The Musicals List REDUX

[domino harvey]

Louis Calhern. You might remember him from everything

[knives]

Believe it or not this is only the sixth or seventh film with him I've seen, but yeah he does seem to sneak in everywhere. Though that's not the person I was referring to. I meant the business guy. Calhern's second banana.

[Cold Bishop]

If this list project has done anything for me, it's shown what a great actor Louis Calhern was. This is one of those character actors who should have been headlining films!

[Matt]

He's got a great role as Jane Powell's father in Two Weeks with Love. It's one of the things I like most about the film.

[colinr0380]

Indeed - and this is probably damning with faint praise - he seems to regard him [Elvis] 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.

I'd object to that. Elvis might have the greater muscial presence but I've always had a soft spot for those ridiculous Frankie Avalon 'beach party' films - they might not really fit a classical definition of 'good' but they are at least livelier than many of the awfully wooden Presley pics.

[knives]

Kiss Me Kate is just stellar with a lovely mixture of styles, punchy characters and gorgeous direction. Without a doubt this is the best I've seen from Sidney by taking everything that works in his other films and dropping every last failing. It really deserves more thought than I'm about to give it.

One of the most striking things and the first that I noticed is that he combines (really develops considering the time line) the naturalism he would use in Pal Joey with his typical musical bombast. It comes across just enough as if it were in our world that making it a musical cracks at the fourth wall even stronger than usual. It's not as extreme, but the effect isn't dissimilar from a documentary just randomly breaking out into song. I guess in this way it's a more Hollywood and traditional version of what Tsai has done with his musicals.

I'm not sure if this next effect is developed out of the above or it's just that good, but there's a rhythm going on that makes me during the speaking scenes want the music to never come on and vice versa. The momentum gets so powerful and stretched that it feels like any change in tempo will halt the film entirely, yet somehow it masters it's way through that feeling to cause a legitimately wonderful experience.

I have to say though I'm more confused than ever at the hate that Howard Keel gets around here. Sure, he's the poor man's Gene Kelly, but that doesn't make him bad with his performance here being the most fun yet. He's also really good I've noticed at changing his physicality. Had I not known it was him in all of these roles I doubt I'd ever figure it out. Here especially he looks more gaunt and dandyish than typical with a great many laughs being born out of his pathetic physique. Grayson too gives the best performance I've seen from her yet with a nice piece of nastiness invading all of her scenes. I'm reminding in a very positive sense by Anne Francis with her self absorbed little queen here. I wouldn't call it a laugh riot only because she did a great job of working in that sadness for the character. This naturally makes it all the more unfortunate that she has to go against Ann Miller who makes everyone else look like amateurs. Fortunately for the other actors she's not in the film a lot, but even with her secondary role she steals the show to such an extremity that at times I forgot she wasn't the lead character. Even in stuff like the red suit dance she face overpowers the rest of the screen and makes the other actors seem small. All this without over acting too, that's an impossible talent. I fear anyone who had to act against her. She can also dance amazingly. I know I already said that with On the Town, but she really outdoes herself here. How she managed to do that in that dress is beyond me.

As a really side note does anyone find James Whitmore to look eerily similar to George Bush?


Today's really good I guess since even the Williams' film of the day is really good. The music's again not integrated in the manner I would like best (with a few amazing exceptions), but at least it's always present and high quality. Obviously the thing that makes This Time for Keeps stand out is how is grapples with the light world of romance and musical alongside the horrors of soldiers returning from war. It never loses the tone of the other Thorpe directed films, but doesn't shy away either. I'm not sure if this is refreshing, stupid, good, or something I can't think of. Any way I look at it though it's an interesting look at society in 1947. I have to say if we do do that musical number short list the bar song in this one might make mine. That came out of nowhere and went everywhere.

[Matt]

Who around here hates Howard Keel? Other than you saying a few pages back that he looks like a creepy pedophile (at least I think you were referring to Keel), I haven't noticed any particular negative criticisms of him.

EDIT: Okay, I see now that zedz said he can't stand Keel, but other than that...

[knives]

Maybe Zedz's feelings on him are so strong that it gave me the impression everyone here more in the know held the same feelings.

[zedz]

Yeah, I admit it: I find Keel's screen presence (blustering self-deprecation and all) to be really ponderous and broad, which is the last thing I'm looking for in a musical leading man. I find watching Kismet like wading through glue, and Kiss Me Kate is like an overloaded airplane trying to take off: it starts to soar whenever Bob Fosse and Hermes Pan take the controls, but crunches back onto the tarmac as soon as Keel and Grayson are wheeled on to deliver the plot. And it takes an awful lot of blah for a film to squander the good will I have for it after seeing Ann Miller do 'Too Darn Hot'.

