Duck Soup (NR)

Nonstop classic Marx Bros. mayhem kids will love.

(Flash is loading. If this text does not disappear you need to install the latest flash version)

About Our Ratings

Common Sense rates it

Seen the movie?

Watch video review
Save It!
Email it
Compare Prices

Movie details

Studio: Universal Studios Home Entertainment
Directed By: Leo McCarey
Cast: Groucho Marx, Chico Marx, Harpo Marx, Margaret Dumont
Running Time: 68 minutes
Release Date: 11/17/1933
Video/DVD Release Date: 01/28/1998
Genre: Classic
MPAA Rating: NR

Parents need to know

Parents need to know that the Marx Brothers in this movie are the epitome of anarchy. They're rude, insulting, pranksterish, and loyal to nobody. Later, tamer features would usually cast them in some good-guy role, their destructive mayhem having a secret agenda to help out a pretty girl in distress or the like, but not in this movie. Parents who think the Three Stooges are a bad influence may feel the same applies here. Also, the opening-credit image of live ducks floating in a pot with a fire under it is a little disturbing.

Families can talk about how a movie this hilarious could have failed at the box office when it opened in the '30s. Other, more popular Marx Brothers movies had boring musical numbers and straight-faced romantic subplots to interrupt the comedy. Should that have been done here? What kinds of comedies that you see today are like Duck Soup, or is this brand of comedy unique?

Message
Violence
Sex
Language

Message

Social Behavior:

The Marx Brothers mercilessly torment the movie's villains to the point that you actually feel sorry for them. And, technically, Groucho's a dictator.

Consumerism:

Drugs/Alcohol/Tobacco:

Lots of cigars -- not just Groucho's.

Violence

Explosions, gunfire, and mortar shells in a comical war. Slapstick roughhousing on the street by Chico and Harpo.

Sex

Some mild innuendo from Groucho. Various young women, one in lingerie, are chased around by Harpo.

Language

Common Sense says

What's the story?

Reviewed by Charles Cassady, Jr.

DUCK SOUP is set in a mythical country called Fredonia, a place so poor that its financial existence depends on the charity of rich widow Gloria Teasdale (Margaret Dumont). She's smitten with the disreputable Rufus T. Firefly (Groucho Marx), and on her orders he's put in charge of the government. Never mind that Groucho still insults Gloria (and everybody else) with his rapid-fire verbiage ("You know you haven't stopped talking since I got here; you must have been vaccinated with a phonograph needle!"). The ambassador of the neighboring country of Sylvania wants to take over Fredonia, preferably without bloodshed, by marrying Gloria. His inept spies Chicolini (Chico) and Pinky (Harpo) try to follow Firefly, but nothing much comes of the scheme -- even when Firefly spontaneously hires Chicolini as his new Secretary of War. Instead the temperamental Firefly leads Fredonia into war against Sylvania in a crazy climax with stock-footage of wildlife and all logic going out the window.

Is it any good?

Duck Soup is considered a masterwork of comedy, and yet it was not a success in the 1930s. In fact, there was some doubt that the Marx Brothers would do another movie ever again after this Paramount release laid an egg at the box office. It was indeed the last time that Zeppo Marx, usually a straight man, appeared onscreen with the troupe. From here onward, the brothers were a threesome. It wasn't until the more anarchy-happy '60s that Duck Soup was appreciated as a bonafide comedy classic. In practically all their other movies, the brothers had to share screen time with snail-paced musical interludes or love stories that had little to do with their wild comedy. Not here.

Allegedly real-life dictator of Italy Benito Mussolini took Duck Soup as a personal insult and banned the movie. Whether there's a serious point being made in all the foolishness is pretty questionable. Just laugh and enjoy -- and if some of the gung-ho military madness and government misfits on screen remind you and your kids of people in today's newspaper headlines, that's something to discuss.