Did he just stop caring or get burnt out like John Carpenter?
shareI think it was a sign of the times. His Gialli and horror films are amazing but when those genres started to wane his caliber of films dropped off too.
shareThat is too bad, because Suspiria and Deep Red are visually appealing films and pretty entertaining despite a great deal of gore that some may consider exploitative.
shareI do wonder if part of the reason is he hasn't branched out.
If you look at someone like David Cronenberg, his early films where body horrors but his later films while sharing some elements, where more crime and thriller movies. Rather than doing the same thing he branched out
I think the same happened to Mel Brooks, he also never branched out.
Or more specifically, he never really got out of the mindset of the 70s, and the type of humour that went back then.
A good example is Robin Hood Men In Tights. He uses the same tired old sexual innuendo, gay jokes and racist comments like it was still 1974.
But that sort of humour had died out by the 90s. Hence his directing career came to an abrupt end...his last move Life Stinks was woeful.
Interesting. Not seen a lot of Mel Brooks films but it's true that as times change, comedy does.
Sometimes this can be needed but I also think a lot of good comedies wouldn't be made now.
Life Stinks was actually made before Robin Hood: Men in Tights. His last film was actually Dracula: Dead and Loving It, and I have to say, I kind of enjoyed that one.
In regard to Robin Hood, it was a hit. I remember when it first came out a lot of people were talking about it, and according to Wiki it made $72 million on a $20 million budget. It also has an 81% audience score on RT, so it clearly has a fanbase.
All that said, I do agree that Brooks's humor and style never changed, for better or worse.
I agree to a degree. He mostly did only Gialli films, but he did have a hand in writing the great western Once Upon a Time in the West and Dawn of the Dead(a horror film along with a satirical approach), so he can adapt to other genres seamlessly.
shareYeah. Probably just feels more comfortable in what he does
share