Caveats: I have yet to see Seven Brides for Seven Brothers and have no intention of seeing the remake of Show Boat, and I don't mind him in Calamity Jane.

[knives]

I can't understand how anything could squander the good will of Ann Miller, but you must find him insanely aggravating then. That woman is character actor perfection (and I only just now realized she played the landlord in Mulholland Dr.)

[Matt]

I find watching Kismet like wading through glue, and Kiss Me Kate is like an overloaded airplane trying to take off: it starts to soar whenever Bob Fosse and Hermes Pan take the controls, but crunches back onto the tarmac as soon as Keel and Grayson are wheeled on to deliver the plot.

I feel exactly the same way about both films and I like Howard Keel. I think you'll find him at the very least tolerable and possibly even charming in Seven Brides. The role fits his performance style almost perfectly.

It's funny, but the bluster and bravado of Gene Kelly's '50s performances are making me start to dislike him as a musical leading man. Watch, especially in the films he co-directed, how he always manages to allow for applause within the film after one of his dance numbers. It's so self-congratulatory.

[zedz]

I know what you mean about Kelly, but at least he's got the smarts to make that vanity and egotism part of the character in several of the roles (and he's actually a rare Hollywood actor who knows how to exploit the dark side of his persona without "playing bad") - and when he dances, all is forgiven.

[knives]

Finished off the TCM set with Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. It didn't immediately jump out to me and for a film with it's reputation it's positively sedated. I do mean positively by the way. The experience of watching the film is great even if, maybe because, it lacks the bombast of what I've been watching lately. The film doesn't roar, but it doesn't need to and this different type of tone almost makes the film sinister and at least gives the appearance of depth. That doesn't even get into how it makes the casual slapstick seem actually casual. The jokes hit stronger because of that false sense of subtlety.

One thing that returns with a vengeance is some stand out production design. Everything is so littered and detailed it's almost a joke in itself that they're used to paint what's so clearly a lie. An amazing amount of thought must have gone into the colour scheme as every scene with Powell has her standing out like an island in a sea of brown. Everyone and everything else just seeps into the background, but this poor girl can't hide. Even as she becomes accepted by the family they let her stick out like a sore thumb.

Related to that I was amused, and annoyed I didn't figure out by the title, at how the story is basically Snow White where she falls for one of the midgets. Having the Dwarfs redeemed through her doesn't seem like a new idea now, but I'm honestly curious if it was really a thing before this movie/ play. The fairy tale insistence on such a relatively naturalistic film is pretty damn fascinating. That said even when it's abandoned for a more bizarre if logical plot I wasn't disappointed. A tad confused as to how we arrived there, but it was enjoyable in a way that makes sense.

I would be amiss not to mention how all of the actors in this very large cast just knock it out of the park, possibly two. A lot of this has to be the physical acting since there's no way verbal acting can cover all of these bases. To aid that this has to be one of the best choreographed musicals I've seen thus far. It really earns that scope framing and then some. It's always playing to that naturalism and always makes sense in the world as constructed, but it's also fills the film. Not an inch is unused and I really want to see Michael Kidd's other films this one worked so perfectly within what Donnen was trying to do.

Pagan Love Song sees Williams playing second banana to Keel which was at first a disappointment, but turned into nice change of pace, though one that pales to the above film. He forces the movie into being much more of a musical than the previous films with a few short pieces. Actually that was probably the thing I appreciated the most. A lot of these musicals have been overstuffed and insanely long, but this one runs barely over an hour and never feels hurt for it. Actually this is one of the loosest films I've seen for the project yet just allowing me to glide in and enjoy it as the fun travelogue it was clearly intended as.

I don't want it to seem like I'm being harsh on these Williams films because they are very fun and I encourage people who haven't seen them to do so, but until now they've defied my definition of a musical. I can almost guarantee now that i know what I'm getting into I'd respond better to them. That's to say I had no trouble here and every element of the film made sense finally (though a new director may be part of the reason). Williams is a really charming and great presence as lead and seems able to lift her honestly terrible material to grand heights for a consistently fun experience. So I suppose i'm not playing leagues with these six, but they're great as second stringers though.

[domino harvey]

Seven Brides For Seven Brothers doesn't really have much of a reputation except maybe with people who don't watch many musicals (See: the Music Man, et al). Frankly, save the barn raising and some intermittent dancing, it's pretty awful, and the sexual politics, though inherent in the source material, are unbearable. As for Williams, I haven't gotten to the second set of her films yet, but your generally positive shrugs fit in line with my reactions thus far to the first set, though the dual "Baby It's Cold Outside" choreography in Neptune's Daughter is brilliant

[knives]

Yeah, I didn't want to bring it up but the second half of the film is downright horrifying. If I understood everything correctly it ends on a really creepy Stockholm syndrome note. That putting up the house sequence is pretty amazing though. As for Williams they're showing Easy to Wed next Saturday on TCM so I'll try watching that. She does have a likable presence, but her films never seem to surpass okay.

