THE TWELVE CHAIRS

USA | 1970 | DCP | 94 min.
Director: Mel Brooks
Cast: Ron Moody, Frank Langella, Dom DeLuise
Brooks’s second feature is set in Russia shortly after the Bolshevik uprising, where a former aristocrat turned hapless clerk (Moody) and a slick con man (Langella) search the country for a set of 12 heirloom chairs, one of which contains a fortune in hidden jewels. As in The Producers, the protagonists, along with their chief rival (DeLuise), are greedy treasure hunters, forever outwitted by their own inept plans. “The Twelve Chairs is more than merely funny. It brings to a full flowering the Brooks attitude” (Roger Ebert).