There are certain kinds of humor that I will never be able to appreciate. I've never seen how people can laugh at Benny Hill or Monty Python or Zach Galifianakis and his immature brand of comedy. Not that I can't enjoy some sophomoric humor now and then, I have the American Pie Trilogy and my share of Judd Apatow movies, but even I have my limitations.
As a fan of early 20th Century comedy I always assumed that low-brow humor didn't come along until sometime in the 60's or the 70's. Imagine my disappointment when I watched "Duck Soup," a movie featuring people I had always heard referred to as comedic geniuses, The Marx Brothers.
The struggling fictional nation of Freedonia has just appointed a new leader/dictator, Rufus T. Firefly (Groucho Marx) at the insistence of a widowed and wealthy contributor. The leader of the country next door, Sylvania, has every intention of attempting to marry said widow to get his hands on her fortune. Unfortunately so does Rufus, and for the same reasons. So what happens when two men in charge of an entire country and with flawed leadership skills become competitive? They go to war of course!
"Remember, while you're out there risking your life and limb through shot and shell, we'll be in be in here thinking what a sucker you are." (Rufus T. Firefly, "Duck Soup")
"Duck Soup" has the potential to be a brilliant political satire in the same vein as "The Great Dictator" or "Wag the Dog" but instead it just becomes a string of crass puns and sophomoric double-entendres. It's not that I didn't "get" the jokes, I got all of them, they just weren't funny. In fact I think the average stupid person would allow most of these jokes to fly right over their heads, however, humor, like virgins try to explain sexual experiences, should be about quality and not quantity. What good are 500 jokes if none of them are any good? The movie briefly flirts with the notion of being a scathing commentary, particularly when his handlers are trying to advise Rufus on everything from national security to treatment of the workforce, but instead they just become the setup gags for more silly puns. This movie actually contains jokes like:
"What has a trunk, no key, weighs 2000lbs and lives in the circus?"
"That's irrelevant"
"Hey that's right, there's lots of irrelephants in the circus"
or this gem:
"Is it true you tried to sell Freedonia's war codes and plans?"
"Yeah I sold two pairs of plans"
... I would ask if they're kidding with this, but they really think they are.
Much of the film's (attempted) comedic sequences come from the duo of Chico and Harpo Marx, two inept spies who have been hired by the President of Sylvania to dig up dirt on Rufus. For some reason they are shown outside Rufus' palace running a peanut stand (I assume to be near Rufus at all times, but I don't want to make any assumptions when it comes to this movie). During these sequences they are seen constantly getting into confrontations with a nearby lemonade stand owner. It is one thing to have a sub-plot in a movie, but these scenes don't even fit in and thus wind up making no sense. I shudder to think of how badly this film would have suffered without these sequences, as the total runtime was only 68 minutes. Subtract these scenes of complete and total filler and you have a 50 minute movie, which may not have been so bad, as the viewing experience felt like it was about 10 hours.
One sequence I take great personal offense to is the now famous "mirror scene." In which Groucho and Harpo, both dressed identically, come face to face in the space where a giant mirror used to be. They mimic each other's movements nearly identically so that both presume the mirror is still there in a gag that goes on for several minutes. Now, this wouldn't be such a problem for the average movie-goer, however for someone who is obsessed with the films of Charlie Chaplin, I was able to easily identify it as cheap plagiarism. This exact same scene takes place almost 20 years earlier in "The Floorwalker" and the same joke is made in about one-third of the time.
The climactic battle scene when the war between the two countries breaks out is about the one redeeming quality I can find in "Duck Soup." Not only do they make a complete mockery of the pettiness of war, but they do it through an extended musical sequence, which, while entertaining, is relevant more so because song and dance is the greatest way to downplay the severity of an overly-serious situation.
Finally, the title alone annoys the hell out of me. As if it isn't a bizarre enough title for a movie, it is never really explained what it even means. During the opening sequence we see several ducks in a pot of water but that is the only reference to this title for the rest of the movie. Ultimately this epitomizes this entire film: pointless and inappropriate.
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