A Slight Case of Murder (1938)

When in 1931 Little Caesar became a surprisingly huge hit, Edward G. Robinson was cemented as the cinema's most popular and most representative gangster star. However often after that movie Robinson would not just act in serious gangster movies, he also often appeared in comedies that parodied these gangster films. These comedies included movies like The Little Giant, The Whole Town's Talking, Brother Orchid and Larceny Inc.. A Slight Case of Murder is one of those comedies and a really good one as well.       

The director of A Slight Case of Murder was Lloyd Bacon, one of the great studio directors of the 1920's, 30's and 40's. While Bacon had been a director (before directing he had been an actor in some of Charlie Chaplin's best short comedies) since the silent era directing short comedies (starting for comedian Lloyd Hamilton and then for comedian producer Mack Sennett), his career really took off in the early talkie era when he started directing feature films for Warner Brothers. During his stay at Warner Brothers, he would become one of that studio's most reliable directors with such great (and diverse) movies as 42nd Street, Marked Woman, Action in the North Atlantic, Footlight Parade and many many more. He would also direct Edward G. Robinson in the comedies Brother Orchid and Larceny Inc.. A Slight Case of Murder was just one of the many great films Lloyd Bacon worked on for Warner Brothers.

During Prohibition Remy Marco (played by Edward G. Robinson) is the king of beer. However when prohibition ends, he decides to go legitimate and sell his beer legally. Since Remy never drinks though he has no idea just how bad his beer is, and now that people can get the good stuff, they have little to no interest in Marco's beer. With the assistance of his wife (played by Jane Bryan), and his gang (played by Allan Jenkins, Edward Brophy and Harold Huber) he tries to keep this business afloat. To add to Remy's troubles when his daughter (played by Ruth Donnelly) returns from school she is engaged to a guy who just got a job as a cop (played by Willard Parker).

This film is a fast paced, laugh out loud funny comedy that never loses its audience's enjoyment. The movie is simply so much fun from start to finish. Edward G. Robinson (as he has in quite a few other movies) proves he is just as good at comedy as he is at crime dramas. Adding heavily to the fun are Remy's Henchmen. Allan Jenkins, Edward Brophy and Harold Huber were in a whole lot of Warner Brothers movies at this time and though they were mostly in supporting roles, they were fantastic in each of these movies, and this movie is no exception. The three have perfect chemistry together and with Robinson and often bring this movie's biggest laughs. By the way my fellow Disney fans probably know Edward Brophy as the voice of Timothy Mouse in Dumbo and my fellow Hanna-Barbera fans might know Allan Jenkins as the voice of Officer Dibble in Top Cat. The whole cast here in fact plays their roles almost perfectly. Adding to this is a very smart and very funny script by Earl Baldwin and Joseph Schrank and expert direction by Lloyd Bacon.

The film was a huge success with both audiences and critics when released. Even though this movie may not be as well remembered as it should be, more people should definitely watch it as it will continue to delight many people today.  

-Michael J. Ruhland

Resources Used
http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/90494/A-Slight-Case-of-Murder/articles.html
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0030764/?ref_=ttfc_fc_tt

The Gold Rush (1925)

Charlie Chaplin's little tramp character is probably the most recognizable image of silent cinema. Even many of those who have never seen a film with this character recognize the look of this character and his funny walk. After watching a movie like The Gold Rush, it is not at all hard to see why this character gained such popularity. After many films of the past have dated (heck even some movies from the 1990's and early 2000's have dated, and many of today's films will seem dated not too long in the future), a movie like The Gold Rush never will. This is the type of movie that so many of those who see it (even those who don't usually like silent movies or slapstick comedy), no matter what year it is, no matter how much movies have changed will continue to be enchanted by this movie. It is this that makes The Gold Rush never date, even when much more recent films are already doing so.

The Gold Rush marked Charlie Chaplin's first starring film for United Artists. United Artists was founded in 1919 by D.W. Griffith, Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks and Charlie Chaplin himself. Though Chaplin had been on of the founders of the studio, he was still under contract to make films for First National. In 1923 Chaplin made his first film for Untied Artists a drama that he directed but only appeared as an uncredited cameo (and is very unrecognizable in that cameo). With The Gold Rush he would finally star in an United Artists film.

