DVD/150: GO WEST (Edward Buzzell, 1940)

The Marx Brothers joined MGM in 1935 under the patronage of influential producer Irving Thalberg and had a hit immediately with A NIGHT AT THE OPERA.  But the following year Thalberg died aged 37 and the brothers found themselves without a champion.  After a loan-out to RKO, they returned to MGM to films with smaller budgets and lower production values, like GO WEST.

Groucho plays confidence man S. Quentin Quail who goes west to fleece new chumps but is himself swindled by wily brothers Joseph and Rusty (Chico and Harpo).

Despite this, they join together to foil villainous railway executives from stealing land away from an old prospector, his daughter and her boyfriend.

Cue brassy saloon girls, threatening Indians, moustache-twirling villains, and other b-western tropes found on the backlot.

A climactic train chase - done while chopping up the train for fuel - ends the film on a high.

Shelf or charity shop?  There is still enough fun to be had from Groucho - and a delightful song RIDIN' THE RANGE by Roger Edens and Gus Kahn - to keep this in my dvd limbo of a plastic storage box.  It should be noted that Buster Keaton was an uncredited contributor to the script which might explain why the train chase occasionally echoes his own classic THE GENERAL.