A Night at the Opera (1935)

Director: Sam Wood

Cast: Groucho Marx, Chico Marx, Harpo Marx, Kitty Carlisle

Have I Seen it Before: For the kid who watched more Turner Classic Movies than MTV in the `90s, it would have been hard to miss.

Did I Like It: I’ve often mentioned that, while enjoyable, the larger majority of the Marx Brothers films fall into that trap that a lot of early sound films fell into, where they are so irretrievably locked into the massive new equipment needed to record the sound* that all they can really do is recorded stage performances. Their movies so often stop entirely for musical numbers that aren’t so much a part of the story trying to be woven, but more akin to a follies revue, which can drag down the proceedings at times**.

This limitations probably works in the Brothers’ favor. Chico and Groucho are simmering cauldrons of snappy dialogue, so much so that if you aren’t certain you are going to have a pretty good time by the first time Grouch says something, then you’re lying. Still, they never would have worked on film during the silent era.

Well, Harpo would. So much so that—as much as I would want to talk about the greatness of Groucho—I think this review should be a celebration of everything that is Harpo. How good is Harpo? Consider the scene in the film where he, Chico and Ricardo Baroni (Allan Jones, pulling Zeppo duties for the proceedings) are being served pasta while being stowaways on an ocean liner. Chico smirks through the event, like he does through pretty much every scene he ever committed to film. Baroni blandly stares his way through getting a plate, impatiently waiting for the next opportunity to croon. In the high peak of the Depression, Harpo looks at that plate of spaghetti with such a longing that the noodles are liable to solve every problem he ever had. Even Chaplin couldn’t sell that level of hunger in The Gold Rush (1925). If you beat Chaplin at the Tramp game, you’re the greatest of all time. I bow before you, Harpo, and so does Charlie.

*More recently, some scenes shot in IMAX had something of the same problem. Maniacally motion-driven films suddenly got locked down to a static shot when “something big”(tm) had to happen.

**I can’t be the only one who fast forwards through 95% of the music guests on Saturday Night Live, right?

Animal Crackers (1930)

Director: Victor Heerman

Cast: Groucho Marx, Harpo Marx, Chico Marx, Zeppo Marx

Have I Seen it Before: Absolutely.

Did I Like It: In my review for Duck Soup (1933) I declared that there is not a moment spent with the Marx Brothers that is misspent. I stand by this sentiment, and while I think that film is the peak of their skills, and the perfect gateway into the finest corners of film comedy, this film may be a bit harder to get into for the uninitiated. Many people would blanche at the notion of any film in black and white, but I can’t imagine I will ever learn to understand those people.

That isn’t to say there is less to enjoy here. “Hooray for Captain Spaulding” is perhaps the greatest song with Groucho at the lead. There isn’t a moment that is less than pleasurable. The whole entity of the film is not as satisfying as Duck Soup or some of their other movies. This was directly adapted from a Broadway play starring the brothers, and it shows. It comes from that period in films shortly after the advent of synchronized sound where almost every film produced was a recording of a stage production, nothing more. Dracula (1931) was very much the same way, if in a different genre. Animal Crackers is more a revue than a narrative film, with bits arranged in loose order. There’s not much of a story here, but if all you need from your early comedy films is a strict sense of story, there is more than enough Chaplin films that might pique your interest.

But I’d still rather watch this than the vast majority of other films in existence. Anything Harpo does or any noise he makes is an unremitting delight, and each and every Groucho bon mot is a pristine display of great artist working in the medium for which they were born.

Duck Soup (1933)

Director: Leo McCarey

Cast: Groucho Marx, Harpo Marx, Chico Marx, Zeppo Marx

Have I Seen it Before: Oh, certainly.

Did I Like It: The easy thing to say as I type this review in the fall of the year 2020 is that the wild, unpredictable story of a failing free-ish sort of country who installs a charlatan of a leader who—with the help of cronies somehow more depraved than him—promptly ruins everything in sight now seems less like the absurdist comedy which the Marx Brothers intended, and more like a documentary now.

That’s not only a cheap thought, but also a huge disservice to Rufus T. Firefly (Groucho). Even his administration of Freedonia would be better capable of meeting the challenge of this year than certain other parties who probably should go unnamed, lest they, through some strange Mandela effect, suddenly make a cameo appearance in an otherwise lovely film.

But bringing anything that the Marx Brothers have done down to our current level feels like ruining one of the purer, joy-filled things in the human experience. I can’t imagine a person would play any Marx Brothers movie (and I’ll admit they can vary in levels of satisfaction, if not quality) and not have a good time. I certainly don’t want to meet such a person.

But that only speaks to the collected works of the brothers as monolith, what about this film? For my money, I think it’s their finest attempt. They’re first few films were produced in those early days of the talky where the film industry still didn’t quite know what to do (or what they could do) with their new technology, and films largely had a quality not unlike a recorded stage production. Some of that same “large-scale performances, with small-scale camera movements” energy is on display here, but they are truly making movies here. The story is as coherent as a Marx Brothers movie ever should be (that is to say, not exceptionally ground in reality) and the bits and numbers that don’t involve either Groucho, Chico, or Harpo are kept to a minimum. Sorry, Zeppo. If you are looking for your gateway into the addicting comfort food of these, the funniest men who ever worked in the movies, look no further.