The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

Blistering performances.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

I saw this one 10 years ago, at the time I could not get past the first 30 minutes. Yesterday I managed to pass the longest version - 210 minutes. I felt that I stood for a month looking at a wall. This movie perfectly sums up everything that is wrong in Hollywood. Excess. Excess. Excess. Everything in this movie is in excess. And Who had the sad idea in putting in this film more than 3 decades of actors, by just putting them, and what is the meaning? Answer - only to increase the ego of the producers and studios, who managed to make a film with a big length. The story of this film could be told in 40 minutes. 210 minutes is an oversized exaggeration. Everything in this film is oversized, and the jokes are so unnecessary (most of the jokes in this movie are not even fun) that more than 85% of jokes and fun times are forgotten even before the start of the third act. And for what? Only for the writers to present at the end a moral lesson. Spare me. And the end, we saw the protagonists (who look more like monkeys) dancing on a ladder of a fire truck. Horrible.Someone burns this movie, please.

I think everyone who loves movies can point to at least one or two movies that sparked their interest. Some people say Star Wars or Citizen Kane, but for me It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World was one of those. I first saw it when I was 11 or so and I've absolutely loved it ever since. A thief named Smiler Grogan (Jimmy Durante) crashes his car in the California hills. When eight people go to check if he's all right, he tells them about $350,000 (in 1963) that he hid at Santa Rosita State Park. After a fruitless attempt at debating who gets what, they all decide to turn it into a race. I won't go any further because if I do I'll end up spoiling the whole thing. I'll just end by saying if you love comedies (or movies in general) that It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World is a must see.

Heard the name of the movie many times before, never watched it.Well, it's pretty lousy, to be honest. It's like "The Great Race" only without the imagination, the plot or the fun. I watched the Criterion restoration, which is 3 hours and 17 min, but I gave up after an hour or so. It's just not interesting, not funny and extremely long.The plot is extremely thin (even for a 90 min film): A few guys race each other in order to get to a treasure first. That's it, nothing more."The Great Race" - which came only 2 years later and is also very long (2.5 hours, depends on the version you watch) and shot in a wide aspect ratio (2.35:1 compared to this movie which was shot in a 2.76:1 Ultra Panavision) - has developments, interesting characters, different situations happening in different places, it has arcs and new characters; This movie has almost none of those. It's just endless talking and driving in cars, with minor stuff happening here and there. It's just boring.It's not horrible. I've seen worse films, but I can't imagine sitting 3 hours watching something like that. It's ridiculous. If it was half the running time, perhaps it would have been bearable.Incidentally, Peter Falk has a (minor) role in this movie too.BTW, I just realized that this movie is rated HIGHER on IMDb than "The Great Race". Can't believe it.

I saw this movie when it was first released, which was when I was in junior high school. My friend and I laughed all the way through it. In the decades since then I must have seen it at least half a dozen more times, and still enjoy it - but from a different perspective today. This was maybe the greatest assemblage of comedy talent ever put together in one movie, even if it isn't the greatest comedy due to a pretty thin story line. There are actors in it, like Buster Keaton and Ben Blue, who started in silent movies. Many of the others came out of the vaudeville circuits. The characters are all great, with some wonderful cameos, such as those by Jack Benny and Jerry Lewis. A personal favorite is Jonathan Winters portrayal of the put-upon moving truck driver.While the story line is thin, it's still a funny movie from beginning to end. Today, hopefully viewers will appreciate what a tribute this movie is to a true all-star cast.