Ruggles of Red Gap

Leo McCarey, who directed the classic Marx Brothers movie Duck Soup and the previous Pick of the Week, The Awful Truth, also directed this one. Charles Laughton plays Ruggles, a British manservant lost to an American in a poker game. When he comes to Red Gap, Washington, Ruggles is the talk of the town. The culture clash jokes are exaggerated and funny. The few melodramatic bits are perfectly timed and impeccably executed. Sixty years later, this film is still funny and moving in just the right proportions.