Iain Gray Freelance Writer

Sunday 22nd June 2008

Originally published in The Sunday Telegraph

Filed under Film

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Duck Soup - Review

Seventy-five years on and this Marx Brothers caper is still one of the most inventively surreal and consistently hilarious comedies ever. 

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Groucho is Rufus T Firefly, the new president (or possibly dictator) of Freedonia, who takes his country to war with neighbouring Sylvania over the love of the wealthy Mrs Teasdale (the majestic Margaret Dumont).

Teeming with biting one-liners (“Not that I care, but where is your husband?” “Why, he’s dead” “I bet he’s just using that as an excuse”) and extraordinary physical comedy (the mirror scene, the humiliation of the lemonade vendor), this is deservedly revered as one of the great achievements in American cinema.

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