Duck Soup

The demented Duck Soup finds the Marx Brothers at the pinnacle of their comic talents and may be their supreme achievement. Their final film with Paramount, it combines satire, slapstick, witty-one-liners, and musical numbers on a massive scale to create an enduring comedic classic. It also contains the much-celebrated mirror sequence, perhaps the Brothers’ funniest scene ever! When Rufus T. Firefly (Groucho Marx) is chosen by wealthy benefactress Mrs. Teasdale (Margaret Dumont) to be ruler of Freedonia, a tiny, penniless nation imperilled by neighbouring Sylvania, she’s hoping he’ll transform the troubled country; if not, her crucial financial support of Freedonia will cease. But Sylvanian spies are out to subvert Firefly, and Freedonia is quickly spinning on a hilarious, farcical course toward war. Duck Soup a relative disappointment at the box office, compared to previous Marx Brothers’ successes. It is now considered one of cinema’s great comic masterpieces. Duck Soup was selected for preservation by U.S.’s National Film Registry, and ranked #5 on the American Film Institute’s list of the Top 100 American movie comedies. “The Marx Brothers in their greatest movie — a semi-surrealist farce about war” (Pauline Kael). “A breathtakingly funny and imaginative spoof” (Geoff Andrew, Time Out). B&W, 35mm, English, 68 mins.