[Matt]

Seven Brides For Seven Brothers doesn't really have much of a reputation except maybe with people who don't watch many musicals

Aw, I don't believe that for a minute. The music, lyrics, and choreography are some of the best to come out of MGM, period.

[knives]

I do hope Dom's pushing on Reefer Madness is just as successful as his pushing on Calamity Jane seems to be. If nothing else it's sense of comedy is completely up my avenue using everything goofy about the original and adding some stylish self consciousness that pushes it up a few notches. Everything is so deliberately mannered and executed with Ozu like exactness (otherwise this movie has nothing in common with him naturally) that it's a massive disappointment to see where Fickman went after this. That's true of most of the cast too (though I think we expect terrible decisions from Cumming by even that point) who hit every beat perfectly but haven't seemed to use that talent subsequently.

I should probably talk about the music and dancing which to be honest gets into my history with the genre better than the other films I've been watching for this project. It reminds me of stage musicals and has ties closer to that than with the Freed and other stuff I've been watching. This makes me a bit confused about Dom's comments since it really seems to have nothing in common with those classic films he talks about sharing qualities with. It's a thoroughly modern musical and sits easy with the other examples I've seen from this era of filmed musicals. In fact (to beat a dead horse) The Wayward Cloud feels closer to the '50s musicals than this film ever does. The movie works in every way though and is guaranteed a high spot for now.

Just to compound the difference I also caught the super old school You Were Never Lovelier which truly lives up to it's name. I can't tell you why this has clicked when Top Hat didn't given how similar the films are, but my response to this one is just a positive feeling of elation and relaxation. This is a cast I don't need to waste any words on (though Hayworth has never made such a strong impression upon me before) so I'll keep things short and focus on the list relevant stuff.

The numbers start off short, unobtrusive, and creep in just enough to allow the film to be a musical for the most part, but then the big number between Astaire and Hayworth though is worth all the waiting in the world. It's aflame for excitement and intimacy. I'm tempted to say best sex scene of the '40s, but again that would be me being absurd. At that point the musical aspect of the film shoots forward with amazing force. I imagine this is the sort of thing people mean when they say the Berkeley films are back loaded, but here the filler between numbers is a pretty great movie in itself and well worth watching even without the music. As my bit of hyperbole suggests though the numbers sparkle too. I think the reason I didn't remember the numbers in Top Hat before is because of an emphasis on singing when Astaire's feet are more effective than his voice. It's not the music but what the eyes can absorb that matter. I'm curious what he would have been like in silent pictures on that account. Maybe someone else will take off on this thought, but Astaire surely does develop an interesting way to make a musical.

To top off the night with I watched an other Williams film, this one directed by Le Roy . Million Dollar Mermaid's not as fun as Gypsy, but it's still fairly above average for these films. The plot is bizarre enough (boxing kangaroo) that it never fails to entertain, but the overwrought emotions that Le Roy brings to the table choke the film to nearly being television soap opera quality. Victor Mature thankfully cancels enough of that out by being a sneering oil snake salesman sort. All of the actors do manage to defeat what should be a story of really bad melodrama and turn into something very good (if far from great). Actually I should compliment the people involved for turning a Pride of the Yankees type picture into a comedy. Williams especially does miracle work getting laughs from her character's biggest accomplishments. I'm honestly curious what sort of career she would have had with a few more Take Me Out to the Ball Games and few less what this set has shown. She's dying at several points and her droll delivery just kills the scene. The movie also provides something that I always get a smile out of: no accents. Apparently every character in the movie is Australian despite sounding like they just jumped out of the middle of America.

Despite being the best in the set yet it's also the least musical. It's not until after the first hour that we get anything in the way of a musical number, but it's a dozy gorgeously choreographed by Busby Berkeley. It never really cracks down on the fourth wall or becomes a thing, but it would be disrespectful to the amazing work put forward to call it anything but. It's more ballet than musical though and I wonder what that means it should be called.

[domino harvey]

I'm awful glad someone else even bothered to see Reefer Madness: the Movie Musical, much less liked it!

Sweet Charity (Bob Fosse 1969) Making a cheerful musical out of Fellini's Nights of Cabiria is a head-scratcher, but Fosse's debut as director is marvelously successful. For those familiar with the source material, the film has a perpetual sense of dread that creeps into the background of even the sunniest moments-- we know this can't have a happy ending, but musicals do, so how's this gonna wind up? Shirley MacLaine is of course game fun in the title role, and the film almost seems too perverse for words as it casts Stubby Kaye and then waits until almost the last moment to give him a song-- I was genuinely getting irate with the possibility that a musical would hire Kaye and not let him sing!

