Search - It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World on DVD

MPAA Rating: G Content Advisory: Suitable for Children Movie Release: 1963 DVD Release: 09/18/2001 Format: DVD - Enhanced Wide Screen Letterbox for 16x9 TV - Closed Captioned Audio Tracks: English, French Subtitles: English, French, Spanish SwapaDVD Credits: 1 Number of Discs: 1 Run Time: 2 hrs 41 mins Studio: MGM Members Wishing: 28 Genres: Comedy, Chase Movie, Farce, Ensemble Film

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

Spencer Tracy - Capt. C.G. Culpepper
Milton Berle - J. Russell Finch
Sid Caesar - Melville Crump
Mickey Rooney - Ding Bell
Buddy Hackett - Benjy Benjamin
Ethel Merman - Mrs. Marcus
Phil Silvers - Otto Meyer
Dick Shawn - Sylvester Marcus
Jimmy Durante - Smiler Grogan
Buster Keaton - Jimmy the Crook