Not exactly, mixtures of comedy and drama do work, even several SWs show these.
1st rule:
If there is comedy, it must be funny!
But even then in a mix, the mix must work, or like you say must be balanced, which still is a tricky thing.
Train for Durango is a good example, My Name Is Nobody is a very good one (even if some of the pure comedy scenes should- and could be also cut out, cause they damage the balance in parts).
In Camposanto and Spirito Santo the balance isn’t working for me (in My Name Is Halleluja it does), mainly because the comedy moments are rather flat.
That’s also the reason why I don’t like The Searchers that much, cause Ford’s special liking for scenes with absolutely primitive humour is here more out of place than in the rest of his output.
Ha ha, I won’t name examples for dull/unfunny full blown SW comedies, everybody knows a lot of them.
I thought this film was OK. It does have some noce touches. I like how Carnimeo sometimes show shootings from a 1st personview from the shooter. Not enough Garko or Berger. Too much of those tow brothers. I like the two idiot mexican workers though. They were pretty funny. 3/5
I agree. I thought this film got that balance pretty well right.
Well, as usual, we all have our own slant on these things. I agree with your point totally but the two examples you give are both ones which I think work well!
I don’t think the shooting granny in Cemetary is funny, nor are most other jokes in that movie.
I have seen the first Halelujah once, but don’t remember it very well
I also dislike John Ford’s silly sense of humour, and yes it hurts his best films most, like The Searchers, Liberty Valence and Fort Apache. But they remain his best films. Those childish jokes are just a thing you have to live with. Maybe it was a sign of the times, some of Hitchcock’s better movies are marred by those silly jokes too.
I think the Trinity movies are good fun, and as for a mix of comedy and violence, Carnimeo’s Sartana movies work quite well
Marchent’s And Santana killed them all and Parolini’s Sabata are good examples too.
The Coen Brothers have also given us some fine examples of such a mix (my favourite Fargo is dead serious, graphically violent and very funny).
The joke with the shooting nanny works (or at least may work) in a Naked Gun type of movie, since all elements in those films are silly, over the top etc. But you can’t throw one or two of those silly jokes in an otherwise serious movie. It’s like inserting a pornographic scene in a film like, for instance, Out of Africa or Sense and Sensibility.
What about the banana peel scene in Companeros? I couldn’t really laugh about that stupid old joke. Also in companeros there are serious scenes about the revolution and then extremly funny and comedy scenes or bloody shoot outs. In a way Camposanto has the same humour as it is seen in Companeros.
I wished Monty Phyton would have done a Spaghetti-Western.
Personally I like The Naked Gun, it’s the only film of the infamous ZAZ (I don’t know if they were all three involved, but you know what type of movies I mean) that really worked for me, along with Airplane (Flying High). It went soon downhill with them (and their actors, especially Leslie Nielsen) but those two movies made me laugh. Okay, not all jokes work, but if you fire hunderd and only 10 work, that’s not a problem.
Not laugh out loud funny, no. What I meant was I think both those films managed to balance the action with the lighter tone stuff. Some of the ‘comedies’ are just so full on they are irredeemable.
[quote=“scherpschutter, post:25, topic:1348”]I don’t think the shooting granny in Cemetary is funny, nor are most other jokes in that movie.
I have seen the first Halelujah once, but don’t remember it very well
I also dislike John Ford’s silly sense of humour, and yes it hurts his best films most, like The Searchers, Liberty Valence and Fort Apache. But they remain his best films. Those childish jokes are just a thing you have to live with. Maybe it was a sign of the times, some of Hitchcock’s better movies are marred by those silly jokes too.[/quote]
The 1st Halleluja has also it’s dose of shitty jokes, it would also be better without the weak humour, but it’s also as a whole more over the top so that this flaws are less damaging.
Silly jokes and superfluous sidekicks were obviously a constituent part of the old Hollywood films.
But Ford’s humour was generally more flat, more silly, and more old fashioned than in other movies of his time.
Scherp, what about My Darling Clementine and Wagonmaster? You think they are not as good as the 3 mentioned by you?
Without the jokes, without the (un)funny sidekicks, without the slapstick like barroom brawl, it would still be a more lightweight western, but now the balance would work (for me).
In Spirito Santo Carnimeo even replaces greater parts of the final shoot-out with Trinity like brawls, sorry, but that hurts.
