10 Directors Who Tried To Be Alfred Hitchcock (And Failed Miserably)

4. Mel Brooks - High Anxiety

Mel Brooks' High Anxiety includes every classic element or plot device of a Hitchcock film: the wrong man, a shower scene and a crippling case of vertigo among others. In usual Brooks form it's a clear parody of all things Hitchcock. The only problem is it's not that good. It's almost as if Brooks got lazy with this one, like he expected the Hitchcockian nature of it to do all the work. With his other films, Blazing Saddles and Young Frankenstein particularly, Brooks was very careful in crafting his jokes; there was substance to each and every one. In High Anxiety he just lets what Hitchcock has already done occur and then try to convince us it's funny. Brooks also seems to have forgotten that even in parody certain rules still apply. Even when he let comedy take the forefront Hitchcock never got loose with his filmmaking; it was always taut and provocative. Brooks was never consistent from film to film, but this was a strangely poor outing from the legendary funny man.