It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World Director: Stanley Kramer Cast: Spencer Tracy, Milton Berle, Sid Caesar, Buddy Hackett
DVD - Wide Screen Learn more
- DVD Release Date: 10/07/2003
- Original Release: 1963
- Rating:
FOR PARENTS
- Common Sense Rates this for Ages: More
Scenes
Features
Closed Caption; English and French 5.1 surround; English, French and Spanish subtitles
Full Product DetailsScene Index
Side #1 --
1. Main Title [4:20]
2. Big Dubya [4:55]
3. Mum's the Word [5:16]
4. Head Games [5:20]
5. Captain Culpepper [2:07]
6. Splits [6:48]
7. Reckless [4:13]
8. Other Means [5:58]
9. Piece of the Pie [4:25]
10. Dirty Lies [6:07]
11. Demolition [4:03]
12. Shake It Up [5:37]
13. Full Circle [5:31]
14. Downhill [4:26]
15. Equal Treatment [4:17]
16. Mixed Nuts [4:51]
17. Big Bang [1:44]
18. High Tension [4:31]
19. Intermission [:43]
20. Out of Control [4:22]
21. Emergency Priority [4:01]
22. Loopy [5:10]
23. Out Alive [7:07]
24. Arrival [6:03]
25. W [5:34]
26. The Dig [:26]
27. To the Police [7:10]
28. Leniency [4:28]
29. Crooked Cop [2:50]
30. Mad for Money [2:39]
31. Airborne Hag [3:31]
32. The End [8:17]
Editorial Reviews
With this all-star Cinerama epic, producer/director Stanley Kramer vowed to make "the comedy that would end all comedies." The story begins during a massive traffic jam, caused by reckless driver Smiler Grogan (Jimmy Durante), who, before (literally) kicking the bucket, cryptically tells the assembled drivers that he's buried a fortune in stolen loot, "under the Big W." The various motorists setting out on a mad scramble include a dentist (Sid Caesar) and his wife (Edie Adams); a henpecked husband (Milton Berle) accompanied by his mother-in-law (Ethel Merman) and his beatnik brother-in-law (Dick Shawn); a pair of comedy writers (Buddy Hackett and Mickey Rooney); and a variety of assorted nuts including a slow-wit (Jonathan Winters), a wheeler-dealer (Phil Silvers), and a pair of covetous cabdrivers (Peter Falk and Eddie "Rochester" Anderson). Monitoring every move that the fortune hunters make is a scrupulously honest police detective (Spencer Tracy). Virtually every lead, supporting, and bit part in the picture is filled by a well-known comic actor: the laughspinning lineup also includes Carl Reiner, Terry-Thomas, Arnold Stang, Buster Keaton, Jack Benny, Jerry Lewis, and The Three Stooges, who get one of the picture's biggest laughs by standing stock still and uttering not a word. Two prominent comedians are conspicuous by their absence: Groucho Marx refused to appear when Kramer couldn't meet his price, while Stan Laurel declined because he felt he was too old-looking to be funny. Available for years in its 154-minute general release version, the film was restored to its roadshow length of 175 minutes on home video; the search goes on for a missing Buster Keaton routine, reportedly excised on the eve of the picture's premiere. Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
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Why We Rated This Appropriate for Ages 8 and UP
What to watch out for
- Drugs:
Some cigarette smoking and drinking. One character is perpetually drunk, and even flies a plane (tricked out with automatic liquor servers) while comically inebriated. Another character takes pills for his nervous condition.
- Language:
"Hell" uttered a few times.
- Messages
- Violence:
Lots of slapstick fighting, pratfalls, and Jonathan Winter's Hulk-like one-man demolition of an entire gas station, all in a bloodless Looney Tunes-style -- even when there are explosions and electrocutions. Much reckless driving, including... More
Lots of slapstick fighting, pratfalls, and Jonathan Winter's Hulk-like one-man demolition of an entire gas station, all in a bloodless Looney Tunes-style -- even when there are explosions and electrocutions. Much reckless driving, including a car crash that is fatal (but made into a joke, as the victim makes a big, flowery death speech and literally kicks a metal bucket). Close
- Consumerism:
Mainly automobile brands and a gas-station chain.
- Sex:
One character complains about America's fixation on "bosoms." A dancing bikini girl. One seeming off-color joke about male impotence likely to go over kids' heads.
What Parents Need to Know
About It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World
Parents need to know that drinking (in the case of one character, comical nonstop drunkenness) and smoking are fairly common. There is an abundance of slapstick roughhousing, reckless driving, and cartoonish violence, with most of the cast ... in a cast by the end. A few minor off-color verbal jokes -- one is so sneaky you wonder if censors even noticed it. Main characters are driven by all-consuming greed, with only one showing conscience and disgust for the corrupting influence of the treasure hunt. You need to watch this in widescreen to get the panoramic scope of the comedy, not a full-screen cropped version. And be prepared for a long sitting.
Families Can Talk About
Families can talk about the corrosive effects of avarice. It's more absurd now because the $300,000 involved -- these days -- is rather small for all the havoc it inspires. The ending of the movie seems to suggest something about the healing power of laughter (though a classic movie called Sullivan's Travels did it rather more successfully). What modern-day TV contests does this movie remind you of?
© 2010 All Media Guide, LLC