Uma Noite no Balé

This movie makes you cry you're laughing so hard. I've seen it countless times, and it just gets better and better each time I see it. The writing is brilliant and the acting is just as good if not better. John Turtturo was born to play this part, just like all his other roles, but excellent in this one in particular. A take off on the Marx brothers' Animal Crackers (1930), it captures a more modern feel, only being twelve years old.

So many great moments and lines it's hard to pick a favorite scene or dialogue. I think that my favorite part of the movie if forced to choose would have to be one of the last scenes, when they are at the ballet and the two guys come out on stage and start hunting swans and ducks with rifles and blood hounds! Every time I see that I think I'm going to faint I'm laughing so hard! One of the best all time movies ever made, and should have one an Academy Award for best comedy of it's time. A classic that will most assuredly go down in history!

I give this movie a 10 out of 10.

End of review.

I will add "thanks" to all the users who have already praised this classic, add plead to Paramount for even a generic widescreen DVD release as my VHS gathers dust.

I saw this movie first in the theater, I went with a friend and at most there were a dozen other people there. Like many users, I laughed 'til I cried, and I am one loud obnoxious freak, wired on juvenile remarks, it must have been a spectacle. At least when I left the theater this became an issue, as my friend, who was mostly silent during the screening, said he didn't think it was that funny. I said the other people there were laughing, and he replied, "They weren't laughing at the movie you freak, that were laughing at you." I'll believe otherwise.

If you just want something funny, silly and fast, you gotta give "Brain Donors" a shot. The jokes overlap and are delivered so straight that it does require repeat viewing to catch the wonderful sight gags that are easily lost to laughing at the dialog so hard you cant see the screen.

Pat Proft, a writer who is certainly hit or miss, is really at the top of his game here, closer to "Bachelor Party" and "Hot Shots" than "Police Academy". And everyone has already cited Turturro, whose movements (chasing ambulances, sitting in chairs) are as classic as his delivery.

So watch it, and Paramount, release it, I'm ready to buy (again).

A lot of critics moaned when this movie came out that its characters were pale imitations of the Marx Brothers. Fine, that might be true. But this movie is still hilarious. On the surface, it appears to be a very dumb comedy, but if you listen to John Turturro's constant string of dialogue, you'll realize that his insults are the most sharp-edged one-liners since Groucho died. Obviously it's not as good as any Marx Brothers comedies, but it's not bad either.

An obvious rip-off of the Marx Brothers' "Night at the Opera," but who cares? It was damn funny, with John Turturro playing the Groucho part to the hilt and the hilarious Bob Nelson doing a great Harpo, right down to the raincoat. A pity it bombed in theaters, but it makes a great "This one too" movie to rent -- an hour and a half you won't regret plopping on the couch and laughing your head off.

This movie is funny, not ha ha funny, but stop breathing turn blue fall on the floor pass out funny.

Whether you find it funny at all will depend on one thing, do you think that a Marx Brothers style movie could be made now? If you don't think so or hate the Marxes then don't bother seeing it, you'll be wasting your time. However, if you like comedy that's both clever and stupid in the classic Marx sort of way, see this film.

The plot has Groucho, er...John Turturro playing a shyster lawyer who is trying to bilk a rich widow of her money by fronting for a ballet. Add to the madness Mel Smith in the Chico role and the incredibly under rated Bob Nelson in a role Harpo would have played if he talked. Its all madness, mis-representation and misdirection that ends up on stage in a ballet only an insane person could have come up with (its at this point breathing becomes optional).

See this movie.

Its simply one of the greatest screen comedies, even though almost no one has seen it.

10 out of 10.