Men, you are about to embark on a great crusade to stamp out runaway decency in the West.
As sad as Gene Wilder's passing is and will continue to be for some time, watching Blazing Saddles in his memory is an incredibly cathartic experience. The second of his three collaborations with Mel Brooks, Saddles gave Wilder one of his most nuanced roles as Jim, the one-time Waco Kid and full-time alcoholic who is the first to side with Bart (Cleavon Little), the newly minted sheriff of Rock Ridge. A railroad worker saved from hanging for hitting his racist boss Taggart (Slim Pickens) in the head with a shovel, Bart has been set up to fail (and possibly get himself lynched) by devious attorney general Hedley Lamarr (Harvey Korman), who needs Rock Ridge's citizenry to clear out so the railroad can go through town and he can make a tidy profit. But what am I doing recounting the plot of Blazing Saddles when that's the least important thing about it?
Besides, Bart doesn't get made sheriff by nincompoop Governor Lepetomane (Brooks in one of his dual roles, the other being a Sioux Indian chief that speaks Yiddish) until nearly a third of the film's 93-minute running time has elapsed, and much of the rest of it is spent introducing those who will be instrumental in helping Bart foil Hedley's perfidious land grab. He starts with Jim, who only needs to sober up to be a useful member of society again, and continues with hulking brute Mongo (Alex Karras), who is only pawn in game of life, and singing seductress Lili Von Shtupp (Madeline Kahn, earning her second nomination for Best Supporting Actress in a row). What's significant about those two is they were sent to Rock Ridge to take Bart down (by Taggart and Hedley, respectively), but the congenial sheriff wins them over with his mental and physical prowess, much as he gains the trust and grudging respect of the townspeople.
Backed into a corner, Hedley puts out a call for all manner of miscreants, allowing Brooks to show an applicant pool that includes a bevy of outlaws, a few anachronistic bikers, some Mexican banditos (who don't need no stinking badges), and even a couple of robed Klansmen because hey, it's 1874 and what else have they got to do out West? Similarly backed into a narrative corner, Brooks and his four co-writers, whose ranks include Richard Pryor, commit the most audacious fourth-wall breakage in movie history, letting their climactic brawl spill over into a musical being filmed in an adjacent lot (under the direction of Dom DeLuise's effete Buddy Bizarre) and then the studio commissary to facilitate the requisite pie fight. It ends as it should, though, with Hedley defeated (after hailing a cab and telling the driver to "Drive me off this picture") and fast friends Bart and Jim riding off together into the sunset.