Gene Wilder takes his most unusual role, a naive 19th-century rabbi sent from his native Poland to the fledgling Jewish community in San Francisco, in this warm-hearted comic adventure. The trusting soul is easy prey for the con men and criminals who prey on the immigrants arriving in the Philadelphia port and the rabbi, beaten but unbowed, continues his trek West solo: broke, underequipped, and hopelessly lost.
Despite the presence of hack director Arthur Hiller, this hybrid comedy-thriller works most of the time as pleasant faux Hitchcock. Gene Wilder is a book editor who is relaxing by taking a cross-country train ride. Then he gets caught up in a murder--and becomes a suspect. It's up to him to prove his own innocence. As noted, the script, by Colin Higgins, owes a big debt to Alfred Hitchcock; but the mystery isn't all that mysterious and the comedy isn't all that hilarious--at least not until Richard Pryor shows up, which is at least halfway through the film.
Mel Brooks' monstrously crazy tribute to Mary Shelley's classic pokes hilarious fun at just about every Frankenstein movie ever made. Summoned by a will to his late grandfather's castle in Transylvania, young Dr. Frankenstein (Wilder) soon discovers the scientist's step-by-step manual explaining how to bring a corpse to life. Assisted by the hunchback Igor (Feldman), he creates a monster (Boyle) who only wants to be loved.
Seduction is a powerful force, and in the form of The Woman In Red, it's certain to lead to unbridled passion and unlimited laughs! Featuring a first-rate cast that includes Gene Wilder, Charles Grodin, Joseph Bologna, Judith Ivey, Kelly Le Brock and Emmy winner Gilda Radner, this comedy bombshell scores a perfect 10! Businessman Teddy Pierce (Wilder) has always played by the rules, until he meets the woman in red. With killer legs and a knockout style, sexy Charlotte (Le Brock) is the ultimate fantasy woman. Now Teddy's headed straight for trouble.
The story of Charlie Bucket, a little boy with no money and a good heart, who dreams wistfully of being able to buy the candy that other children enjoy. Charlie enters into a magical world when he wins one of five "Golden Tickets" to visit the mysterious chocolate factory owned by the eccentric Willy Wonka and run by his capable crew of Oompa-Loompas. Once behind the gates, a cast of characters join Charlie and Grandpa Joe on a journey to discover that a kind heart is a finer possession than a sweet tooth.
One of the looniest pictures to come along in some time! Stir Crazy teams two of the most brilliant and zany comic performers today: Richard Pryor and Gene Wilder. Skip (Wilder) and Harry (Pryor) have both just been fired from their jobs, so they take off in their van for California to seek fame and fortune. But somewhere along the way the van konks out, and they're broke and... well, they have to eat, right? So they land a gig as singing and dancing woodpeckers to promote a bank opening. When two bank robbers steal their costumes and stick up the bank, guess who gets the blame?
Gene Wilder and Donald Sutherland play two sets of identical twins who are mismatched at birth shortly before the French Revolution. One pair is reared as royalty; the other is raised as the children of peasants. The plot in this film by Bud Yorkin is a wonderful mishmash of Dumas, Victor Hugo, and Moli?re, with the peasant brothers joining the revolutionaries while their bizarrely foppish siblings eat cake and ignore the events around them.
Mel Brooks's directorial debut remains both a career high point and a classic show business farce. Hinging on a crafty plot premise, which in turn unleashes a joyously insane onstage spoof, The Producers is powered by a clutch of over-the-top performances, capped by the odd couple pairing of the late Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder, making his screen debut. Mostel is Max Bialystock, a gone-to-seed Broadway producer who spends his days wheedling checks from his "investors," elderly women for whom Bialystock is only too willing to provide company.
Woody Allen pushes the frontier of comedy by consolidating his madcap sensibility and wickedly funny irreverence with his developing penchant for visually arresting humor. Giving complete indulgence to the zany eccentricity of his medium, Allen reveals himself as a filmmaker of "wit, sophistication, and comic insight." - Cue. Allen rises to the occasion with several hysterical vignettes that probe sexuality's stickiest issues!
Mel Brooks scored his first commercial hit with this raucous Western spoof starring the late Cleavon Little as the newly hired (and conspicuously black) sheriff of Rock Ridge. Sheriff Bart teams up with deputy Jim (Gene Wilder) to foil the railroad-building scheme of the nefarious Hedley Lamarr (Harvey Korman). The simple plot is just an excuse for a steady stream of gags, many of them unabashedly tasteless, that Brooks and his wacky cast pull off with side-splitting success.
