A wild parody of old Frankenstein pictures based on Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley's novel, Mel Brooks' Young Frankenstein stars the comedic talents of Gene Wilder as the mad doctor, Peter Boyle as the monster, Marty Feldman as the hunchback assistant, and Cloris Leachman as the mad housekeeper. A classic story with a hilarious twist, Gene Wilder and Mel Brooks' screenplay received an Oscar® nomination. A must-have for Mel Brooks fans. (Gary Reber)
Special features include commentary by Mel Brooks; BonusView Inside The Lab: Secret Formulas (HD 31:50); seven deleted scenes (SD 16:27); the featurettes It's Alive! Creating A Monster Classic (HD 31:16), Making FrankenSense (HD 41:52), and Transylvanian Lullaby: The Music Of John Morris (HD 10:29); and The Franken-Track: A Monstrous Conglomeration Of Trivia.
This Mel Brooks classic was filmed in black-and-white Panavision® Academy Standard Flat. The 1.86:1 1080p AVC picture has been remastered and exhibits a generally clean image with subtle grain and noise artifacts. The gray scale is excellent, with deep blacks and excellent shadow delineation. Some scenes provide excellent contrast due to good lighting techniques, but overall resolution is soft. The intention was to create imagery that reflects the original Frankenstein black-and-white classics. As such, the picture succeeds, even with film grain evident throughout.
The original theatrical soundtrack was monaural, and that track is available on the disc. As a monaural soundtrack, it is undistinguished with fidelity that is mediocre and dynamics that are compressed. The repurposed 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio™ soundtrack simply spreads the monaural information to the left and right front channels and monaural effects and music to the surround channels. This provides a greater sense of sonic space, while maintaining the original monaural character. Dialogue sounds intelligible throughout. Fidelity is dated, and dynamics are compressed. Still, the soundtrack is a fun and engaging experience.G