A DAY AT THE RACES (1937)
Label: Warner Archive
Region Code: Region-Free
Rating: Unrated
Duration: 111 Minutes
Audio: English DTS-HD MA 2.0 Dual-Mono with Optional English Subtitles
Video: 1080p HD Fullscreen (1.37:1)
Director: Sam Wood
Cast: The Marx. Brothers., Groucho Marx, Chico Marx, Harpo Marx, Allan Jones, Maureen O' Sullivan
The Marx Brothers A Day at he Races (1937) was their seventh film and the second they for MGM and without brother Zeppo, made after the success of A Night of the Opera this would be their most lavishly budgeted flick, over 2 million dollars, which resulted in a nearly two hour extravaganza chock full of wild detours. It was a success, but the larger budget resulted in diminishing returns, and their production going forward were much more modest in budget.
In it Judy Standish (the always wonderful Maureen O’Sullivan, Tarzan the Ape Man) operates the Standish Sanitorium, the place has fallen into financial ruin due to mismanagement by her business manager Mr. Whitmore (Leonard Ceeley, Moonlight Murder), and she has only one month left before banker J.D. Morgan (Douglass Dumbrille, The Catman of Paris) calls in the debt, looking to foreclose on the loan so he can tear down the sanitorium and erect a casino in it's place. Wealthy patient Mrs. Emily Upjohn (the fifth Marx brother Margaret Dumont, Zotz!), a hypochondriac, agrees to loan Judy the money to save the place, but only if she’ll send for Dr. Hugo Z. Hackenbush (Groucho Marx), a horse doctor that the heiress has googly-eyes for, but Standish is unaware that he's a horse doctor and not a psychiatrist
It turns out that Whitmore is a stooge for Morgan, and when they find out about the arrival of Dr. Hackenbush they go to exhaustive lengths to discredit him to ensure that the sanitorium fails, with it all coming down to Standish's nightclub singer boyfriend Gil (Allan Jones, A Night at the Opera) entering his recently acquired racehorse Hi-Hat into an upcoming horserace to win the dough to sae the day.
For a comedy about horse racing it takes a long time to get their, it's a bit long in the tooth and peppered with wild detours, none of which are boring, there's just a lot happening here, so brace yourself, it;s a convoluted but thoroughly enjoyable comedy fracas! We also have ony Chico Marx as dutiful sanitorium employee Tony, plus Stuffy (Harpo Marx) as Hi-Hat's inept jockey. This one has some of the Marx's best bits, we get the famous "Tootsie-Frootsie Ice Cream" bit, Dumont's medical exam, the Florida call, Groucho's seduction og Flo (Esther Muir, City Girl) the floozy with some wallpaper wackiness, but be warned it's also got the unfortunate blackface bit with Chico and Harpo, a misguided relic of the era for sure, but not done with malice. Also present are the musical numbers, among them "Tomorrow Is Another Day", "All God's Chillun Got Rhythm", and "Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen".
It's great to see WAC giving another comedy classic from the Marx Bros. a wonderful restoration, plus quite a few fantastic extras to boot. This is certainly the definitive edition of the film, fans and newcomers will not be disappointed by this wonderful release, so get at it, this is mandatory slapstick silliness.
Audio/Video: A Day at the Races (1937) arrives on Blu-ray from the Warner Archive label in 1080p HD 1.37:1 fullscreen, the original theatrical exhibition aspect ratio. According to Warner Archive's George Feltenstein from The Extras podcast promoting the film this is a new restoration sourced from 4K scan of the best-available preservation elements, and the results are outstanding. The black and white image showcases the original nitrate grain structures with excellent detail and textures throughout. Black levelas and grayscale are strong, and whites are crisp and pleasing. This was more than likely assembled from different sources and it does occasionally dip in quality for brief moments, but on the whole this is a vert pleasing restoration. Audio comes by way of English DTS-HD MA 2.0 dual-mono with optional English subtitles, the track is clean and vintagely accurate, there are no issues with hiss or distortion other than a very minute amount of hiss that is detectable at higher volumes.
The Well-stacked bonus content starts of with an Audio Commentary by author/film historian Glenn Mitchell that is packed with background about the production, truly an expert who has probably forgotten more than I will ever know about the Marx Bros.. We also get the 2-min Making-of featurette "On Your Marx, Get Set, Go!" from 1998, hosted by
Dom De Luise and featuring archival input from Maureen O’Sullivan, as well as comedy-writers Irving Brecher, Carl Reiner, and Larry Gelbart, plus historian Robert Osborne. Next up is the 10-min Robert Benchley M-G-M short "A Night at the Movies; 3 Classic M-G-M Cartoons by way of "Gallopin' Gals" (7:26), "Mama's New Hat" (8:24) and "Old Smokey" (7:34); the audio-only extras by way of the 3-min Groucho Marx Radio Performance of "Dr. Hackenbush", which was written for film but unused; a 3-min Musical outtake "A Message from the Man in the Moon" and the 13-min Leo is On the Air Radio Promo. Disc extras are buttoned-up with the 3-min Original Theatrical Trailer plus the ability to jump to a specific Song Selection if you're just in the mood for musical numbers.
The single-disc release arrives in a standard keepcase with a single-sided wrap featuring the original illustrated movie poster, which is replicated in the Blu-ray disc as well.
Special Features:
- Audio Commentary by author/film historian Glenn Mitchell
- Making-of featurette "On Your Marx, Get Set, Go!" (27:37)
- Robert Benchley M-G-M short "A Night at the Movies" (10:00)
- 3 Classic M-G-M cartoons "Gallopin' Gals" (7:26), "Mama's New Hat" (8:24) and "Old Smokey" (7:34)
- Audio-only treasures: Groucho Marx radio performance of "Dr. Hackenbush" (written for film but unused) (2:56), Musical outtake "A Message from the Man in the Moon" (2:34) and Leo is On the Air Radio Promo (13:28)
- Original Theatrical Trailer (2:59)
- Song Selection
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Screenshots from the Warner Archive Blu-ray:
