The Unseen #59: At The Circus

Why’d I Buy It?: Came In The MGM Marx Brothers Boxset I Bought.

Why Haven’t I Watched It?: The Dirt poor reputation of the post Day At The Races Marx Brothers Comedies. But then I found Room Service to be relatively painless. And hey one of my favorite underrated Golden Age Comedies is The Circus and how could the Marx Brother’s spreading mayhem at a circus not be fun?!! Hey maybe I was in for a treat after all!

How Was It?: Relatively dire. If Room Service was pleasant surprise, a minor but energetic and effective farce, then At The Circus is unfortunately exactly the later day studio micromanaged Marx Brothers film you’ve heard it is. The gags fall flat a disorienting amount of the time. The four leads look palpably tired. Worst of all entire swatches of the movie are taken up by the romantic troubles of the bland couple at the center and their truly, truly terrible songs. They fret how to save their circus from the evil loan sharks who robbed them (if only his wealthy aunt could help!) and then sing and sing flat tuneless songs. Every now and again one of the brothers shows up. It takes a full five minutes for one of the Brothers to even make an appearance. Almost fifteen until Groucho appears. That’s not disappointing. That’s near criminal.

It’s not to say that the movie is completely worthless. For Marx completests it’s worthwhile for Groucho’s performance of Lydia The Tattooed Lady, perhaps the last truly iconic routine The Marx’s cooked up. In an odd bit of synchrony with Room Service the one truly stellar sight gag moment is an animal based . This time with Harpo trying to hold an umbrella over a circus seal during a downpour.

But to get to these moments of gold you once again have to sit through some truly interminable filler, which when it’s not boring is just off putting and strange. Like the huge African American musical number dedicated to how weird Harpo Marx is. Really. I didn’t just make it up. It actually happens. Admittedly, while about as far from PC as you can get it’s hard not to be charmed by a musical number devoted to what a mutant Harpo Marx is.

The back half of the film picks up a bit. The invaluable Margo Dumont shows up and the sight of feature Groucho harassing an elderly dowager is one of those things that simply does not get old.

But even the isolated bright moments just feel like the pale reflections of past glories. At The Circus sags under the weight of all too apparent studio mandates, and it shows the Brother’s hearts aren’t in it. At The Circus is a depressingly dispirited movie from the kings of spirited anarchic comedy.

The Unseen #55: Room Service

Why’d I Buy It?: Came included in the Marx Brother’s box set I purchased.

Why Haven’t I Watched It?: The post Night Of The Opera MGM Marx Brother’s films have a reputation set firmly between dire and dismal. Studio edicts forced the brothers off of the A List and into increasingly crummy B pictures into which inane subplots featuring “normal” leads were shoe horned in.

I unlike the MGM executives of yore have never been deranged enough to let the thought, “I’d like to see The Marx Brothers movie. Only I want the brothers to be toned down and not as funny as they can be. Also I’d like long stretches of the films dedicated to boring people I could care less about." enter my head

As there are enough of the Classic Marx Brothers films to rotate through while remaining fresh, it seemed to me that watching one of the lesser films would be a bit masochistic. Why eat baloney when one has Porter House, or rather Duck Soup, so readily available?

How Was It?: Easier to watch then I anticipated. The film isn’t perfect and has more in common with classic farce then The Brother’s usual brand of free range anarchy (One sublime moment involving an inconveniently alive turkey notwithstanding). The Brother’s play a troupe of Theater Impresarios trying to secure their funding while outwitting a hotel manager trying to thwart them.

There’s no denying that the focus is firmly on The Brothers. While a few drab “straight” leads do show up, they act not so much as focuses for the film as targets for the Brother’s madness.

Really what is missing isn’t the anarchy, but the scope. Even though The Brother’s films were always brisk, the range of action in them, particularly Duck Soup and Opera are borderline epic. With plenty of sets, locations, and extras to play along. Room Service on the other hand is made up of the two aforementioned extended set pieces. One in which the Brother’s attempt to keep from being thrown out of their hotel room, and one in which they attempt to escape it, glued together by a few scenes. It’s essentially one set, and hardly more then a half dozen actors. The Brothers are at this point in their career very much property of the B unit. The film has CHEAP stamped on its forehead.

There is no denying that the lack of freedom and more formalized script bound humor make for a lesser film then The Brother’s masterpieces. But it is impossible to place the Marx’s in an enclosed space and not have something funny happen and as mentioned before there are a few brushes with the old brilliance.

On the whole the experience has to be called “Less then painful.” If the likes of Room Service was all The Marx Brother’s had to show it’s highly doubtful they’d be remembered as the comic geniuses that they are. But taken in context with their work, it’s a low key pleasant exercise. Should all of The MGM films prove this painless I shall think them very underrated.