Monkey business 1931 - Joyful comedy, plenty of fun

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IMDB rating: 7,6

Director: Norman Z. McLeod
Main Cast: Marx Brothers, Thelma Todd, Rockliffe Fellowes, Harry Woods

"Until Monkey Business was filmed in 1931, the fabulous Marx Brothers had made only films adapted from their stage comedies. Noted humorist S. J. Perelman was the leading force among the writers who concocted this zany tale about four stowaways on an ocean liner. The title is a perfect one for a Marx movie even if the film doesn't have anything to do with monkeys. When the brothers are practicing their hijinks aboard the ship, the sight gags, pratfalls and quips are virtually non-stop. After they each imitate the actor Maurice Chevalier while going through customs, however, the jokes dissipate, and the second half of the movie, which takes place in a New York mansion, is not nearly as frenetic. Some consider this the best Marx Brothers movie, but many viewers and critics prefer Duck Soup." - www.allmovie.com

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Animal crackers 1930 - One of the best Marx Brothers films

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IMDB rating: 7,7

Director: Victor Heerman
Main Cast: Marx Brotheers, Lillian Roth, Margaret Dumont

"Though many critics rank 1933's Duck Soup as the funniest Marx Brothers movie, others may prefer Animal Crackers, released in 1930. Based on the hit Broadway play by George S. Kaufman and Morris Ryskind, Animal Crackers features Groucho Marx as explorer Captain Spaulding, who is the guest of honor at a party hosted by wealthy matron Mrs. Rittenhouse (Groucho's favorite foil Margaret Dumont). The plot is a flimsy excuse for Groucho, Chico, and Harpo to run amok, with Zeppo playing his customary straight-man role. Director Victor Heerman is basically a bystander as the brothers take over, treating film as an extension of vaudeville. Animal Crackers was funnier and a bigger success than its predecessor, The Cocoanuts, and it marked the true beginning of the Marx Brothers' long and successful film careers, establishing their unique blend of physical and verbal mayhem." - www.allmovie.com

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A day at the races 1937 - The last of the great Marx Brothers classics

IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0028772/?ref_=nv_sr_1
IMDB rating: 7,7

Director: Sam Wood
Main Cast: The Marx Brothers, Allan Jones, Maureen O'Sullivan, Margaret Dumont

"The follow-up to A Night at the Opera (arguably the Marx Brothers's best film), A Day at the Races falls a little short of the mark in comparison with Opera, but is still lunatic fun of a high order. The boys are in fine form here, performing difficult routines with such skill that they come across as effortless (and are all the more enjoyable therefore). Several classic routines - including 'tutsi-fruitis', in which Chico keeps conning Groucho into buying racing tip books, a riotous medical exam, and a wallpapering sequence - make the film memorable, as does the extended race finale, which manages to be both terribly funny and moderately tense. Aside from the routines, the strength of the script lies in its cohesiveness and coherence, qualities often lacking in other Marx efforts. As indicated, the brothers are their usual hilarious selves. What's surprising is how animated Margaret Dumont gets to be in this film. Although the score's big ballad is no great shakes, its two production numbers - one of which features an outrageous art deco set incorporating lily pad tables and fountains and an impressive Vivian Fay dance routine - are memorable. The other is simpler, but packs an even greater wallop: Ivie Anderson and the Crinoline Choir performing 'All God's Children Got Rhythm', a number which occasionally veers close to racial insensitivity, but which is saved by Anderson's radiant vocalizing and the gospel wails of the choir, as well as some snappy jitterbugging. Races would be the last of the Marx Brothers' classic films; while follow-ups like Room Service have some wonderful moments, they lack the sparkle found in the boys' best work. - http://www.allmovie.com/movie/a-day-at-the-races-v12602

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A night at the opera 1935 - A smash-hit gigglefest

IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0026778/
IMDB rating: 8,1

Director: Sam Wood
Main Cast: The Marx Brothers, Kitty Carlisle, Allan Jones

"Although some purists hold out for Duck soup (1933), many Marx Brothers fans consider A night at the opera is the team's best film.
It was the first Marx Brothers movie without Zeppo Marx and also the first under the supervision of MGM's legendary producer Irving Thalberg. A relatively sane plot line and conventional romantic subplot place this film in the more conventional camp of Marx Brothers movies. Due to the critical and commercial failure of Duck soup (1933), the Brothers' previous movie, the studio decided to pre-test many of the skits on live audiences; while Duck soup's anarchic revelry left many in the audience less amused than baffled, A night at the opera's script by George S. Kaufman and Morris Ryskind and direction by Sam Wood were more controlled and focused than in previous Marx efforts. But as was often the case in their movies, the Brothers' comedy takes aim at the pompous and pious hypocrisy of the upper crust, and this movie features many of their most famous routines, including the stateroom scene, the contract scene, the bed-switching sequence, and the operatic finale. The film's openly subversive and derisive tone was a perfect match for a Depression-era crowd looking for some wealthy authority figures to laugh at." - http://www.allmovie.com/movie/a-night-at-the-opera-v35272

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Duck soup 1933 - The definitive Marx Brothers movie

IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0023969/
IMDB rating: 8,1

Director: Leo McCarey
Main Cast: Marx Brothers (Groucho, Harpo, Chico, Zeppo), Margaret Dumont, Raquel Torres

"Along with A Night at the Opera, Duck Soup is often regarded as the definitive Marx Brothers movie, the picture in which every shot, every line, and every gag worked. Modern audiences are often surprised to learn that it was a notorious flop that killed the Brothers' contract at Paramount Pictures in the mid-1930s. Audiences harried by the Great Depression seemed unable to connect with the Marx Brothers in their Paramount movies, at least not in the way that Broadway theatergoers and Paramount executives who'd seen them in The Cocoanuts or Animal Crackers did. Part of the problem may have been their piercing topicality and ethnic humor, whether Groucho's Jewish conniver or Chico's fake Italian. And no movie was more piercing in its topicality in 1933 than Duck Soup, a satire of nationalism, diplomacy, and international intrigue that seemed all too real as Hitler's rise to power in Germany dominated world news. When the Marxes then moved to MGM, the company's chief of production, Irving Thalberg, convinced them to tone down their image and give themselves sympathetic personae, and audiences then devoured their work. But Duck Soup, a failure in its time, remains the brothers' definitive film in their classic original style." - http://www.allmovie.com/movie/duck-soup-v14904

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Horse feathers 1932 - The maddest comedy on the screen!

IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0023027/
IMDB rating: 7,7

Director: Norman Z. McLeod
Main Cast: Marx Brothers (Groucho, Chico, Harpo, Zeppo), Thelma Todd

"If ever there was an archetypal Marx Brothers comedy, it was the team's 1932 offering Horse Feathers. The movie makes no more sense than most of the boys' films, and that's exactly the way it should be. Ostensibly a parody of the college films that had become popular at the time, Feathers is really an attack on everything conventional - including rational moviemaking. More technically polished than Cocoanuts and Animal Crackers, it still revels in anarchy and elevates the non-sequitur as close to an art form as it can get. The movie is filled with Groucho's special brand of humor ('Why don't you go home to your wife? I'll tell you what, I'll go home to your wife and, outside of the improvement, she'll never know the difference') and features one of his signature songs, 'I'm Against It', as well as the very popular 'Everyone Says I Love You'. Other highlights include the classic exchange involving the password 'swordfish', a delightfully silly classroom shoot-out and a deliciously zany football game send-up featuring the boys in a sanitation wagon disguised as a Roman chariot. Director Norman Z. McLeod keeps the camera trained on the boys and then gets out of the way, but he does manage some well staged moments in the finale. Most importantly, he keeps the pace from flagging, even during the Zeppo sequences, with the result that there's hardly a wasted moment in the film." - http://www.allmovie.com/movie/horse-feathers-v23170

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