AIRPLANE! vs. BLAZING SADDLES - Which is the funnier movie?

[ITR_champion]

@pulykamell

I disagree. The vast majority of the humor is verbal and sight gags, with slapstick, absurdism and the such thrown in. I was born in the mid-70s, and I love the movie and think it’s funny as shit despite not recognizing any of the actors or celebs from anything else.

Seconded. I first watched Airplane! circa 1990, when I would have been about 9 years old, and I found it hilarious despite not recognizing any of the actors. (My Dad had to explain who Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is.) I’ve watched it many times since then and notice new funny things every time. There’s a whole lot that happens in the background that’s easy to miss. Also pretty audacious in its tasteless jokes about mental illness, suicide, wife-beating, heart surgery, Catholic nuns, Buddhist monks, etc… Nothing like that would get produced today.

Blazing Saddles has some hilarious scenes. It also has some scenes where the jokes fall flat. It’s a great comedy but not in the same class as Airplane!.

[Chronos]

For the record, farts are not inherently funny. They do, however, have great potential to be funny. Not all fart jokes meet that potential, but the scene in Blazing Saddles did.

[madmonk28]

@Loach

…I agree with that. I also think High Anxiety is criminally underrated. I think all of them are funnier than Airplane!. And I love Airplane!.

Cloris Leachman is insanely funny in that movie. I can watch it over and over.

[RioRico]

@JohnGalt

The thing that puts BS over the top for me is the last scene (not the second-to-last scene), with the two riding off on horses and leaving in a limo, while the very sincere theme song plays.

Trivia note: Frankie Laine didn’t know the film was a sarcastic comedy. He sang the theme most seriously.

[Dendarii_Dame]

Based on the number of times I laughed, Airplane! is funnier to me.

[BrotherCadfael]

@smithsb

I went with Young Doct…, wait, no, Blazing Sandals since YDF isn’t in the poll.

@smithsb

All the above and no one commented on me spelling “Saddles” as “Sandals” the first mention. I did that on purpose; nothing from the peanut gallery. Subtlety is dead.

Blazing Sandals would have been a brilliant sendup of Biblical epics! Way better than History of the World Part I.

[Akaj]

@Dendarii_Dame

Based on the number of times I laughed, Airplane! is funnier to me.

Roger.

[Kent_Clark]

@Acsenray

Many things in Blazing Saddles aren’t even jokes. Like the farting scene. It’s just a bunch of guys farting. He never bothered to write an actual joke for that scene.

Don’t forget there was a fart scene in Airplane! Combined with a drool scene and juxtaposed with a bouncing boobs scene.

There are reasons to prefer one movie over the other, but let’s face it, none of those reasons is the level of sophisticated humor in either one.

[Frodo]

@pulykamell

I disagree. The vast majority of the humor is verbal and sight gags, with slapstick, absurdism and the such thrown in. I was born in the mid-70s, and I love the movie and think it’s funny as shit despite not recognizing any of the actors or celebs from anything else. (Like, I don’t even know what juxtapositions you’re talking about. I did learn last week that Leslie Nielsen was more known as a dramatic actor before this, but my generation knows Leslie Nielsen from Zucker films, and not knowing his dramatic background does not seem to have impacted the enjoyment or humor people get from these style of movies.)

I didn’t even realize until now that that was actually the June Cleaver actress. The movie stays funny on its own merits without knowing any kind of celebrity backstories. Sure, there are some culturual things you have to be aware of, like hare krishnas in airports and … I dunno … that’s the only thing that comes to mind. Maybe the whole “air disaster” fad of movies that inspired this spoof (and, more directly, “Zero Hour”), but you don’t really need to know that to find it hilariously funny. Nobody I knew heard of “Zero Hour,” though I vaguely remember being aware of the airplane disaster genre.

When I first saw “Donde esta el Piloto?” in the original Spanish, I was:

A nine year old boy
From a different culture
Who didn’t even know who Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was (I was too nerd for sports)

I loved it, I laughed so much I couldn’t breathe.

I’ saw it in English a few years ago and is still extremely funny.
Blazing Saddles is probably a better movie, but Airplane is way way funnier.

[zimaane]

@madmonk28

I’m in the minority in that I don’t even think that Blazing Saddles is Mel Brooks’ funniest movie. I prefer Young Frankenstein, The Producers, and High Anxiety to Blazing Saddles.

Agree with you and would throw in “History of the World Part 1” as better than Blazing Saddles

[carnivorousplant]

@zimaane

Agree with you and would throw in “History of the World Part 1” as better than Blazing Saddles

“Jews in spa-a-a-ace!”

[TimfromNapa]

@Alpha_Twit

Sorry Mods - I needed a poll so I placed if here instead of CS.

Pretty much what the thread title asks. Between these two movies, and only these two, which is the funnier movie? Yes, I know,other funny movies exist. You might even say that one or more of them are funnier if you want to …be…wrong? Those other movies are completely outside the scope of this thread though.

Just my opinion, BLAZING SADDLES is the funnier movie because Madeline Kahn was three days dead and still funnier than Julie Hagerty was on her best day.

Poll coming

I couldn’t possibly choose one as funnier that the other. They are equally funny, but in different ways. This is like asking, “Who was lovelier, Barbara Eden or Elizabeth Montgomery?”

[JohnGalt]

@TimfromNapa

I couldn’t possibly choose one as funnier that the other. They are equally funny, but in different ways. This is like asking, “Who was lovelier, Barbara Eden or Elizabeth Montgomery?”

Ooh - ooh! I know! Elizabeth Montgomery of course!

[Kent_Clark]

@TimfromNapa

I couldn’t possibly choose one as funnier that the other. They are equally funny, but in different ways. This is like asking, “Who was lovelier, Barbara Eden or Elizabeth Montgomery?”

Bailey! No, Mary Ann!

What was the question again?

[Gatopescado]

@Shoeless

It’s a close call, but I gotta go with Blazing Saddles.

Hard choice for me as well. I went Saddles, BUT only un-edited. Start cutting it up, and it is ruined.

[El_Kabong]

I’ll agree that Blazing Saddles is the more ambitious film, and I love the way that Gene Wilder and Cleavon Little play off each other, but I have to give the nod to *Airplane as the funnier of the two. Even more so if one runs it back to back with Zero Hour, the stolid 1957 melodrama that it inspired it.

[Elendil_s_Heir]

Both are funny, but Airplane! is quite a bit funnier, I thought at the time and still think so now.

[cmkeller]

I’ve got to go with Airplane! It cracks me up far more than Blazing Saddles does, and the ending of Blazing Saddles really brings the movie down several notches for me.

But, RTFirefly:

They’re both two of the funniest movies ever, but Monty Python and the Holy Grail is THE funniest movie ever.

Gotta disagree. Much as love Holy Grail, it’s not even (IMHO, of course) the funniest Python movie - Life of Brian is better and funnier.

[Shodan]

Airplane is funnier than Blazing Saddles. (Young Frankenstein is funnier than both of them put together.)

Airplane just keeps hitting you with joke after joke. If one fails, wait ten seconds for the next one. In Blazing Saddles you have to sit thru the whole Mongo subplot, which doesn’t work very well, and the ending is just tacked on and is a let down after the brilliant opening and the shimmering incandescence of Madeline Kahn.

Regards,
Ethel Merman

[Shodan]

@cmkeller

Much as love Holy Grail, it’s not even (IMHO, of course) the funniest Python movie - Life of Brian is better and funnier.

IMO Life of Brian is better, but Holy Grail is funnier.

Although Holy Grail’s ending is also anti-climatic - it feels like they just ran out of money and/or ideas.

Regards,
Shodan