped from a nut house, were just not funny, and Mostel and Wilder did a much better job in the 1968 film. After half an hour of this I was just about ready to bail out, but I decided to wait a bit longer, and then after another 10 minutes Will Ferrell came on wearing lederhosen, singing Der Guten Tag Hop-Clop song and I found myself laughing out loud. I don't know what it is but there's something priceless about Ferrell as an ex Nazi in lederhosen, up on a rooftop singing and dancing to this ridiculous song. After this comes a spectacular song and dance scene from Uma Thurman, a very funny gay song and dance scene with Beach and Bart and, maybe the funniest scene of the whole movie, the Hitler auditions, ending with Ferrell singing the Deutsche Band song. The climax of the film is the 'play within the play', Springtime for Hitler. Franz Liebkind (Ferrell), was going to play the part of Hitler but breaks his leg on the opening night so Beach is called in at the last minute to replace him. Whilst Franz Liebkind's Hitler would have guaranteed the whole audience walking out and the show's demise by page four of the script (as the producers had planned), Beach's gay Hitler is a surprise hit with the audience and they return to their seats laughing. Beach effectively ruins Broderick & Lane's carefully planned attempt to create the ultimate Broadway flop so that, instead of running off with the money Lane has conned from his little old lady admirers, he ends up in jail with Broderick. The original film included a very funny scene with Ferrell's counterpart, Kenneth Mars screaming orders at the audience to stop laughing at Hitler, which made them laugh even more. Another lost scene was Mostel and Wilder trying to blow up the theatre, when all else had failed. The whole play / film was designed by Brooks to be on the outer fringes of bad taste. Conning little old ladies to back the play by having sex with them, multi-million dollar business fraud, perverting an innocent accountant, gay clichés, Nazi stormtroopers, the 'Springtime for Hitler' song, and finally Adolph Hitler (just in case nothing else had worked up to that point). 'Springtime for Hitler' was much more shocking in the first film, complete with swastika flags and a large mug shot of Hitler. Apparently a women got into a lift with Mel Brooks and his wife Anne Bancroft, sometime after the first film was released, and told him that she thought the film was vulgar. Brooks smiled and said 'Lady, it rose below vulgarity'.
Bring It On: Again (2004)
This is one of my favourites
The screenplay is brilliantly written and the film has a strong cast. Bree Turner makes up in looks for what she lacks in acting experience. The whole thing holds together well with lots of subtle humour and touches of satire here and there. The writing is warm and light hearted and, whilst centred on the intense rivalry between the existing school team and a new school team of misfits, it manages to poke fun at the world of cheer leading the same time as it's glorifying it. The film has one problem however - it's title. Most reviews compare this to the original and would like a continuation with the original cast. This film bears no relation to the original other than being about cheer leading. In its own right this has a lot going for it and I have given it 10/10 as I think that it has been very much underrated.