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Singin' In The Rain does teach us that you can expose a person's true nature by turning their microphone off at strategic points (incidentally, that's one of those rather cruel moments that makes me feel a little ambivalent towards the film):

domino harvey wrote:... ... get ridiculous...it's...the...musicals, just...The Greatest

I guess that everyone has seen the car advert that took the joyous title song from the film and turned it into a nightmarish vision of terrible CGI and jerky, rubbery body movements?

Just watched Monte Carlo- are the characters supposed to be likable, or was I just missing the point?

It depends on how you define supposed. I find them perfectly charming and wouldn't say any of them are truly villains, but enough are daft.

I like Jack Buchanan more than I liked Chevalier, but up until the opera finale (which was pretty fantastic) it felt a bit like Bringing Up Baby to me- some of the behavior went beyond quirky and up into the sadism zone.

I'm in love with Lubitsch's dirty jokes, though, I could watch those all day.

domino harvey wrote:Don't let's get ridiculous-- it's one of the greatest musicals, just not The Greatest

Might as well address one of the elephants in the room since it's come up. It's certainly one of the greatest musicals, in my estimation, though that received opinion has been drummed in so relentlessly it's easy to understand a certain degree of pushback. Me, I'm not a big fan of the all-stops-out final production number, and the easy charm of the title sequence was beaten out of it through constant repetition and imitation even before I saw the entire film for the first time. (For my money, if you want a number that goes straight from simple and stripped down to ecstatic and sublime, 'Dancing in the Dark' is a much better example.)

But there's still riches galore, with O'Connor stealing the film with 'Make 'Em Laugh' (which could be among my top ten individual numbers), and the film's really remarkable achievement for me is as a comedy. It's consistently smart and funny, and it's one of the rare first-rate musicals that I think could still be a first-rate comedy with no songs. Has anybody here not put on a Lina Lamont voice when registering a complaint to a loved one?

Last week I saw Calamity Jane for the first time and really enjoyed it. Lots of charm from the leads (I could even stand Keel, for once), fine songs: a good time all around. It'll probably make my list, but I found it was limited by the perfunctory nature of the photography, production design and direction. On the one hand, the stylistic blandness allowed the filmmaking to get out of the way of the performances, but on the other hand, it was still bland, and Donen and Minnelli never needed to go that far to highlight their cast.

zedz wrote:Last week I saw Calamity Jane for the first time and really enjoyed it. Lots of charm from the leads (I could even stand Keel, for once), fine songs: a good time all around. It'll probably make my list, but I found it was limited by the perfunctory nature of the photography, production design and direction.

Going to have to take umbrage with this-- I've always considered the "Windy City" number a virtuoso use of a fixed stage space, here essentially a triangle of workable room. There are I believe only two cuts, and when Butler at one point rearranges the fixed space to allow the camera to follow Day "up the escalator," it's virtuoso filmmaking-- an unforeseen expansion of the limited area within the given screen space.

zedz wrote:It's consistently smart and funny, and it's one of the rare first-rate musicals that I think could still be a first-rate comedy with no songs.

I would guess that aspect is a huge part of why it's so much more universally beloved than most musicals of the era- I know that in my case, it's a movie I adore in spite of the fact that I've really never learned to understand or enjoy most musicals on their own terms.

domino harvey wrote:

zedz wrote:Last week I saw Calamity Jane for the first time and really enjoyed it. Lots of charm from the leads (I could even stand Keel, for once), fine songs: a good time all around. It'll probably make my list, but I found it was limited by the perfunctory nature of the photography, production design and direction.

Going to have to take umbrage with this-- I've always considered the "Windy City" number a virtuoso use of a fixed stage space, here essentially a triangle of workable room. There are I believe only two cuts, and when Butler at one point rearranges the fixed space to allow the camera to follow Day "up the escalator," it's virtuoso filmmaking-- an unforeseen expansion of the limited area within the given screen space.

