The defence The Sentimental Softie
“Sincerity is not manipulation.”
The film risks embarrassment to make emotion communal, and that openness is harder than fashionable detachment.
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Animal Crackers
Comedy · Music · 1930
The well-known explorer and hunter Captain Spaulding has just returned from Africa, and is being welcomed home with a lavish party at the estate of influential society matron Mrs. Rittenhouse when a valuable painting goes missing. The intrepid Captain Spaulding attempts to solve the crime with the help of his silly secretary Horatio Jamison, while sparring with the anarchic Signor Emanuel Ravelli and his nutty sidekick The Professor.
Movie details
Animal Crackers
“The maddest comics of them all!”
1930 Comedy · Music 1h 38m
Critical arithmetic
The consensus, allegedly.
Scores change. Arguments endure.
IMDb
7.4 / 10
15.5K votes
Rotten Tomatoes
97 %
Tomatometer
Metacritic
77 / 100
Metascore
TMDB
6.9 / 10
Community rating
External scores via OMDb · CC BY-NC 4.0. Values normalized for display; availability varies by title.
The well-known explorer and hunter Captain Spaulding has just returned from Africa, and is being welcomed home with a lavish party at the estate of influential society matron Mrs. Rittenhouse when a valuable painting goes missing. The intrepid Captain Spaulding attempts to solve the crime with the help of his silly secretary Horatio Jamison, while sparring with the anarchic Signor Emanuel Ravelli and his nutty sidekick The Professor.
CriticWise case file
What this film says about your taste.
Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.
The archetype split
Who fights over Animal Crackers?
For the defence
The Sentimental Softie
“You came to feel something, and you will.”
Read their case For the prosecution
The Cool Ironist
“Feeling things is a little embarrassing.”
Read their objectionThe split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.
Taste neighbourhood
Nearby on the taste map.
TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.
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Where it lives
Watch in your region.
Cinema release signals and current streaming, rental, and purchase options for your region.
Streaming availability data supplied by JustWatch.
Names above the title
The people responsible.
Cast & crew
Directed by
Victor Heerman
Written by
Morrie Ryskind · George S. Kaufman
Groucho Marx
Captain Jeffrey T. Spaulding
Harpo Marx
The Professor
Chico Marx
Signor Emanuel Ravelli
Zeppo Marx
Horatio Jamison
Lillian Roth
Arabella Rittenhouse
Margaret Dumont
Mrs. Rittenhouse
Louis Sorin
Roscoe Chandler
Court is in session
Put Animal Crackers on trial.
Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.
The prosecution The Cool Ironist
“The strings are showing.”
Every cue tells you exactly what to feel and when, leaving sentiment to do the work character should have done.