Das verrückteste Auto der Welt

This movie is the 4th movie in the "Dudu" series, a yellow beetle doing a rally over the Alps. It draws from Herbie the white beetle, but where Herbie had a soul, this one is controlled by a computer (lot's of blinking lights, clicking sounds, and a tape recorder.

The film itself is rather mediocre, the plot is shallow and pretty much predictable. There are a few moments where you have to smile because it's just so incredibly stupid. I remember seeing this thing when I was about 6 or 7 and I loved it back then. So seeing this movie does require the right kind of infantile attitude :).

Many characters in the movie itself are dubbed in Swiss German, as the rally happens in Switzerland. This invites a lot of smiles for Germans, it just sounds cute, in my opinion.

The fourth of five movies director Rudolf Zehetgruber made about a yellow Volkswagen beetle with many gadgets. He played the driver Jimmy Bondi himself under the stage name Robert Mark. Aldo Regozzani returns from the previous episode as a race driver. Walter Giller is back as well, but in a totally different part (last time a gangster, this time a hotel employee). Part 4 is a race movie again like the first movie, but instead of Africa set in Switzerland against a beautiful scenery of snowy mountains and castles. The screenplay writing, in opposite to the photography, leaves a lot to be desired. It is the usual race routine with accidents, tricks and rivalries. The only new ability of Dudu is that he can talk now, but that leads only to a few cheap jokes. Again he can fly, which helps to win the race, but also means he can quickly leave his driver behind if he's angry with him... Mildly entertaining, but the series gets tired at this point. I voted 4-7-6-5-3 for the five movies.

Four wheels, four times the fun and speed? No pun intended obviously - or is it no fun intended? No of course this is fun and the fun is intended. Now I reckon the series has run (or drove?) its course ... and we do somewhat get back to square one - with a racing tournament of sorts.

You may want nun of that - but the nuns want some of it. More puns - I don't know if the movie does justice to my puns ... probably not. It might feel or be funnier than what some expect I reckon. The silly humor remains - and you have to know if that is something you can deal with or not. I did not rate any of those movies for the acting in it.

Part of that is because they are sort of dubbed - back in the day (especially in the 70s in European cinema), they shot with everyone speaking in their native language. After that they were dubbed in the country the movie was released ... so tough to rate with different voices and all that.

The ending is anything but surprising in and of itself - but it did contain language that nowadays some would call "woke" ... so even 50 years ago people could be considerate ... or maybe it was meant a bit as a joke ... no matter what, it works.