The zany screwball Marx Brothers comedy "Horse Feathers" remains one of the most outrageous satires of college football, gangsters and dizzy dames ever to drive a movie audience wild. Made in 1932 at the low-point of the depression, this fourth Marx Brothers feature raised America's sagging spirits with an enormous box office hit, setting the pattern for a string of immensely popular pictures starring the most hilarious vaudeville zanies ever to hit the big screen.
The set up in "Horse Feathers" is a bit improbable, to say the least. The faculty of Huxley college is made up entirely of pompous windbags, while the harebrained students are so busy chasing the type of girl you can't bring home to mother they have no time to cheat on their exams. Football players are oafs or nitwits, while gangsters rule both on and off campus. A shady swindler, college President Quincy Adams Wagstaff (Groucho Marx as a deadpan crackpot) is determined to get Huxley College a football victory even if he has to hire overage hoodlums out of a speakeasy to play on the team. A riotous comedy of errors ensues that ends on the gridiron, in one of the most surrealistic sporting events ever to hit the big screen. If the story doesn't make a whole lot of sense, it doesn't have to! There's plenty of opportunity for hilarious gags at every mis-step along the way.
The Marx Brothers smashed their way into Hollywood just as talking pictures came in. Their first feature length film, "Cocoanuts," was also the first wacky comedy with sound and featured a lot of wild wordplay in addition to cartoon crazy sight gags and the kind of side-splitting slapstick that was already a staple of the silent movie era. Groucho, Chico, Harpo and Zeppo were brothers in real life, as on stage and screen, and before appearing on film they honed their incomparable comic skills in endless live performances at vaudeville theaters all across the nation. This was the key to their artistic success. They perfected their art over and over again on stage before putting it on screen.
In 1974, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences awarded "Horse Feathers" star Groucho Marx the special lifetime achievement Oscar for his performance in over a dozen unforgettable roles in which he ridiculed the pretensions of the rich, the pompous and the high and mighty, while making a hash of logic, common sense and the script of any movie in which he appeared.
Think it's easy to capture this type of mayhem on camera? Well, it ain't! Very much of the credit for the success of "Horse Feathers" belongs to the crew behind the camera, director Norman McLeod and especially cinematographer Ray June, who also immortalized such stars as Jean Harlow, Spencer Tracy and Cary Grant. His smooth polished style is responsible for many of our most cherished images from Hollywood's golden age.
Personally, I was tickled silly by "Horse Feathers."
The set up in "Horse Feathers" is a bit improbable, to say the least. The faculty of Huxley college is made up entirely of pompous windbags, while the harebrained students are so busy chasing the type of girl you can't bring home to mother they have no time to cheat on their exams. Football players are oafs or nitwits, while gangsters rule both on and off campus. A shady swindler, college President Quincy Adams Wagstaff (Groucho Marx as a deadpan crackpot) is determined to get Huxley College a football victory even if he has to hire overage hoodlums out of a speakeasy to play on the team. A riotous comedy of errors ensues that ends on the gridiron, in one of the most surrealistic sporting events ever to hit the big screen. If the story doesn't make a whole lot of sense, it doesn't have to! There's plenty of opportunity for hilarious gags at every mis-step along the way.
The Marx Brothers smashed their way into Hollywood just as talking pictures came in. Their first feature length film, "Cocoanuts," was also the first wacky comedy with sound and featured a lot of wild wordplay in addition to cartoon crazy sight gags and the kind of side-splitting slapstick that was already a staple of the silent movie era. Groucho, Chico, Harpo and Zeppo were brothers in real life, as on stage and screen, and before appearing on film they honed their incomparable comic skills in endless live performances at vaudeville theaters all across the nation. This was the key to their artistic success. They perfected their art over and over again on stage before putting it on screen.
In 1974, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences awarded "Horse Feathers" star Groucho Marx the special lifetime achievement Oscar for his performance in over a dozen unforgettable roles in which he ridiculed the pretensions of the rich, the pompous and the high and mighty, while making a hash of logic, common sense and the script of any movie in which he appeared.
Think it's easy to capture this type of mayhem on camera? Well, it ain't! Very much of the credit for the success of "Horse Feathers" belongs to the crew behind the camera, director Norman McLeod and especially cinematographer Ray June, who also immortalized such stars as Jean Harlow, Spencer Tracy and Cary Grant. His smooth polished style is responsible for many of our most cherished images from Hollywood's golden age.
Personally, I was tickled silly by "Horse Feathers."
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