I concede that that's the best-conceived of the film's musical numbers, but I'd assumed that the camera was just following existing stage choreography as well as it could.

However, according to wikipedia, the film musical predated the stage musical, so I guess I need to give Butler a little more credit - or maybe it's the choreographer and Day who are really driving that scene visually.

Bye Bye Birdie (Sidney, 1963): What starts out as a fun, lively "teenage" musical wears out its welcome in its overlong second hour. People complain that musical numbers were cut from the stage version in the transition to film, but I think one or two more could have been cut. The "speed" plot, which was added for the film, is an awful attempt at wacky comedy, something you'd see in a lesser Don Knotts movie of the time. The stupid sped-up ballet just goes on and on and gets unfunnier by the minute.

Ann-Margret is surprisingly charming here, Dick Van Dyke is appropriately restrained, and Janet Leigh makes a decent white substitute for Chita Rivera (who probably knocked the role of Rosie out of the park on Broadway). Paul Lynde is Paul Lynde with all but the gayest mannerisms unchecked. Surprisingly, Jesse Pearson as Conrad Birdie is a total snore, which probably explains why his career went nowhere. Knowing that Elvis was initially offered the role as a chance to spoof himself only makes you wonder how much more interesting that might have been.

The music is surprisingly good, and I didn't know until I saw it that this is where "Put on a Happy Face" came from. In the end, despite my completely losing interest in the second half, the first half is strong enough that it may scrape the bottom of my list. Others may have more patience with it.

I love the era depicted, I love the idea of the material, and I generally love George Sidney. But Bye Bye Birdie is a pandering, smarmy piece of shit and just one of the worst movie musicals ever. Sorry, I could've warned you

What Sidney's besides Pal Joey and given your enthusiasm Kiss Me Kate are good?

The Harvey Girls, Garland's best musical, for one. Thousands Cheer and Annie Get Your Gun also have their moments, and on the non-musical tip, Scaramouche is probably the best swashbuckler Hollywood ever produced

While we're on George Sidney [and Ann-Margret], is Viva Las Vegas worth watching at all? I haven't seen it since I was a kid. I know it's considered Elvis' best film after Jailhouse Rock, but I also know that isn't saying much.

In general are any of the Elvis movies good? Frys has the Blus dirt cheap, but I'm assuming they're universally terrible.

I've never seen an Elvis movie, actually. Rick Altman generally keeps his opinions to himself, but I can remember from memory this diss: "When is a musical not a musical? When it stars Elvis Presley." I'd be curious to watch at least a couple, though, if anyone's actually seen one haha

From my limited experience I would say avoid Fun In Acapulco, if only for the horribly irritating cute kid that they partner Elvis up with. It is kind of following the Blue Hawaii template of sun, sea and sex in exotic locations but doesn't recapture much of the charm of that film.

And I'm not that big a fan of Blue Hawaii either!

Back when I was little I saw a lot of Elvis movies. The local weekday "4:00 Movie" would periodically do an "Elvis Week". When I was 8 or 10, those were my second weeks for that TV movie show (behind "Monster Week", all Godzilla / Rodan / etc.). Even so, nothing about my memory of them has led me to track down those movies in recent years ...... with the sole exception that my kevyip does include a copy of Jailhouse Rock (which I don't remember ever having seen as a "4:00 Movie", possibly because they were already sticking to color movies when they could).

