comedies – Halloween Horror Haiku

Title: Young Frankenstein
Director: Mel Brooks
Screenwriter(s): Gene Wilder, Mel Brooks
Starring: Gene Wilder, Teri Garr, Peter Boyle, Marty Feldman, Madeline Kahn, Cloris Leachman
Distributed by: 20th Century Fox
Year: 1974 Run Time: 1 hr 47 minutes

Tomorrow is Frankenstein Friday. Last Friday before Halloween in October is always dedicated to Mary Shelley’s novel about a mad scientist and his undead monsterous creation. So, in tribute and in keeping with our theme of Halloween Classic, today’s Thursday Time Travel is Mel Brook’s Young Frankenstein.

Newly engaged Dr. Frederick Frankenstein, grandson of the mad scientist Dr. Victor Frankensten, learns he’s inherited his family’s estate in Transylvania. Embarrassed by his family’s legacy, Dr. “Fronkenstein” travels to Europe, where he meets his late grandfather’s staff, hunchbaked assistant named “eye-gore”, the lovely Inga, and scary housekeeper Frau Blucher.

When Frederick finds Victor’s secret laboratory and private journals, the doctor attempts to perform his own experiments on a reanimated dead corpse.

Mel Brook’s hilarious parody of the old Universal monster films of the 30s and 40s was shot in black and white and consistently shows up on all the top comedy lists of all-time. In 2003, it was deemed culturally, historically, and aestethically significant by the United States National Preservation Board and selected for preservation in the Library of Congress National Film Registry.

You can find Young Frankenstein on Amazon Prime this October.

Title: I Married a Witch
Director: René Clair
Screenwriter(s): Robert Pirosh, Marc Connelly
Starring: Veronica Lake, Fredric March
Distributed by: Paramount Pictures
Year: 1942 Run Time: 77 minutes

It’s an election year… remember to go vote and check out one of my favorite fantasy comedies this month, I Married a Witch starring Veronica Lake and Fredric March.

Just before being burned at the stake, 17th century witch Jennifer casts a curse on the family of her accuser, Jonathan Wooley, dooming all the men in the lineage to be unlucky in love and marry the wrong woman.

250 years later, Jennifer and her warlock father Daniel are accidentally freed from their eternal prison, but in incorporeal form. When Daniel starts a fire in order to casts a spell to give Jennifer a human body, they come upon the latest Wooley descendant, Wallace Wooley, who just so happens to be running for governor and engaged to the spoiled daughter of his biggest campaign supporter and financier, J.B. Masterson.

Hijinks ensue after Jennifer accidentally drinks a love potion she intended for Wallace. Jennifer and Daniel, now also in human form, crash the wedding. Estelle to call the whole thing off when she catches her groom to be in an embrace, leading JB to denounce Wooley to the papers. After eloping, Jennifer casts a spell rigging the election, so the while city votes for Wallace, including his opponent! This finally convinces Wolley that he’s indeed married to a witch.

Veronica Lake and Fredric March have great chemistry here and the entire cast is perfect. This movie is a lot of fun and great for Halloween viewing.

Veronica Lake was somewhat of a troubled star. She was a heavy drinker and had a bad reputation for being difficult on set. Many of her directors and co-stars didn’t like her, including March, who said some pretty nasty things about her. Her career supposedly stalled out in late forties. Many critics and fans have since then revisited her life’s story and realized her alcoholism was result of untreated schizophrenia and some horrible tragedies that befell upon her. We may never know how much Hollywood directly contributed to her downfall.