Duck Soup (1933) - film review

With Freedonia facing bankruptcy, the wealthy widow Mrs Teasdale agrees to lend 20 million dollars to the exchequer, on condition that her favourite, Rufus T. Firefly, takes over as Prime Minister.  One man who is not pleased by this development is the ruler of the neighbouring kingdom of Sylvania.  He had been hoping that the ruined Freedonia would tumble into revolution, allowing him to invade the country and add it to his empire.  Whilst the Sylvanian ambassador, Trentino, tries to discredit Firefly by drawing him into an illicit affair with the vampish Vera Marcal, two spies, Chicolini and Pinky, are sent to dig up incriminating information about the new Freedonian leader.   Trentino’s tetchiness gets the better of him when Firefly starts insulting him in public, and in the end he has no choice but to declare war on Freedonia.  In the ensuing carnage, both countries are devastated, thousands of lives are lost, misery and suffering are brought to millions, but the politicians are happy, and that’s the main thing.  Cue laughter.

Widely considered the zenith of the Marx Brothers’ achievements, Duck Soup is a comic masterpiece that features some of the best material from one of the greatest comedy teams ever.  Part political satire, part anarchic farce, this is a compendium of comic delights that is chock-full of inspired visual gags, hilarious set piece routines and quick fire comic dialogue (including material borrowed from the radio show Flywheel, Shyster, and Flywheel made by Groucho and Chico just before this film).  There is perhaps no better introduction to the genius of Groucho and his vaudevillian siblings than this tirelessly funny masterwork.  

Of all the great gags this film has to offer, the most memorable is the famous mirror sequence, in which Harpo pretends to be Groucho’s reflection in a broken mirror.  The joke had been done before – by Charlie Chaplin in The Floorwalker (1916) and Max Linder in Seven Years Bad Luck (1921) – but not nearly as perfectly or as hilariously as it is done here.  The other great set piece is the chaotic battle scene at the end of the film, which is a riot of anarchic fun, as well as being an effective anti-war statement.  

Duck Soup was made at the time when the Marx Brothers had begun to fall out with Paramount Pictures, the company that had produced their four previous films.   With the studio running into serious financial difficulties and seemingly unable to honour its financial commitments, the Marxes were considering leaving to set up their own production company.  Duck Soup was barely in the can before the brothers waved an acrimonious farewell to Paramount and transferred their allegiance to MGM.   At this point, Zeppo, the Marxes’ straight man and understudy, left the team.  He went on to found his own very successful theatrical agency (his clients including his other brother Gummo), whilst developing his talent for all things mechanical – he ran a company that made machine parts during WWII and invented a wristwatch that monitored the pulse rate of cardiac patients.

Whilst it is highly regarded today, Duck Soup was not as well-received as previous Marx Brothers films when it was originally released in 1933.  With the United States in the midst of the Great Depression, audiences preferred the pure escapism offered by glitzy song and dance musicals, romantic comedies and King Kong to the thinly veiled reality of tongue-in-cheek satire.  The film was presumably conceived as an attack on the Fascism that was beginning to sweep Europe.  Benito Mussolini certainly found the film offensive and had it banned in Italy, much to the delight of the Marxes.  There’s nothing funnier than a Fascist without a sense of humour.

© filmsdefrance.com 2009

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