Fans of The Marx Brothers are in for a treat as Warner Home Video will release seven classic films onto DVD this year. Due on May 4th, the titles include A Night at the Opera, A Day at the Races, A Night in Casablanca, and the double features Room Service/At the Circus and Go West/The Big Store. Each disc will include remastered video and audio and a bounty of bonus materials, including audio commentaries (Leonard Maltin on A Night at the Opera and "The Marx Brothers Encyclopedia" author Glenn Mitchell for A Day at the Races), new documentaries, vintage MGM shorts, classic cartoons and more. Each disc will retail $19.97, or you can pick up a boxed set package of all five discs for $59.92.

From Davisdvd.com

Dan

Sounds like it will be worth the price of admission.

You know, a memory just occured to me. Just before my father died a horrible alcoholics death, he watched "A Day At The Races" with me. The only time I ever remember seeing him laugh was when Harpo thrashed that piano.

So I will be picking the box set up for sure.

Love Happy would actually make no sense to me since I really wouldn't classify it as a "Marx Bros." movie since Groucho is only really the narrator or something.

I would Consider these the real Marx Bros. movies:
Current Owner (Original Distributor)

Night in Casablanca, A (1946) WB (UA)
Big Store, The (1941) WB (MGM)
Go West (1940) WB (MGM)
At the Circus (1939) WB (MGM)
Room Service (1938) WB (RKO)
Day at the Races, A (1937) WB (MGM)
Night at the Opera, A (1935) WB (MGM)
Duck Soup (1933) Universal (Paramount)
Horse Feathers (1932) Universal (Paramount)
Monkey Business (1931) Universal (Paramount)
Animal Crackers (1930) Universal (Paramount)
Cocoanuts, The (1929) Universal (Paramount)

:whofart:

Dan

This is a must buy. If the Maltin commentary is the same one as the Criterion it will be excellent. If he is doing a brand new one it may even be better. I will probably sell that LD now that A Night at the Opera is coming to DVD with the Maltin commentary.

Night in Casablanca was not released by MGM originally. It was released by a smaller independent studio the name of which eludes me.

I'm not sure, so don't quote me on this, but I don't think Love Happy was an MGM release, either.

I've always read that the Marx Bros. sort of disavowed "Love happy", since they weren't too thrilled with the final product, and they came to regard "Night in Casablanca" as being truly the final "Marx Brothers" movie. "Happy" is not really much of Marx Bros. film per se- it primarily features Harpo, and the other two just kind of show up towards the end of the movie. It's really only noteworthy for a walk-on appearance by Marilyn Monroe at the end (before she was "Marilyn Monroe").

Given all of the above, I would hope they include "Room Service" instead of "Love Happy". "Service" is not one of their better efforts, but it is much better than "Love Happy".....which is damning it with faint praise, certainly.

Of course, bad "Marx Brothers" is still better than good "Abbott and Costello", so either one would be fine.

"Love Happy" was developed as a Harpo solo vehicle. When funding couldn't be found, the other brothers were approached. I believe video rights are currently held by Artisian.

The Brothers also appeared (although not together) in Irwin Allen's THE STORY OF MANKIND, a great bad movie from the late 50's. The Spirit of Man (Ronald Coleman) and The Devil (Vincent Price) argue for and against the destruction of the world by nuclear weapons in a heavenly tribunal presided over by SIr Cedric Hardwicke. Bizzare casting includes-Hedy Lamar as Joan of Arc, Dennis Hopper as Napoleon, Peter Lorre as Nero, Chico Marx as a monk advising Christopher Columbus, Groucho Marx as Peter Minuit (who sells Manhattan to a gorgeous "Indian" babe in a short skirt) and Harpo Marx as Sir Issac Newton (I swear I'm not making this up). Rights are now controlled by WB. I'd scoop this up in a heartbeat if it were to be made available on DVD.

Universal also controls rights to the Brothers' last appearance together; "The Great Jewel Robbery". It originally appeared on a TV series called GE Theater. There is only one line of dialog, delivered by Groucho at the end. It would make a nice special feature if they ever get around to redoing the Paramount films.

Well, 'or something', at least ... Groucho is in four or five scenes, and they made him the narrator as well in order to make it look like he's in it more.

Look, I'm not defending it as a good movie, I'm saying that based on the fact that 'Room Service' was done by a different company, and not realizing that there had been an official word at DavisDVD, it made more sense to me that way. I am glad I was wrong, though.

Thanks for your research, btw.

Ah, but it was UA, and my memory of watching Bond films growing up is that MGM and UA merged at some point, so their library would've come together, where RKO, I don't know what happened to. (Obviously, this is a moot point going by what DavisDVD said.)

Thing is, I've heard Groucho disavow all of their later work to various extents, especially everything done after 1940. I believe that he thoroughly dislikes 'Night In Casablanca', which I've always enjoyed, and I know nobody (especially them) thinks that 'Room Service' [that is to say, them doing a play that wasn't written for them] was a good idea, but again, I've always really liked that one. (On the other hand, I've never cared all that much for 'Night at the Opera'.)

'Love Happy' isn't very good, no, but it's just fascinating, for me, to watch the way Harpo gradually, over the years, took over their films ...

Agreed. The only reason I would actually want 'Love Happy' in the box is so that I'd have an excuse for owning it besides "for completion's sake". I'd rather buy 'Room Service' in a seperate release than 'Love Happy', not that it actually makes any real difference.

With one notable exception.

OMG! I've been away from the boards a while and I come back to find the best news ever! I grew up watching the Marx Brothers and still laugh my ass off. I think I'll get together with my dad and have a marathon.

I've been waiting for A Day At The Races ever since I got into DVDs. I'm a happy camper.

Gonna go gets meself some Tootsie Frootsie Ice Cream!

Allow me to respond to this great news with the appropriate smilie: :eyebrow:

quote:
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Originally posted by bardevious
Of course, bad "Marx Brothers" is still better than good "Abbott and Costello", so either one would be fine.
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Better make that 2 notable exceptions:

You nailed it!

I have to agree with one thing. I liked Abbott and Costello films and will buy them on DVD, but I will take any Marx Bros film anyday over even Buck Privates. Groucho by himself was funnier that anything ever done in a A&C film.

The Marx Bros were on another level never achieved by any other comedy team on film.

the first 4 marx brothers films are available in a box set - R2 unfortunately.. But for $70 get a cyberhome 500 and start enjoying region free viewing.

With one notable exception.

Look, the best Marx Brothers material is far and away better than the best A & C stuff, no argument there. I just don't buy this "any Marx Brothers is better than A & C" stuff. The Marx Brothers had more than their share of awful material, and some of it will be in this box set.

I'm giving this thread a bump to announce that Love Happy will be released on June 15 by Lions Gate and will have an MSRP of 14.95 (should discount to about $9).

My 2c's.... What is driving the price of these two packages is that "A Night at the Opera" and "A Day at the Races" are two superb Marx Brothers films. All that followed were made after they lost the support of Irving Thalberg (he died). After Thalberg MGM put very little effort into making Marx Brothers Films and their quality suffered.

So..... we are left with the option of buying the two great films or paying just a little more and getting a package of the MGM films "warts and all".

It's a breathtaking job of setting the right price points.

I hate complementing "the man"!

Warner Brothers is releasing a set for Tarzan with six movies with similiar packaging and pricing. Does anyone know if they plan on releasing any other movies in similiar fashion?


Paul

pics anyone

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...=2BFUUMHNN05CX

here's pics.

Got my hands on an early copy of this set. Haven't watched any of the discs yet, but was happy to see Warner used keepcases instead of snappers. :)

No way!

:banana:

Andrew