The Great Race is probably my favorite, though there are a few others that I really like that seem to be kind of obscure.
The Wrong Box is one I rarely get to see, but I find it screamingly funny. Peter Sellers has a small part as a senile doctor with a house full of cats - at one point, he carefully washes his hands and pats them dry with a kitten.
And, to be honest, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is pretty much of the same genre, if you disregard the songs.
They may have been ancient, but they weren’t over the hill. They had put out two movies the previous year, and would go on to do five more films afterwards, as well as several TV appearances and the live action sequences for their cartoon show. They were still doing physical comedy, albeit much reduced from their younger years. But all IAMMMMW had them do was stand there holding fire-axes.
This thread makes me want to watch the Great Race again. I saw it often in bits and pieces on TV when I was a kid but I don’t even remember if I ever watched it from beginning to end.
Anyone seen Grande Vadrouille: a French epic comedy set in WW2? Quite enjoyable and it features two of the biggest French comedians of the day: Louis de Funes and Bouvril as well as Terry-Thomas who is probably the quintessential actor of this genre. Apparently it’s one of the most popular films in France.
Another neglected gem is “Scavenger Hunt”. with Cleavon Little, Roddy McDowell, James Coco,
Richard Mulligan, Chloris Leachman, Meatloaf, and many many more. It’s about a scavenger hunt for a large inheritance. Seek it out, you won’t be sorry.
Maybe the epic-length comedies of the 60’s don’t quite work because they were made by Blake Edwards and Jerry Lewis and other people who had been greatly impressed as children during the golden age of comedy. Except in 1916 the producers were handed a two-sentence scenario written on the back of an old envelope, while in 1964 the envelopes contained checks for millions of dollars; which resulted in those over-produced “I guess we’re supposed to be laughing now” moments.
(I could be wrong of course, since none of them threw an entire train off a bridge.)
But I still think their reach exceeded their grasp. During the golden age, a lot of longer movies had comedy, but they also broke for songs, or dance numbers, or dramatic subplots. That mix is what I think was missing. I read on IMDB that in the movie The Bible, Charlie Chaplin was to play Noah, but wanted to direct his segment. It’s too bad that they couldn’t work something out.
Piffle. The 1967 version of Casino Royale is, bar none, the best Bond film ever, and I wouldn’t complain if the entire rest of the franchise had considered itself constrained by the plot point asserted in its ending.
I have not seen 1941, and am not prepared to comment on the film, but I will say that the companion paperback book would have been better suited to the role of outhouse . . . furnishing (consumables).
And Mars Attacks! was 106 minutes of pure AWESOME!
Not quite, at least if release date is being considered. Scavenger Hunt was released on December 21, 1979. The Villain, with him in a much larger role (opposite Kirk Douglas and Ann-Margaret), was released on July 27, 1979.
Come on, people, I know you can check the IMDb, but I knew this one without even having to look it up:
Arnold played Hercules (under the name “Arnold Strong”, because he was playing opposite character actor Arnold Stang – get it?) in the 1970 movie Hercules in New York. They dubbed his voice
IMDb lists two other movies besides “Pumping Iron” (where he didn’t act), one TV movie, and acting appearances on two TV shows before “The Villain”.