The Great Race is a 1965 American Technicolor epic slapstick comedy film directed by Blake Edwards, starring Jack Lemmon, Tony Curtis, and Natalie Wood, written by Arthur A. Ross (from a story by Edwards and Ross), and with music by Henry Mancini and cinematography by Russell Harlan.

The supporting cast includes Peter Falk, Keenan Wynn, Arthur O'Connell and Vivian Vance.

The surviving teams are Leslie with his loyal valet Hezekiah Sturdy, Maggie DuBois driving a Stanley Steamer by herself, and Fate and Max.

[6] "Texas Jack", a local outlaw, becomes jealous of the attraction to Leslie shown by showgirl Lily Olay and a saloon brawl ensues.

They awaken on a small ice floe which drifts into their intended Russian port, where Hezekiah is waiting for Leslie, who casts off Maggie for deceiving him.

After driving across Asia, both cars enter the tiny kingdom of Carpania, whose alcoholic Crown Prince Friedrich Hapnick is the spitting image of Professor Fate.

Plotters under the leadership of Baron Rolfe von Stuppe and General Kuhster kidnap the Prince, Fate, Max, and Maggie.

Following a sword fight with Leslie, Von Stuppe attempts escape by leaping to a waiting boat, but bursts the hull and sinks it.

Leslie and Max return the real Prince to the capital in time to defeat Kuhster's plan for a military coup.

As the racers leave Pottsdorf (with Maggie now back in Leslie's car), it becomes a straight road race to Paris.

Leslie stops his car just short of the finish line under the Eiffel Tower to prove that he loves Maggie more than he cares about winning the race.

Director Blake Edwards based the film on the 1908 New York to Paris Race, very loosely interpreted.

Only the approximate race route and the general time period were borrowed by Edwards in his effort to make "the funniest comedy ever".

[5] The film includes such time-worn scenes as a barroom brawl, the tent of the desert sheik, a sword fight, and the laboratory of the mad scientist.

)[9] Working with Warner, Curtis's new agent Irving "Swifty" Lazar negotiated US$125,000 for Curtis—more than Edwards and Lemmon, who were to receive US$100,000 each.

[12] Many of the sight gags for The Great Race were expensive to create, and the costs ballooned to US$12 million by the time the film was finished.

During the five months of filming, Wood's unhappiness was not visible to the cast and crew, and her characterization of Maggie DuBois was playful.

[13] On Friday, November 27, the day after Thanksgiving, Wood wrapped the last bit of dialog work, then went home and swallowed a bottle of prescription pills.

[17] Another of the four appears painted dark green in the 1970 Warner Brothers film The Ballad of Cable Hogue—the grille can be seen bearing the words Leslie Special, with the wheels and tires remaining their original white color.

The Volo museum describes the Hannibal Twin-8 as built by Warner Brothers at a cost of US$150,000 ($1,496,674 in 2024 dollars [18]), powered by a Corvair six-cylinder engine with three-speed manual transmission and six wheels.

When the actors returned Monday morning, the set stank so badly that the building required a thorough cleaning and large fans to blow out the sour air.

[5] At first, the actors had fun with the pie fight assignment, but eventually the process grew wearisome and dangerous.

Leonard Maltin compared The Great Race pie fight to The Battle of the Century and determined that Laurel and Hardy's pacing was far superior, that the more modern film suffered from an "incomplete understanding of slapstick" while the 1927 pie fight remains "one of the great scenes in all of screen comedy.

"[22] The Great Race was generally not well-received upon release and critical assessment was mostly negative, making it the first notable failure for director Edwards.

[23] Schickel felt that Wood was "hopelessly miscast", and that the energies of Lemmon and Curtis did not quite make the slapstick work.

[25] Despite earning theatrical rentals of over $11.4 million in the United States and Canada, due to its high cost, it caused a loss to the studio.

[32] Mancini collaborated with lyricist Johnny Mercer on several songs including "The Sweetheart Tree", a waltz released as a single.

The song plays on along the film as the main theme without chorus (except in the entr' acte) and it was performed onscreen by Natalie Wood with the voice dubbed by Jackie Ward (uncredited).

[38] In his Top 10 Favorite Comedies, Doug Walker cited Jack Lemmon's performance as Professor Fate as a major influence for his Nostalgia Critic persona.