Once upon a very long time ago (not quite as long ago as those "Elvis Week" shows), I was in a high school production of Bye, Bye Birdie. So I have some nostalgic attachment to the movie Bye, Bye Birdie. Still I can go with the bit about the pacing being off in the second half. I think that it is mostly due to the whole "speed" sub-plot that wasn't in the stage version. Everything about the Russian ballet, the back and forth with Sullivan Show reps, and everything related to that is a detour in the story that doesn't lead anywhere or add anything, and it bogs down the second half. (Some of that seems to be because, unlike any stage production, they actually *had* Ed Sullivan and they wanted to show him on screen more.) When you get rid of all of that stuff, the pacing works much better, even with one or two extra songs. Also the movie whitewashes the implicit racism built into Ma Peterson's objection to Rosie as a daughter-in-law, and that takes some bite out the show's character interactions. I sometimes wonder whether changing Rosie's last name from Alverez to DeLeon was an attempt to make her seem less Hispanic (and the one cut song that I miss is "Spanish Rose"). Also, as I recall, "Put On a Happy Face" happens much earlier in the stage version, so that's another slower paced song that originally wasn't in the second half of the show.

LA DOLOROSA Jean Grémillon, 1934
Probably the least of the four Grémillons I’ve seen, but the montage passages are extraordinary and Rosita Díaz Gimeno’s scorned martyr-ish mother brings to mind Annabella in Fejös’s astonishing, confounding Marie, légende hongroise. Both La dolorosa and Marie are studies of their lead actress’s faces (bingo) on a level of beauty and profundity approaching Dreyer, each film painting a sorrowful, bleak, but eventually, in some sense, cathartic portrait of motherhood rife with religious grief (hallucinatory religious imagery/visions feature during key moments in both). Certainly, La dolorosa is not a screen musical in any conventional sense (it’s a zarzuela, a kind of Spanish folk opera about which I know nothing), but it is a narrative film that contains several songs (four, I believe) sung by major characters, so I’m having a hard time discounting it. Would anyone else who has seen it care to weigh in? As of now, it’s on my musical list, but will probably miss the cut on my 30s list (though Gueule d’amour and La petite Lise will certainly be making it, both of them very high).

CAREFREE Mark Sandrich, 1938
The musical numbers are distracting peanuts compared to the enchanting effect of Ginger’s impish path of destruction (and her taunting “ha ha ha”), anticipating her psychological regression in Monkey Business, which is currently doing battle with The Lusty Men for the number one spot on my prospective 1950s list; if it wins out, then my 30s, 40s, and 50s lists (as they are now) will each be topped by a Hawks film. There isn’t a director who deserves it more. Oh, but I’m supposed to be writing about Carefree, aren’t I? How much do you think it would cost to hire a dancer to go out and pull a Fred in the middle of a hole on the PGA tour? Is Improv Everywhere still around?

EASTER PARADE Charles Walters, 1948
Astaire’s two superb openers, the magazine covers number (proto-Hypothesis of a Stolen Painting?!), and the first “It Only Happens When I Dance with You” build up so much goodwill that the film mostly comes out of its more interminable passages unscathed. The "Mr. Monotony" outtakes are a wonderful inclusion to the disc. I should really make an effort to see all of the That’s Entertainment!s.

tarpilot wrote: Monkey Business (...) the number one spot on my prospective 1950s list.

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knives wrote:In general are any of the Elvis movies good? Frys has the Blus dirt cheap, but I'm assuming they're universally terrible.

It's sitting on my TiVo unwatched, but the critical consensus seems to be that Jailhouse Rock is good. I guess I will be the guinea pig for Viva Las Vegas and report back.

tarpilot wrote:LA DOLOROSA Jean Grémillon, 1934
Certainly, La dolorosa is not a screen musical in any conventional sense (it’s a zarzuela, a kind of Spanish folk opera about which I know nothing), but it is a narrative film that contains several songs (four, I believe) sung by major characters, so I’m having a hard time discounting it.

I think there are several more than four songs here, though some of them are quite short or combined with truncated versions of other songs in a sort of medley. The last 20 minutes or so, as I recall, is one song after another, all running together. I get the sense that Grémillon was trying to pack in as much from the zarzuela as he could in a 70 minute film, though some songs were still left out.

Matt wrote:

knives wrote:In general are any of the Elvis movies good? Frys has the Blus dirt cheap, but I'm assuming they're universally terrible.