This film had an odd inspiration for a comedy, it was inspired by the story of The Donner Party, a group of pioneers who were stuck in a snow storm and had to resort to cannibalism. Making comedy out of something tragic or dark is something Charlie Chaplin excelled in as you can see in such films as Easy Street or Monsieur Verdoux. 

 This film has three of Chaplin's most famous set pieces, the eating of the shoe, the Tramp turning into a chicken and the dance of the dinner rolls. The shoe was made of licorice, and 20 pairs of these shoes were eaten to get the take just right. Mack Swain who would share the shoe with him in the movie, got to the point where he could hardly eat it anymore. In the scene where Big Jim hallucinated the Tramp as a chicken and tried to eat him, Charlie himself was in the chicken costume. Originally a painter was supposed to wear the costume, but Chaplin was not happy with his performance and felt he had to do it himself. This scene would inspire cartoon director Chuck Jones, who would use a similar bit in the 1943 Bugs Bunny cartoon Wackiki Wabbit. The dance of dinner rolls scene was not the first time this skit had been done on film. Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle had performed a very similar skit in the 1917 short film The Rough House. However it had never been done better anywhere than in The Gold Rush. All these set pieces are worthy of the praise they get, as all these scenes are fantastic.      

Georgia Hale played the part of Georgia. However this part was originally going to be played by Lita Grey. Lita Grey had previously been the angel that Charlie was tempted by in The Kid. However Charlie and Lita had an affair and Lita was now pregnant, and therefore couldn't play the part as she refused to get an abortion. Though The Gold Rush was the only Chaplin film Georgia Hale appeared in, she would be briefly considered to replace Virginia Cheryl in Chaplin's City Lights.    

This film is not only really funny, but quite dramatic as well. What is incredible about this movie is that the comedy and the drama work perfectly together. Neither ever gets in the way of the other, and instead they only seem to help each other. Both the comedy and the drama work near perfectly here, and neither ever feels forced. This is something no one else could do as well as Charlie Chaplin, and this film is the perfect example of why. The whole movie is simply a delight to watch and one of Chaplin's best films.

Charlie Chaplin would later rerelease this film in 1942. However in that version he would narrate the movie and cut about a reel from it. While that version is still quite good, to me at least, the 1925 silent version remains the best way to watch this movie.

-Michael J. Ruhland

Resources Used
http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/5779/The-Gold-Rush/articles.html
DVD commentary by Jeffery Vance.

Smiles of a Summer Night (1955)

When one thinks of film comedy Ingmar Bergman is usually not the first director who comes to your mind. However he actually made some comedians over his career including The Devil's Eye, Secrets of a Woman and All These Women. However probably the best of his comedies is Smiles of a Summer Night.

Around the time Bergman started making Smiles of a Summer Night, he was in fact very depressed. After a lot of stress making some of his previous movies, he knew he had to make a film just for fun and that film ended up being Smiles of a Summer Night. He would later say at this time he had just two options, "write Smiles of a Summer Night, or kill myself." Fortunately he choose the first option. Bergman would also later say "I thought it was time for a box-office success, and though everyone disagreed with me, I was convinced that this picture would succeed."

This film was heavily by the famous Shakespeare play, A Midsummer Night's Dream. One person who definitely realized that connection was Woody Allen, who would incorporate much of this Bergman film into his 1982 movie, A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy.

Fredrick (played by Gunnar Bjornstrand) is married to a young woman named Anne (played by Ulla Jacobsson). Despite being married for two years and sharing a bed Anne is still a virgin and this makes Fredrick quite nervous. Fredrick asks a woman who he used to have an affair with, Desiree a beautiful actress (played by Eva Dahlbeck). Desiree still has feels for Fredrick though she is currently the mistress of a solider named Count Malcom (played by Jarl Kulle). Meanwhile Fredrick's son Henrik (played by Bjorn Bjelvenstam) has devoted himself to God, but finds himself quite tempted by the family's maid Petra (played by Harriet Andersson).

