IMDb > A Day at the Races (1937)
A Day at the Races
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A Day at the Races (1937) More at IMDbPro »


Overview

User Rating:
7.6/10   5,676 votes
MOVIEmeter: ?

Down 1% in popularity this week. See why on IMDbPro.

Director:

Sam Wood

Writers:

Robert Pirosh (story) &
George Seaton (story) ...
more

Contact:

View company contact information for A Day at the Races on IMDbPro.

Release Date:

11 June 1937 (USA) more

Genre:

Comedy more

Tagline:

Three Great Laff Stars ! . . . more gags and gals . . . more songs and dances ! more

Plot:

A vet posing as a doctor, a race horse owner and his friends struggle to help keep a sanitarium open with the help of a misfit racehorse. full summary | add synopsis

Plot Keywords:

more

Awards:

Nominated for Oscar. more

User Comments:

"Either he's dead or my watch has stopped." more (56 total)


Cast

  (Complete credited cast)

Groucho Marx ... Dr. Hugo Z. Hackenbush

Chico Marx ... Tony

Harpo Marx ... Stuffy
Allan Jones ... Gil Stewart

Maureen O'Sullivan ... Judy Standish
Margaret Dumont ... Emily Upjohn
Leonard Ceeley ... Whitmore
Douglass Dumbrille ... J.D. Morgan
Esther Muir ... Flo Marlowe
Sig Ruman ... Dr. Leopold X. Steinberg (as Sig Rumann)
Robert Middlemass ... Sheriff
Vivien Fay ... Speciality Dancer (as Vivian Fay & Her Ballet)
Ivie Anderson ... Specialty Singer
The Crinoline Choir ... Musical Ensemble
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Additional Details

Also Known As:

Um Dia nas Corridas (Brazil) (Portugal) [pt]
Un jour aux courses (Belgium: French title) (France) [fr]
Das grosse Rennen (Germany) [de]
Dzien na wyscigach (Poland) [pl]
Ein Tag beim Rennen (Germany) [de]
En dag på galopbanen (Denmark) [da]
En dag på kapplöpningarna (Sweden) [sv]
Ena skandalon stis kourses (Greece) [el]
Marx Brothers - Das Große Rennen (Germany) [de]
Marx Brothers - Ein Tag beim Rennen (Germany) [de]
Mia mera ston ippodromo (Greece) (reissue title) [el]
Oi afoi Marx ston ippodromo (Greece) (reissue title) [el]
Päivä kilpa-ajoissa (Finland) [fi]
Skandal auf der Rennbahn (Austria) [de]
Un día en las carreras (Spain) [es]
Un giorno alle corse (Italy) [it]
Yom B'Merutzim (Israel: Hebrew title) [iw]
more

Runtime:

111 min | Germany:105 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White | Black and White (Sepiatone) | Black and White (blue tinted)

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1 more

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Sound System)


Fun Stuff

Trivia:

It is the 'other' film that ends with the line, 'Tomorrow is another day.' more

Goofs:

Continuity: When Stuffy gets on the horse with the wagon, he is wearing a coat and dark trousers. As jockey he wears white pants and jockey shirt. While he could have lost the coat easy enough, there was no opportunity for him to change pants. more

Quotes:

Tony: Getta your tootsie-frootsie ice cream! more

Movie Connections:

Featured in Brother, Can You Spare a Dime? (1975) more

Soundtrack:

Cosi-Cosa more


FAQ

This FAQ is empty. Add the first question.
20 out of 31 people found the following comment useful.
"Either he's dead or my watch has stopped.", 13 February 2001
6/10
Author: The_Movie_Cat from England

Forty years after the release of A Night At The Opera the rock group Queen released an album with the same title. When, the following year, they released another called A Day at the Races, it was largely knocked for not matching the quality of it's predecessor. The actual films follow this pattern, too, with Races, coming two years later, being held to be good but lacking in comparison. It's a fair assessment.

Everyone knows the Marx brothers, of course. There's Groucho (The anarchic wise guy with the drawn-on moustache), Chico (The likeable Italian stereotype), Harpo (The mute, childish, slightly annoying one, there for kid appeal) and Zeppo (The normal-looking one who was always left as the straight guy). Zeppo didn't appear in either of these two films, of course, though gets his usual substitute - in Day it's Allan Jones as the stiff romantic lead.

Even today Groucho is still very funny and his rapid one-liners hit the target ("Take these bags and run up to my room and here's a dime for yourself" "Oh, no, no, no, no - this is Mr. Whitmore, our business manager." "Oh, I'm terribly sorry - here's a quarter.") but after many lines there's a forced silence, as if to anticipate the audience laughter. As a result it feels strangely artificial and muted, never more so than in his first scene at the sanatorium. Things do get better, particularly when he's appearing opposite Chico, with whom he understandably has a greater rapport. Groucho talking to Whitmore via phone and Dictaphone, using multiple voices, is another winner.

The need for a romantic subplot and occasional reliance on the traditional trappings of the American sitcom do hold things back. The Brothers would be held to have more art and attitude than Laurel and Hardy, though they're nowhere near as amusing. Perhaps this is because Stan and Ollie generally avoid the over-earnest sentimentality of a Marx Bros. Movie.

Another major sticking point is the song and dance sequences. There are three in total, all of them lasting over twenty minutes combined. That's twenty minutes where we could have had more verbal by-play from Groucho, who is a little neglected in sections. An elaborate routine (not all that well directed) during the first forty minutes slows things to almost a standstill, even before the film has really got going. It's really quite irksome and not what a Marx Brothers film is - or should be - about. Much funnier is Groucho doing the rumba. For someone so well known as a verbal comedian, it's notable how much of a gifted physical performer he is, too. Okay, he's not a full-on slapstick contortionist like some of his peers, but just seeing the way he walks into a room has me in hysterics.

The film adheres to a formula as usual, with Chico again coming across a piano and Harpo again coming across, yes, you guessed it. It's another musical interlude that is too self-consciously cute, and, at six minutes, too long. The best musical segment is a later sequence where Harpo leads a group in a rendition of "Gabriel Blow Your Horn". This is marred only by t he fact that the group in question is the most stereotyped portrayal of black people ever laid to celluloid. After much hand shaking and eye rolling, the brothers themselves get in on the offensive act by dousing their faces in oil in an attempt to blend in. Like Laurel and Hardy's "Pardon Us", this is a film that cannot be judged by contemporary sensibilities... it's just the way things were.

Sometimes the mania can be a little forced and artificial - witness the "examination" scene, where the brothers - Harpo particularly - do zany things just because they're zany and not because of any consequence of plot. The ending is satisfying, though, with a well-presented sabotage of the horse race and the eventual song to play out. This isn't a perfect film by any means - judging it via the rather trite metaphor of a cake mixture, then the ingredients aren't quite right. With two additional songs that were removed, there's clearly too much music in the film. There's also slightly too much Harpo and there was room for more Groucho. The romantic subplot should have been scrapped and there are long stretches that unfortunately discard the need for dialogue. Yet while the cake isn't baked to perfection, the basic ingredients are there, and this is still, if not wholly satisfying, a worthwhile view. 6/10.

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Message Boards

Discuss this movie with other users on IMDb message board for A Day at the Races (1937)
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Did Allan Jones pursue a musical career? bkutach
Racial Issues Dario_Uruguay
Anybody wanna join my new Marx Brothers Club? Calvero_
Down By The Old Mill Stream slatbrad-1
Here's your Florida call, Mr. Whitmore. bonsai-superstar
This was actually my favorite Marx Bros. Film AfraidofVirginiaWoolf
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