Charlie Chaplin’s first feature is a sad comedy about a woman who abandons her child with the intention of commiting suicide. The little Tramp finds the baby and takes him under his wing. When the woman, Edna, turns out to be an opera star five years later, she spends her extra time doing charity work for youngsters who live in the slums, hoping that she will find her son. Eventually, the truth comes out and the authorities take the baby away from Chaplin. He steals the child back, but is soon discovered and separated once again from him. A reunion at the mother’s mansion resolves things happily, yet the earlier somber tone prevails, making this sweet and heartwarming story resonate for the viewer.
Translator
A collection of law-dodging characters in London are brought together by coincidence when a streetwise young man loses half-a-million pounds in a card game. He has a week to get together the money or face losing some fingers. Desperate, he and his friends decide to rip off a gang who are planning to rip off a bunch of ganja farmers. Simple. Except the drug dealers want their money back, as do the theives, and now there are three sets of criminals after their blood.
DUCK SOUP captures some of the Marx Brothers’ zaniest routines and funniest quips, creating a laugh-out-loud spectacle of politics gone haywire. Backed by wealthy widow Mrs. Teasdale (regular Marx straightwoman Margaret Dumont), Groucho becomes the leader of Freedonia, quickly frustrating his cabinet and offending the aggressive neighboring country to the point of war. Chico and Harpo, sent by the rival country, spy on Groucho and try to steal his battle plans, but when war does come, loyalties become muddled all around.
Director Leo McCarey gets the most out of the brothers, letting them be their wackiest best in what many critics consider to be the funniest Marx Brothers movie. Groucho plays Rufus T. Firefly, one of his best characters. The one-liners fly through the air like the bombs exploding in the hysterical battle scene. DUCK SOUP is a must-see comedy spectacular; don’t blink or you’ll miss yet another stinger….
Teamed with a relentlessly cheery producer and a smart-aleck cameraman, TV weatherman Phil Connors is sent to Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania to cover the annual Groundhog Day festivities. But on his way out of town, Phil is caught in a giant blizzard, which he failed to predict, and finds himself in small town hell. Just when things couldn’t get worse, Phil wakes up the next morning to find it’s Groundhog Day all over again… and again… and again.
The classic fantasy/comedy based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning play starring James Stewart in one of his finest performances as the good-natured Elwood P. Dowd, whose constant companion is Harvey, a six-foot tall rabbit that only he can see. When Elwood’s sister Veta Louise reluctantly decides to have him committed to a mental hospital, a wonderously funny turn of events occurs.
During the Gold Rush, prospectors brave Alaskaâs dangerous Chilkoot Pass, hoping to strike it rich in the snowy mountains. Just as Big Jim McKay discovers gold on his claim, a storm arises, prompting a Lone Prospector to take refuge in a cabin. Unknown to him, the cabinâs occupant is desperado Black Larsen, who attempts to throw the vagabond Prospector out. Strong winds, however, repeatedly blow the little man back inside, and soon after, Jim is also swept into the cabin. Jim fights with Larsen over his shotgun, and after Jim prevails, the Prospector claims him as a close friend in order to remain safe. Over the next few days, the three men live together uneasily, their hunger growing as the storm rages on.
When a dizzying robbery takes place in the Orthodox Jewish diamond district, a flawless 86-carat gem, the size of an infant’s fist, is lifted in the snatch. Taking it to London, the diamond’s thief and courier, Franky Four Fingers arrives in the city as a stopover en route to New York to deliver the huge diamond to his bigwig crime boss, Avi. But because Franky can’t resist temptation and London is a town with its share of illegal trade, a small crowd of miscreants and malefactors eventually ends up chasing each other and the whereabouts of the diamond. These include: Doug the Head, a jeweler who pretends he’s Jewish because it’s good for business; Boris the Blade, a Russian gangster with a deserved reputation for being impossible to kill; Bullet Tooth Tony, a legendary hard guy and Brick Top, perhaps the scariest of the lot.
