This film is Stanley Kramer’s tribute to slapstick comedy. It stars Spencer Tracy and a few stars of early television. These include Milton Berle, Sid Caesar and Phil Silvers. It also stars Jonathan Winters, Mickey Rooney , Buddy Hackett. Terry-Thomas, Ethel Merman, Dorothy Provine and Edie Adams. A person might think, how can this many people in a movie make it work? It does and very well.
The story is pretty much a simple tale about down on their luck people, who witness an accident. A car goes down a ravine, after the driver loses control. The driver is Jimmy Durante. Before he dies, he says that he was going to get money that was buried after a robbery. The money is a considerable amount, over $300,000. Before Durante dies, he tells them the location. They then proceed in their cars to locate it.
Spencer Tracy, who plays Captain T.G. Culpepper, becomes aware of Durante’s demise, and that the ill gotten money is being chased by the greedy and stupid cast of characters.
While they are chasing the loot, the cast run into all sorts of characters. This includes Mickey Rooney and Buddy Hackett, who play Ding Bell and Benjy Benjamin, who run into Tyler Fitzgerald, a drunken millionaire, played by Jim Backus who owns a plane. They persuade him to fly them to the location of the money. While piloting the plane Jim Backus’ character, thinks its a good idea to drink, while operating the plane. Backus passes out and they try to fly the plane with assistance from the flight tower. They are assisted in landing by an incompetent tower controller, played by Carl Reiner. Reiner can’t help them, and they crash into the waiting area.
Milton Berle’s character, J. Russell Finch, ends up traveling with Terry Thomas’ character, J. Algernon Hawthorne. They end up getting into a fight over each other’s slurs about their countries, America and England. Ethel Merman’s character is stranded with her daughter, and calls her crazy son, Sylvester, played by Dick Shawn, to come and get her. Sid Caesar and Edie Adams are locked in the basement of a hardware store, with dynamite going off. Phil Silvers character, Otto Meyer, follows a little boy’s advice to cross a river; in his car, and nearly drowns.
After all of these things happen, this crazy cast of characters, finally find the location of the money. Spencer Tracy has tracked them down, and he watches them dig up the money. He tells them who he is, and tells them to turn themselves in. Captain Culpepper takes the money, and then heads in the opposite direction. His intention was to follow the people and keep the money, because his pension was cut off by the city. Everyone follows Tracy into a building. Tracy runs out onto a fire escape, and is followed. The fire escape is faulty, and starts to collapse. The fire department attempts to rescue everyone, with a fire ladder, but they can’t control it. Everyone falls off and lands through windows, pools, or fountains. The end of the film shows most of the cast in the hospital with serious injuries.
Spencer Tracy was a very talented academy award winning actor, who was famous for doing serious dramas, especially with Stanley Kramer. He did comedy, particularly with Katherine Hepburn. This is a very different type of comedy for him. He basically plays it straight and it works.
Stanley Kramer keeps this film going from the beginning, with the well photographed speeding car scene. He also adds emphasis to Jimmy Durante’s death scene. There is a bucket at his feet, and he kicks it. It’s corny, but effective. He tops this throughout the movie with various scenes and ends with the fire ladder finale. It is a difficult thing to get comedy right, particularly when Kramer’s background was heavy dramas. He got it right, with the help of veteran comedy players, like Mickey Rooney and Milton Berle.
What this film shows is that people will do almost anything for money. A good example in this movie is the scene with Jonathan Winters, who plays Lennie Pike and Phil Silvers. Winters is trying to get a ride and Phil Silvers stops. Winters tells Silvers about the money, and Silvers leaves Winters character behind. This experience sours Winters’ character for the rest of the film. Jonathan Winters is a good reason to see this movie; he gives a sense of innocence and naïveté around all the other, mainly unlikeable characters. This movie succeeds because of Winters, and the ability of the cast to show their comic talents. It has a long running time, but it doesn’t feel like it. It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World, is an exercise in making a person laugh for a few hours.