This is a sex comedy that is very frank about sex (shockingly so for a 1955 Swedish movie). However it never delves into cheap or easy vulgarity. Rather than this, the humor in the film remains very smart, sophisticated and charming even with its highly sexually nature. The humor also remains very funny throughout. Often making one laugh out loud. The humor is not the only great thing about this film as the performances are all fantastic and Gunnar Fischer's cinematography is quite lovely to look at. This all comes together to create a film that is smart, sexy, funny and just all around fantastic. 

The film was huge success all over the world. Because the film earned so much money Svensk Filmindustri, the studio Bergman was working for would give Bergman strong control over his future films. The studio was so happy with this film they submitted it to the Cannes Film Festival. However Bergman was unaware of that it was even submitted until one day while sitting reading the newspaper he saw that the film was a huge success there.

-Michael J. Ruhland

Resources Used
http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/90563/Smiles-of-a-Summer-Night/articles.html

Monkey Business (1931)

Though most people site Duck Soup or A Night at the Opera as their favorite Marx Brothers movie (I love both those movies a lot  by the way), my personal favorite is Monkey Business. This film is so fast paced and full of jokes, yet almost every single one of them hits perfectly. This movie features the great skit where all four of the brothers try to inmate Maurice Chevalier (which has to rank as among the funniest skits in movie history), Groucho and Thelma Todd have great chemistry (she would only appear in one more Marx Brothers movie, Horsefeathers), there is a brilliantly surreal sequence in which Harpo interrupts a Punch and Judy show that doesn't seem to have any puppeteers and it has one of my favorite Groucho lines "Madam, you're making history. In fact, you're making me, and I wish you'd keep my hands to yourself". Also helping make this film great is that Zeppo is actually given some good scenes here and he pulls them off very well (making me wish he was given more to do in other Marx Brothers movies).

Monkey Business was the brothers' third movie and their first one written specificly for the screen. Their two previous films, The Coconuts and Animal Crackers had been two of the brothers' successes on Broadway. Since these were hits on Broadway, it was assumed they would probably have success with them on the movie screen and that ended up being correct. Those movies were huge successes.

Writer S.J. Perelman had written a book called Dawn Ginsbergh's Revenge, which Groucho really liked. Groucho sent a complimentary letter to Perelman and asked to meet him backstage (the brothers were still on Broadway at this time), and Perelman said he would enjoy writing for the brothers. He was assigned to co-write (with W.B. Johnstone, who wrote the brothers' first stage success, I'll Say It Is) a radio script for the brothers, this would end up not happening because of the difficultly of the non-speaking Harpo being on radio. However the basic story idea of the Marxes as stowaways became the basis for this film in which Perelman would be a writer. However despite Groucho being impressed with Perelman' book, he wasn't as impressed with the script. His response can be summed up in two words "It stinks". Groucho often stated that the brothers in reality adlibbed nearly all of the funniest jokes in this movie and the next film Horsefeathers (also written by Perelman) and little of what Perelman wrote ended up in either script. The director of both films, Norman Z. McLeod, agreed that there was a lot of adlibbing on both the movies, and McLeod felt these adlibs were funnier than anything in the script. Groucho would later state about Perelman "...he is a great writer with a brilliant comic mind that didn't always mesh well with the lunacies of the Marx Brothers."

This film has inspired debate among Marx Brothers fans. It begins with a man telling the captain that there are four stowaways on the ship, but no one has seen them. When asked how he knows there are four, he states that they were singing Sweet Adline. Then the film cuts to four barrels and we hear Sweet Adline being sung, and after the song the Marx Brothers pop out of each. Now the debate has to do with whether there are three or four voices singing and if we actually hear Harpo's voice. Unfortunately I do not know the answer to this.

This film was not surprisingly a hit at both the box office and with critics. Now the story is simply an excuse for comedy, and it is impossible to properly analyze why the Marx Brothers are so funny. So just watch the movie for yourself and laugh yourself silly, you won't regret it.

-Michael J. Ruhland

Resources Used
http://www.tcm.com/this-month/article/290225%7C86548/Monkey-Business.html