Blazing Saddles and Raceism
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Mel Brook's 1974 western spoof Blazing Saddles is as controversial today as it was when it was released. The film was tailored to make people laugh by offending them and testing what they thought about race relations and the way whites treat blacks. The racial moral of the movie is covered in a thick layer of slapstick comedy that can easily be misinterpreted as off-color humor, but Brooks has a definite stance on race relations that can be found if you look close enough.
The story of Blazing Saddles is a silly one. A railway company has plans to lay down a track that's path is being obstructed by the small western town of Rock Ridge which populated by citizens all bearing the same last name. In hopes to run the citizens of Rock Ridge out of town a gang of hired goons goes in and terrorizes the town. Instead of running the people there wire the governor and request a new sheriff. The railway company chairman talks the governor into electing a black man as the new sheriff of Rock Ridge. Upon arriving at Rock Ridge the sheriff is met with much racial hostility and swears that he will eventually win over the people of Rock Ridge. While in town he makes the town drunk, the former fastest gunman in the west (the Waco kid), his new deputy...