'Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man!' HBO Share on Facebook Share on X Google Preferred Share to Flipboard Show additional share options Share on LinkedIn Share on Pinterest Share on Reddit Share on Tumblr Share on Whats App Send an Email Print the Article Post a Comment Logo text Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man! is the third and, thus far, best of Judd Apatow and Mike Bonfiglio's multi-part HBO documentaries about legendary comics. As excellent and insightful as The Zen Diaries of Garry Shandling and George Carlin's American Dream were, the filmmakers began chronicling their subjects posthumously, requiring extra effort to bring Shandling and Carlin's respective voices to the screen in addition to their ample professional outputs. Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man! The Bottom Line As funny as you're expecting, but wildly emotional, too. Airdate: 8 p.m. Thursday, January 22, and Friday, January 23 (HBO)Directors: Judd Apatow and Mike Bonfiglio With The 99 Year Old Man!, Apatow and Bonfiglio - though only Apatow appears on-camera himself - are able to sit down with Mel Brooks, putting one of the best storytellers of his or any era in the spotlight, not for the first time and hopefully not for the last. Related Stories TV HBO Max Teases 'Lanterns,' New Seasons of 'The Pitt' and 'Industry' in 2026 Preview Hollywood Lampoon Why Spoof Movies Are Getting the Last Laugh Brooks, still reflective and funny at 99, is a powerful presence, but the documentary's gut punch comes as much from the people who have been so integral to his life who are no longer with us - from figures like Carl and Rob Reiner, who both sat for interviews, to indispensable loved ones including Norman Lear and the essential Anne Bancroft, whose absence is felt even if they're present in ample archival footage. That Mel Brooks: The 99 Year Old Man! is funny and well-sourced and thoughtfully composed isn't surprising, but the emotional potency perhaps is. You'll laugh at this two-part, nearly four-hour film; it's also hard to avoid tears at multiple points, especially in the second part. And why would you want to avoid? How many of us have laughed until we cried at Blazing Saddles or Young Frankenstein or even Spaceballs? This feels like an extension of that mirth, a summation of a life of tremendous achievement in which friendships and a 40-plus-year marriage might be more significant than all the Oscars, Emmys, Grammys and Tonys. Allowing Brooks to steer the documentary, Apatow and Bonfiglio are able to stick to a fairly strict chronology. The first part goes from Brooks' birth in Brooklyn in 1926 - the documentary's title will, knock on wood, become outdated on June 28 - to his service in World War II, his Borscht Belt roots and his early collaborations with Sid Caesar. It covers that indelible early partnership with Carl Reiner and his push into filmmaking with The Producers up to Blazing Saddles. This chapter includes his first marriage and then the early days of his relationship with Bancroft. The second part traces Brooks' career from Young Frankenstein - yes, Brooks' unparalleled 1974 is split in two - to the present day, when he's going through what son Max describes as the fourth or fifth waves of his fame, with the return of Spaceballs, The History of the World and possibly, if the FX series moves forward, Young Frankenstein. Although The Producers, Blazing Saddles and Young Frankenstein probably get the most time and depth, the filmmakers make sure to touch, at least briefly, on most of Brooks' credits, including films that were considered disappointments at the time and perhaps still are. That means that The Twelve Chairs, Silent Movie, Life Stinks and Robin Hood: Men in Tights get proper discussion. Only fans of Dracula: Dead and Loving It - I'm sure they exist somewhere - are likely to be disappointed. Ample, or at least near-ample, time is given to Brooksfilms, the production company that brought The Elephant Man, Frances, My Favorite Year and The Fly to the screen; ditto the decorated Broadway musical adaptation of The Producers. Only fans of the musical stage version of Young Frankenstein - I'm less convinced they exist - are likely to be disappointed. There is some dryness to the first hour of the documentary, which is mostly biographical background, delivered by Brooks, who traces the origins of his sense of humor, as well as the early adversity he faced as a low-paid writer on Caesar's Your Show of Shows. Brooks and his three children with Florence Baum, two appearing on-camera and one via audio, aren't hesitant to discuss his bouts with depression and the reasons that first marriage failed. The documentary hits a high gear when Brooks connects first with Carl Reiner and then, nearly a decade later, with Bancroft. The tracing of those two key relationships provides the heart of the documentary - especially the apparently countless appearances, both talk shows and filmed public events, at which Brooks either discussed those relatio