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[DVDVRMC] IT'S A MAD MAD MAD MAD WORLD (Kramer, 1963)


odessasteps

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(i just lost the review i was writing when i switched browser tabs. I will go back and add in chunks.)

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Look at that list of headliners (which doesnt include Spenser Tracy, who got top billing)

Most of them are among the biggest comedians of all time and at or near the top of their careers.

And the mid-card comedians are no slouches either.

AND then you have the cameos: Jack Benny, Jerry Lewis, Don Knotts.

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Although some of the comedy may not have aged well in 50 years, you have some bits so famous that they are still parodied. (insert clips from Simpsons Big T episode) and things like the fireworks and gas station scene are still funny in 2014.

If you watch the. criterion, make sure to watch the feature on the special effects, which, among other things, detail the creation of the climactic fire escape scene. The film won 3 oscars, for special effects, sound and cinematography.

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Just caught this the other night.  I SHOULD have loved this movie, but context killed it; I am simply in the exact wrong psychological place to enjoy a movie about a bunch of dumb greedy selfish bastards who fuck their whole lives up in a mindless pursuit of money.  And some of the misogyny was kind of hard to take; WOW, this movie HATES women.  Sees them as nothing but shrews and nags who oughta shut up and stop henpecking the men and just Know Their Place.  (Which is kinda odd when the film quietly makes sure to not be racist, with its few small roles of black people being treated just like ordinary fellows.)  

 

The cast was amazing, of course; my favorite was Jonathan Winters as the square-jawed, honest-injun truck driver with the physique of Ben Grimm.  The cameos were lovely too, Don Knotts is always good to see, and I laughed my ass off when the Three Stooges showed up in a single blink-and-you'll-miss-it shot as firemen.  But overall, I just wasn't in the right mood for this movie; and I know that's my problem, not yours or the film's.  Also didn't help that it had that 1960s epic running time where practically every big-budget blockbuster ran for three hours, whether it needed to or not.  

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Jimmy Durante - Great death scene or greatest death scene?

Eh, certainly great, I dunno about greatest.  Lots of competition in the "ridiculously drawn-out death scenes": Paul Reubens in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Alan Rickman in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, Bill Murray in Zombieland, half the cast in Kung Pow: Enter the Fist, etc.  It's a tough, crowded, competitive category.  

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  • 9 months later...

The Three Stooges are on screen for 5 seconds looking solemn, don't say a word, don't even MOVE and it's still one of the funniest bits in the whole movie.

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  • 2 weeks later...

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