(Credits: Far Out / YouTube Still)
Wed 22 April 2026 22:30, UK
Mel Brooks is going to go down in history for quite a few reasons; most probably for perfectly lampooning the world of Star Wars thanks to 1987’s Spaceballs, definitely for a group of flatulent cowboys sitting eating baked beans in Blazing Saddles, but perhaps less so for coming up with one of the more memorable marketing lines in movie history.
But the soon-to-be centenarian was in fact involved in one of those taglines that have gone down in folklore, a fact that’s made all the more surprising given it was for a film in a genre that couldn’t be much further removed from Brooks’ world of puerile sight gags and giant Darth Vader helmets.
The movie in question was, in fact, David Cronenberg’s 1986 buzzy gorefest The Fly, featuring a young Jeff Goldblum, long before the days of his morphing into some kind of bizarre jazz-obsessed human cat.
The horror sci-fi tells the tale of an eccentric scientist who has rigged up a load of equipment at his house in order to try to teleport from one place to another (standard). Unfortunately, a fly nips into one of his pods before he closes the door, leading to his getting spliced with the irritating little picnic-botherer, and chaos ensues.
It was Goldblum’s real breakthrough role and a big hit at the box office, with fans going crazy for Cronenberg’s no-holds-barred approach to squelchy special effects, and in fact, the movie won the Oscar for ‘Best Make Up’ at the following year’s ceremony. But the film arguably wouldn’t have done quite as well, or be so well remembered, without that famous strapline that has passed into modern culture: ‘Be afraid. Be very afraid’.
And Brooks, whose company was producing the movie, leading to his spending some time on the set, is the man responsible for it. Cronenberg explained to Movie Crypt: “At one point, Mel was saying, about that particular moment, he said, ‘When he says, Don’t be afraid, the answer should be, Yes, be afraid, be very afraid.’ He wasn’t really giving me dialogue, he was just reacting. And I said, ‘Yeah, I’m going to put that in the script.’ So let’s say it was a collaboration. But yes, it was Mel who came up with that.”
It is Goldblum’s co-star Geena Davis who utters that immortal line in the movie, and it has gone on to be featured in several other TV shows and films over the years, including in 1993’s Addams Family Values and even an advert for the video game Metroid 2. But there is some debate as to whether or not Brooks was inspired by other places when he came up with it.
For instance, there was a little-watched spoof horror show on US TV in the 1980s called Beware of the Owners, which pre-dates The Fly and featured another eccentric scientist who had a neighbour who would often shout ‘Be afraid, be very afraid’. It was quickly cancelled, however, due to low ratings and terrible reviews.
Brooks, meanwhile, is going to be back on the big screen next year thanks to the release of the long-awaited sequel to his 1980s space classic, titled Spaceballs: The New One – reuniting many of the original cast, including Rick Moranis, who has barely been seen since stepping away from movie-making almost 30 years ago, it is scheduled to arrive in cinemas in almost exactly 12 months’ time.
