ISLAMABAD             -          HBO Max have begun showing a warning before the classic Western spoof Blazing Saddles, alerting viewers to the 1974 film’s ‘racist language and attitudes’ throughout. 

The film began streaming on the platform on July 28. Ahead of the film, HBO airs an introduction by University of Chicago professor of cinema studies and TCM host Jacqueline Stewart - similar to the disclaimer introduced in June in front of Gone with the Wind. 

‘This movie is an overt and audacious spoof on classic Westerns,’ Stewart says in the newly added intro. 

‘It’s as provocative today as it was when it premiered back in 1974.’ The film tells the story of a railroad worker, Bart, played by Cleavon Little, who becomes the first black sheriff of Rock Ridge, a frontier town about to be destroyed in order to make way for a new railroad. 

Initially, the people of Rock Ridge harbor a racial bias toward their new sheriff, but then warm to him after realizing that Bart and his perpetually drunk gunfighter friend, Gene Wilder, are the only defense against a wave of thugs sent to rid the town of its population.