The Great Race

When I was a kid, I lived two blocks away from the public library, and one of my favorite things to do was to peruse and check out the thousands of library books and movies. I have always loved movies, and part of that love has stemmed from my childhood days spent checking out all kinds of library movies on VHS. Let’s not forget this was the early 2000s. It was around this time, when I was 10 years old, that I discovered the movie “The Great Race,” and my life has never been the same.

“The Great Race” was released in 1965, starring Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon and Natalie Wood, and it is about an early 20th-century car race from New York to Paris. One may wonder how a car race from New York to Paris would even be feasible, but that is one of the great things about “The Great Race.” It transcends feasibility and creates some of the most bizarre and hilarious situations.

The movie begins with the good and handsome Great Leslie (Curtis) proposing a car race from New York to Paris. Naturally, Leslie’s arch-nemesis Professor Fate (Lemmon) declares he will finally defeat The Great Leslie and rises to the challenge. Also entering the race is the spirited and determined suffragette, Maggie DuBois (Woods).

The race begins and the three main characters manage to work their way into some unexpected yet comic situations. They stop in the western town of Boracho for some gun slinging and musical numbers, ride an iceberg to Europe with a polar bear, meet the drunk and pug-obsessed Prince Hoepnick (also played by Lemmon) in Pottsdorf and fight in the greatest pie war recorded in film.