Word: harpo
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...scenario of "Monkey Business" back in 1931, and the gags are still free of wrinkles. The plot, such as it is, has to do with four stowaways-the Marx Brothers-and how they manage to get off a luxury liner. The entire film is a chase, with Groucho, Chico, Harpo, and Zeppo in front and the captain and his crew behind. The running stops from time to time to allow for the situations, which are about as hilarious as anything the four zanies have ever done...
...Harpo, who is somewhat restrained in this flicker, has one or two excellent scenes. His pantomimic ability reaches its zenith in a sequence with Punch and Judy. Chico and Zeppo distribute themselves capably, though their comic action hardly approaches that of their more gifted brothers...
...international embroglio from which not even a rapier-keen cigar can extricate him. His butt is Louis Calhern--since elevated to tonier company as "The Magnificent Yankee"--an embassy villain who early in the film loses his coattails, and his dignity, to the omni-present shears of Harpo, the foursome's fair-haired and superbly equipped delinquent...
...into fumbling sleuths, who, finally, get their man, if not their woman. Such concern over villains and their "just deserts' cuts the Marx Brothers out of much of the fun, giving Sig Rumann-labelled for future generations as the typical National Socialist-as many scenes as Groucho, Chico and Harpo together. And unlike Margaret Dumont, the gracious Mrs. Rittenhouse of earlier Marx Brothers triumphs, Rumann is not content to remain a foil, and Groucho must contend with him as both a Nazi and a gag-stealer. Harpo, with a new wig and a slightly more fashionable, belt-trailing polo-coat...
Chico, whom Bob Benchley called the Annie Oakley of the piano, obliges on that instrument as pleasantly as ever. Harpo, who once was dangerously close to artiness, still has the best of his old wildness, plus new restraint, sadness and subtlety. He is used more centrally than before, and this is on the whole his finest performance. Groucho still carries the weight of the show and the woes of the world somewhere in the kidney region and walks, accordingly, with the famous sway-backed stoop. He still fires off his lines in the voice of a baying hound, with such...