Thursday, September 29, 2005
Movie: It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World
In 1962, movie director Stanley Kramer was known as "The Man With The Message." He had just finished Judgment at Nuremburg, and was also known for such heavy, message-laden dramas as Inherit the Wind and The Defiant Ones. His dramas were so serious, in fact, that people started saying that he couldn't make a comedy.
And so the gauntlet was thrown down. Kramer set out to make not just a comedy, but "the comedy to end all comedies." The result was a maniacal three-hour journey through southern California featuring nearly all of Hollywood's great comedic talent.
It's not for nothing that It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World is recognized as one of the great classics of comedy. With such comic luminaries as Buddy Hackett, Sid Cesar, Milton Berle, Jonathan Winters, and Terry-Thomas leading the cast -- to say nothing of liberally-sprinkled cameos from such folks as Buster Keaton, Jack Benny, Jerry Lewis, and the Three Stooges -- slapstick and chaos are the name of the game.
The cast also features a few people not specializing in comedy, such as Spencer Tracy and Ethel Merman -- but their efforts are no less stellar.
Not a single performer in the entire film did a bad job. Everyone, even the knockoff cameos had their own moment to shine -- the Three Stooges didn't even have any dialogue or business, but they get enough of a laugh by just standing around in a sight gag that has to be seen in context to be understood. Even some of the minor players -- among them William Demarest, Dick Shawn, Peter Falk, and Jim Backus -- make plenty of hay with their parts.
The setup is simple. Eight people in four cars are passed by a desperate motorist on a winding mountain road in southern California. When the desperate motorist (played by Jimmy Durante) goes off the road and into a ravine, the drivers go to check on him. Realizing that he's dying, he tells the motorists about $350,000 he's buried in a Santa Rosita park under "the Big W." (To put that amount in perspective for today's money, just add another zero.) Then he kicks the bucket, and the fact that there just happens to be a bucket next to his foot for him to kick is like a starter's pistol for a wild chase for the money.
From Jonathan Winters trashing a brand-new gas station (the third-funniest fight scene I've ever seen in a movie, and the funniest without swords), to Sid Cesar and Edie Adams trying desperately to escape the steel-reinforced basement of a hardware store, to Phil Silvers fast-talking his way into and out of calamity, to Jim Backus as a drunken millionaire pilot with Mickey Rooney and Buddy Hackett on board, the race for Santa Rosita never lets up.
And what I mention here barely scratches the surface.
And then... well, one of the rules of farce in motion pictures is that you always reach the climax with a chase. So what do you do when the picture is a chase? The answer is simple -- end it with an even wilder chase! When the money is finally discovered but ends up in the hands of only one of the fourteen people at the dig site, the pursuit -- and its end -- are simply spectacular.
Of course, I did find it interesting that this movie set in southern California had so many people in it with New York accents (Berle, Cesar, and Hackett, of course; and notably also Arnold Stang and Bernie Kaplan as the owners of the aforementioned service station). But really, who cares?
It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World is hilarious from beginning to end.
And so the gauntlet was thrown down. Kramer set out to make not just a comedy, but "the comedy to end all comedies." The result was a maniacal three-hour journey through southern California featuring nearly all of Hollywood's great comedic talent.
It's not for nothing that It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World is recognized as one of the great classics of comedy. With such comic luminaries as Buddy Hackett, Sid Cesar, Milton Berle, Jonathan Winters, and Terry-Thomas leading the cast -- to say nothing of liberally-sprinkled cameos from such folks as Buster Keaton, Jack Benny, Jerry Lewis, and the Three Stooges -- slapstick and chaos are the name of the game.
The cast also features a few people not specializing in comedy, such as Spencer Tracy and Ethel Merman -- but their efforts are no less stellar.
Not a single performer in the entire film did a bad job. Everyone, even the knockoff cameos had their own moment to shine -- the Three Stooges didn't even have any dialogue or business, but they get enough of a laugh by just standing around in a sight gag that has to be seen in context to be understood. Even some of the minor players -- among them William Demarest, Dick Shawn, Peter Falk, and Jim Backus -- make plenty of hay with their parts.
The setup is simple. Eight people in four cars are passed by a desperate motorist on a winding mountain road in southern California. When the desperate motorist (played by Jimmy Durante) goes off the road and into a ravine, the drivers go to check on him. Realizing that he's dying, he tells the motorists about $350,000 he's buried in a Santa Rosita park under "the Big W." (To put that amount in perspective for today's money, just add another zero.) Then he kicks the bucket, and the fact that there just happens to be a bucket next to his foot for him to kick is like a starter's pistol for a wild chase for the money.
From Jonathan Winters trashing a brand-new gas station (the third-funniest fight scene I've ever seen in a movie, and the funniest without swords), to Sid Cesar and Edie Adams trying desperately to escape the steel-reinforced basement of a hardware store, to Phil Silvers fast-talking his way into and out of calamity, to Jim Backus as a drunken millionaire pilot with Mickey Rooney and Buddy Hackett on board, the race for Santa Rosita never lets up.
And what I mention here barely scratches the surface.
And then... well, one of the rules of farce in motion pictures is that you always reach the climax with a chase. So what do you do when the picture is a chase? The answer is simple -- end it with an even wilder chase! When the money is finally discovered but ends up in the hands of only one of the fourteen people at the dig site, the pursuit -- and its end -- are simply spectacular.
Of course, I did find it interesting that this movie set in southern California had so many people in it with New York accents (Berle, Cesar, and Hackett, of course; and notably also Arnold Stang and Bernie Kaplan as the owners of the aforementioned service station). But really, who cares?
It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World is hilarious from beginning to end.
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