Who doesn’t know Mel Brooks? By this time in your life you should have seen any one of his movies; Robin Hood: Men in Tights, The Producers, Spaceballs, Blazing Saddles, etc. This past Friday the Tabler Arts Center screened Young Frankenstein starring Gene Wilder, Peter Boyle, Marty Feldman, Cloris Leachman, Terri Garr, Madeline Kahn, and Gene Hackman.

Mel Brooks loves spoofing classics but the idea of Young Frankenstein was conceived by Gene Wilder. Just as Blazing Saddles was getting its finishing touches Brooks was invited into the project, accepted, and helped Wilder with the script. The result was a film that sent Brooks to the top.

The young Frankenstein was a scientist in America teaching future doctors and trying to set himself apart from his family’s history, ‘an accidental relationship to a famous cuckoo.’ But once a will is introduced he travels to Transylvania and eventually accepts his legacy. Manipulated to finish and succeeding the experiment of reanimating dead tissue turns him into the babysitter or a groaning misunderstood tall ‘thing.’

After failed attempts to keep it controlled, Frankenstein decides to present it to the scientific community. The last resort is combining their brains so The Creature could express itself better. And throughout Igor and Inga prove their loyal friendship to Frankenstein, creating the strong bonds that keep him engrossed with his goals. The second level supporting characters or Frankenstein’s fianc’eacute; and Frau Blucher enhance the story in what are considered minor scenes.

In black and white fashion Young Frankenstein upholds the classic artistry of shadows and light but with its colorful cast has a modern attitude. After the camera slightly zooms into the silhouette of a dark and daunting hilltop castle it slowly pans its exterior walls into a room and then along a casket. This is usually used to create suspense and fear but here it causes laughter because it is just so long. And the evidence of this purposeful joke is what comes next; on the second try a man pries a box out of a skeleton’s cold dead fingers.

Peter Boyle as The Creature had to rely on his limited body movement and simple facial expressions. There were many moments when with humor he had to make a connection with the audience. The acts of turning his face toward the camera and slightly rolling his eyes required an understanding of the script and anticipating how the audience would react at specific times. Whether just screaming out in pain, signaling disappointment or sadness, pretending to catch butterflies, or trying to sing with a locked jaw was enough to change the dull to memorable scenes. At the end Boyle successfully humanized his character from The Creature to a deformed man.

Terri Garr as Inga and Marty Feldman as Igor knew their characters were one dimensional in personality and purpose but they put the best of themselves to give life. The extra characters were to remain in the background but Madeline Kahn and Cloris Leachman were too good to allow it. They brought the story full circle.

The love for physical comedy is what makes Young Frankenstein such an adored film. Everyone is so expressive that there never is a need to question their underlying intentions while presenting a realistic humor within its fiction. Brooks’ and Wilder’s films are always meant to entertain the audience first and then let them think about its theme afterwards.

The message in every adaptation and original Frankenstein is serious and an immortal truth. Humans have a universal need to manipulate the world but it s the direction and of how far they go that must be checked before they have created a monster.

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