Blazing Saddles

It's strange what you can find lying around your house. I was told that it was an early spoof film recently and vowed to watch it, without realising that one of my brothers owned it.

I've watched this having already seen the Scary Movie films, the Naked Guns films, Family Guy, American Dad, etc. Shouldn't it seem very tame in comparison to those? I think it stands up well. Also it was interesting to see how laughing at small-minded racism has been around since 1974. The "meta humour" whereby the film jokes at itself and the actors break character must've been a first of its sort. There is a good Hitler joke towards the end.

The film is not as fast-paced as modern spoofs are, and I don't think is a bad thing. It has a chilled-out feel and you don't need to be paying attention to get every joke that's cracked as you do in some 30 Rock episodes. It references a few other films but not that many (IMDB shows that it has in turn been referenced a lot). Some spoof films jump around too much with the references so that you can't build up any sense of the characters. The Scary Movie films fall into the category in which the characters are just means of referencing other films; Blazing Saddles has memorable, funny characters in it.

I'll give this 8/10. It makes you laugh, which is mission accomplished. It broke new ground. It's still worth watching 36 years later.

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World

A few films have based on graphic novels lately. Whereas Kickass didn't feel cartoonish, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is cartoonish to the point of satire. It's funny seeing Scott's getting a Continue after he's died or seeing a POW sign appear when Kim the drummer pretends to shoot herself. I liked the references to the old video games of my misspend childhood: Mario, Sonic, Zelda, Final Fantasy, Street Fighter. The film cuts across scenes very quickly, but the plot is simple enough that you don't need to think quickly. The characters are all good: Scott is a geek, his sister is a lot cooler, Knives is a niave young girl, Ramona is fit and mysterious. One problem is that Scott's housemate seemed a bit of a twat and I don't know why Scott put up with him.

It's a fun film and I'm giving it 8/10. It's not going to win any awards since it doesn't deal with any weighty issues. The most sophisticated explanation you can give is that it's wish-fulfilment: Scott, an all-round geek, ends up with a very beautiful and interesting girl, and Knives (his ex) even lets him do this. It was a bit ridiculous that Knives allows Scott to run off with Ramona after all that, but you do get to see that Scott was sensitive enough by the end of it to realise that he was being a tad harsh on young Knives, so it feels as if everyone's happy by a fantasy miracle. I wish this sort of thing would happen to me.

Did anyone else notice that Alison Pill (playing Kim the drummer) looked a lot less attractive in this film than she does normally? Was this done because Kim is supposed to be not that fit in the comics?