Day 16 History of the World Part 1 (1981)

Comedy Tuesday

In the 70s and 80s, you just expected a Mel Brooks film every couple of years. They were even more reliable than James Bond in that era. Anyone who is a fan of Brooks knows that some of his films are hits and some are misses. Even the ones that may not be top drawer have things to recommend them. “History of the World Part 1” has several great moments but many more that are labored and feel a bit clunky.

A parody film will of course try it’s best to make fun of those things that we know well, but what if we don’t know them well or at all? The opening joke on 2001 is crude but it’s funny because of the knowledge we have of that opening and the use of the music. I think the Stone Age section is really an old fashioned sketch comedy routine, but it has the advantage of playing off of a bunch of Caveman movies, like “One Million Years B.C.” and “Caveman”. It is also relatively brief.

There is another sketch that plays with the “Ten Commandments” and it is basically a one joke premise that gets it’s laugh and then gets off the stage. The same cannot be said for the follow up segment on the Roman Empire. In spite of a few borsht belt jokes that work, and a couple of visual gags, this segment feels very long and not very involving. It plays like an SNL bit that goes ten minutes when it should have been two. Everybody puts their heart into it but it mostly lays an egg.

The French Revolution segment has many of the same problems, but it works better for a couple of reasons. Whenever Mel added Harvey Korman to the cast, the jokes work better. I have used Count De Monet as a punch line for forty years. My guess is there are people out there who use the line “It’s good to be King” and don’t even realize that this is where it came from. Brooks himself is the star of the two long segments and seems more comfortable as the King than he does as the Comic. Hard to believe but That’s my opinion.

The highlight of the film comes between those two segments. It is relatively brief, it sticks to it’s one note joke, but gets huge mileage out of it, this is the “Inquisition” number. Brooks as Torquemada, sings and dances through a number that Busby Berkeley could be proud of. The aquacade is a brilliant twist and the production design for the whole sequence is perfect, especially the slot machine. The song is like so many great songs from Brooks other movies, it is well thought out, it sticks to the conventions of the type of tune it is supposed to be, and it is as funny as all get out. This segment alone justifies the whole movie.

While it is completely unnecessary, I think I would give “History of the World Part 2” a chance, the trailers featuring Hitler on Ice and Jews in Space are short and to the point, helping this film get it’s legs back under it.

In 1981, I had a summer job, driving a truck and delivering photographic supplies to printing houses and design firms around Southern California. One of the places I delivered to, printed movie posters. I could not get my hands on the James Bond posters that they were producing, but someone had an extra of this films poster and I still have it in my collection.