Mad Holiday

This film is a spoof of ALL the mystery films of the 30's & 40's. An actor quits his job playing a "super sleuth", goes on a Vacation, and discovers a REAL murder!

Lowe & Landi are terrific together; there's quite a "chemistry" between them. It's a shame that they didn't make this combo into a series!

More laffs are provided by Edgar Kennedy (with his "slow burn"), Zazu Pitts, and Ted Healy. It's quite obvious that everyone enjoyed making this film! It's a real HOOT! (Especially funny how it spoofs its own "mystery" genre).

The only (slight) drawback to this film is that it's incredibly easy to figure out who the "masked murderer" is....but, you've GOTTA see this film!

Here Edmund Lowe plays actor Philip Trent who is tired of playing the same detective in a series of B films. The problem is these B films make money! So the studio and the author of the detective books do not want Trent to leave. Trent decides to decompress on a cruise between LA and San Francisco, but his vacation turns out to be anything but refreshing. The writer turns up on the cruise to try and convince Trent to stay, and then there is an actual murder mystery on the ship that turns out to have lots of twists and turns in it.

Ultimately this film is somewhat like "The Thin Man" in that you have a reluctant detective (Lowe) and a woman spurring him on and getting involved in the mystery herself (Elissa Landi). This is actually a very good role for Landi, actually much more up her alley than some of the other films I've seen her in.

The film gets very busy with lots of minor character actors showing up, including the zany Zasu Pitts and the always on edge Edgar Kennedy. I might have given this film an 8/10, but Ted Healy absolutely ruins every scene he is in, he is just so obnoxious. He cut the Three Stooges loose in 1934, they went to Columbia, the rest is history. Healy stayed at MGM ,and the rest is just not funny. In this film he has some kind of pseudo stooge that looks like a genetic splicing of Moe and Larry. It is all very weird.

The end is just a big joke, but as (deliberately) corny and hammy as the individual parts were, it really fit well into a satisfying whole of a spoof. I'd recommend it.

For those of you familiar with The Thin Man starring William Powell and Myrna Loy, you will see many similarities but I believe this is not nearly as good as Powell and Loy together. Edmund Lowe is an actor who plays a detective but is tired of doing the same thing so he wants to take a vacation to get away from what he considers poor detective stories. On the ship he meets up with his co star for the movie, Peter Dean played by Ellisa Landi. They accidentally get involved in a real murder and can't seem to get out of several "scrapes" together. They do all right as a couple but again, I believe this movie tried to copy The Thin Man style and didn't do too well. There's a lot of slapstick in this movie so if you enjoy that from the '30's you will enjoy this movie. All in all it isn't too bad so I gave it a 5 but no higher. If you enjoyed this movie you will love The Thin Man series so I highly recommend any of those.

"Mad Holiday" is a typical low budget 30s thriller, centering on Edmund Lowe as a vacationing movie idol, a shipboard killer and a diamond heist. But the real mystery is why Loew's co-star, Elissa Landi, never became a star in her own right. Rising above the grade B trappings as an incognito author, she's a revelation...sexy, stylish and bouyantly amusing with the sparkle of a Rosalind Russell or Katherine Hepburn. She also gave a stand-out performance in the second "Thin Man" caper, "After the Thin Man" (albeit in a less captivating role.) But by 1943, her screen career was over. She's not the only gifted performer who somehow got lost in the maze of the studio system. But watching her sail through this otherwise tepid crime story, one an only wonder how Hollywood let her get away.

Edmund Lowe and Elissa Landi are terrific in this comedy-drama directed by sure comedy hand George Seitz. They are supported by the always hilarious Edgar Kennedy and Zasu Pitts, as well as the annoying Ted Healy, with Edmund Gwenn in a small but well-performed role.

The movie looks like it was originally intended for William Powell and Myrna Loy as a spoof on THE THIN MAN, but the lead pair -- Lowe plays a movie actor trapped in a series of successful murder movies written by hack Landi -- manage their own chemistry. Lowe times his wisecracks like Groucho Marx and Landi's timing and character reminds me of Greer Garson, still three years from being noticed by Louis Mayer.

Seitz had had a sure hand for comedy, both as a writer for Broadway and for the movies since silent days. He would direct a couple more great comedies for Metro, including the amazing MY DEAR MISS ALDRICH and then spend the remainder of his life directing the lively Andy Hardy series. If you get a chance to see what he could do with a good script and adult actors, take it.