Kelsey’s Flick Pick: ‘Blazing Saddles’

Blazing Saddles

‘Blazing Saddles’

Kelsey Husnick

Arguably Mel Brooks’ greatest film, “Blazing Saddles” is a musical Western skit filled with memorable characters. Cleavon Little plays Bart, the first black sheriff in a rural town set in the mid 1800s, still trying to wrap its head around the concept of freed slaves. Bart befriends Jim — a whiskey-loving jailbird with the fastest hands in the West — played by Gene Wilder.

The pair has to protect the town of Rock Ridge — in which all of the inhabitants seem to have the same last name — from Hedley Lemar, a rich man with stakes in the railroad who’s trying to drive the townsfolk out so the rail construction can move in. 

After an especially unwelcoming reception of its new sheriff, the town starts to warm up to Bart and they band together to stop Hadley — or Headley, or Heedley or however you pronounce his name. 

As in all Brooks movies, you can expect satirical and quick-witted humor. As Bart said, the goal is “to keep my audiences riveted.”