It's sitting on my TiVo unwatched, but the critical consensus seems to be that Jailhouse Rock is good. I guess I will be the guinea pig for Viva Las Vegas and report back.

I saw Viva Las Vegas a few years back, bowing to the cult that insists it's Elvis' best film and (surprise!) a great musical. Meh. Ann Margret's fine, and she does some good dancing, there are some good songs, but the rest of the film is draggy and strictly by the numbers and the best I could say for Elvis himself is that he doesn't completely disgrace himself dramatically, but when he's not singing or dancing he's a surprisingly flat presence. There was nothing in the film that made me curious to see any of his others.

domino harvey wrote:The Harvey Girls, Garland's best musical, for one.

Of the ten films I've managed for this stage of the project, this has been the most purely enjoyable. The musical numbers are great, the fact that Angela Lansbury's singing is dubbed (yes, that's right, future Broadway star Angela Lansbury) is surreal, and the film has a generally interesting attitude to its showgirls / prostitutes - basically an important stage in the civilisation of the West between the menfolk and the "respectable" women. And unlike in many of Ford's films, they don't have to die nobly to be redeemed.

As for Elvis, I've got a pile of unwatched DVDs free from a newspaper that I intend to get around to soon - and Jailhouse Rock on the SkyBox. Reports should follow. Btw Domino, I've just read Altman (great book by the way, highly recommended) and the quote you remember is actually showing the limitations of the then genre classification rather than on Elvis himself. Indeed - and this is probably damning with faint praise - he seems to regard him in a completely different league to the majority of Teen rock stars and classes him as the most significant figure in musicals in the 60s. Hmmmm.

Second dip in the TCM set came out significantly better with Annie Get Your Gun. That sounds very backhanded so I'll just say it's a very good film. Certain elements annoyed me like the scenes that seem to just tease and brutalize Annie as some ignorant hick. That's not to say she isn't one, but that the portrayal and tone is patronizing and rude. She at least in the beginning comes across as a cartoon with stereotypical 'feminine' emotions liberally shoved on. The Indian stuff near the end isn't much better put at least it's very short. That said they take the gas out of the show people on occasion so it's not absolutely criminal.

An other thing that probably allows me to be more forgiving of this element is Hutton's amazing performance which is just so earnest and into her character that I couldn't really dislike her and by extension the film. She just does this amazing job of playing up the most likable characteristics of a very obnoxious as written portrayal. Without her this film would die in an instant and I really don't have the proper words for the praise she deserves.

That's not to say that the other players don't do a great job either. Sidney steps back as usual, but does a few nice cuts that add to the drama without playing it up. Ditto toward the comedy even if it can get a little too yuck yuck for my taste. Honestly I don't know what the general problem with Keel on the board here is. I'm willing to forgive Show Boat considering here and elsewhere he seems good enough. He reminds me of Chevalier which I guess is where the problems arise, but I'm having fun with his stupid act. The standouts of course are Buffalo Bill and I didn't catch his name but anyone who's seen the movie knows exactly who I'm talking about. The terrible thing there is that I recognize the actor, but his name slips by me right now. Either way both performances do the right degree of show stealing and bowing to the leads to keep me interested in their fun, but not wishing the movie was about them.

The best thing though is the music which again like Show Boat is basically what I expected out of a Freed musical, but this time great. This is the one surefire perfect element to the film. The songs don't set out to be catchy (though like the Sondheim quote you're going to remember "there's no business like show business") but are supremely enjoyable and allow the film to roll about like the ocean.

Also took my second dip into the Esther Williams set with Fiesta and likewise it is better, but not as much. Like wise I'm irritated that I was promised a musical and got a regular romance with some music instead. If Williams weren't such a great screen presence I'd send my copy back for false advertising. The whole film beyond her is really just meh and it makes me wonder how Thorpe could have directed the extremely fun Prisoner of Zenda remake. The only energy on the screen is the star and a film really needs more than that.