Horsestuff

A Day at the Races

(1937)

Yeah, I know, I'm supposed to find this stuff hilarious. But let's face it: the typical Marx Brothers movie is not enough clever wordplay from Groucho and Chico, not enough genuinely funny slapstick from Chico and Harpo, a tedious romantic plot involving two completely uninteresting non-Marxes, and some abysmal musical numbers that leave us weeping for the next Marxist incursion.

The difference in this one is that even the Brothers aren't very funny. There is one positive exception as well, that comes just when you've despaired of being entertained at all: a musical number that comes from nowhere and actually redirects the course of the action it's so good. It's a not-altogether-racist (at least until the end, when the Brothers assume blackface--except for Harpo, who becomes a black-and-white cookie--to elude the law) song-and-dance "All God's Chillun Got Rhythm" by The Crinoline Choir.