Speaking of singing, the musical has the good fortune to be hitched to a great collection of songs, which Fosse has cut up and interrupted to better serve his syncopated dance inclinations-- it's fantastic to watch him continually reconfigure "Hey Big Spender" or "If They Could See Me Now" in cinematic language. Other highlights are "There's Got to Be Something Better Than This," which tugs at the emotional core of the film, and the completely superfluous (in a good way) show-stopping "Rhythm of Life" number with Sammy Davis Jr leading a choir of hippies in a parking garage. Most of the numbers post-intermission are likewise narratively useless, but what's a Broadway adaptation without bloat?

("Rhythm of Life" has inspired me to finally watch those hippie musicals of the 70s, Hair and Godspell-- will I regret my decision? Are there others I should also seek out?)

Senior Prom (David Lowell Rich 1958) A bunch of unattractive nobodies portray college students in love and out in this hopelessly square teenage entertainment by committee. While it's kind of hilarious how far from the mark the film "gets" teens in the late 50s (BOB CROSBY'S GONNA SING AT OUR PROM?!), this musical is saddled with too many detriments (lousy cast, songs, direction, production values, and the beat goes on) for any salvage operation to be possible while viewing.

Too Many Girls (George Abbott 1940) And here's a college film filled with tons of recognizable faces but still sucks. Notable now only for having introduced Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, the pic also asks the viewer to accept Eddie Bracken as a star quarterback and has early spots for Ann Miller and Mrs. Johnson's blonde boy Van. Rodgers and Hart's songs are awful, the "New Mexico" set design an eyesore, and no one involved seems to have any idea what's going on. All interested parties would be better served watching Lucille Ball's later, wonderfully self-reflexive college comedy Best Foot Forward instead.

[knives]

I'm awful glad someone else even bothered to see Reefer Madness: the Movie Musical, much less liked it!

I figured worse comes to worse I'll finally be able to toss out my VHS of the original. Turns out I got a whole lot more. I do urge others to check it out. Tip top recommendation.

[antnield]

("Rhythm of Life" has inspired me to finally watch those hippie musicals of the 70s, Hair and Godspell-- will I regret my decision? Are there others I should also seek out?)

Neither's great, nor as good as Sweet Liberty. Godspell has a certain bizarro appeal, but Hair sorely disappoints given Milos Forman's presence as director. Far better is another Galt MacDermot credit from around the same time, Joseph Despins' The Moon Over the Alley - although this is more Brechtian musical than musical-musical. There's an excellent region-free BFI Blu-ray out there which pairs the film with the fascinating (non-musical) Duffer... and therefore a thread devoted to the film on this forum!

[knives]

Maybe I'm thinking about this too much, but I love how deliriously self conscious The Band Wagon is. I'm not talking the obvious Astaire as bankrupt Astaire stuff, but how out of time he is. The movie makes the '50s look like a particularly scuzzy '70s. He's so lost in this sea of modernity that even when he's happy he seems like a goose amongst ducks, or maybe the other way around. These sort of men out of time films are just fantastic and I can hardly think of a film that measures up to this one. Every scene compounds this perfectly and I'd just be transcribing the film if I gave a list of favorites, but I have to mention the perfect example for the whole film of the first Faust pitch. Astaire's bewilderment and sadness is just hilarious even as it makes me think a little too much. Putting this all to a tried and true story probably helps the most since there's no real distraction from the characters. All the mechanics are so familiar that you can ignore it and examine the cogs which are to my eyes uniquely shaped for the reasons above.

As the movie goes on I think this may make the main plot a little creepy. Again I'm likely over thinking things, but he's using music and the theater as a way to escape from what he sees and doesn't like. There's a sense of lamentation in things like the super creepy baby scene or the gangster bit. It gives the film an air of tragedy and darkness that while not all consuming still gives it a lot more depth than first appearances suggest.

This is also the best use of music I've seen between the three Astaire's. The camera is so alive and bouncy so that Astaire is never alone in these songs. Whether for right or wrong the only number where this isn't true is 'That's Entertainment', but I think that's just part of it being such a big number. Going along with that the movie never repeats itself with each number being pulled out of a different style, but ultimately unified by interesting quirks by Minnelli. The way he waves the camera back and forth and uses the set, things I already picked up on The Pirate which so far is my favorite classic musical, is very distinctive and I wonder how much he was involved with the choreography. The film is just a wonderful organism.

The performances likewise kill. I know I keep saying that, but it's true and I'm glad it's been a while since that wasn't. They're all working with types which while benefiting the movie could have been a pain to them. Each actor imbues subtle physical elements to their performance that makes the character stand out from their type. While his character is the most one note I like think I like the pansy ham the best. I'm embarrassed to admit he had me rolling at points. I don't think there's a way to say things with that voice and not make it comical.

[domino harvey]

(...)the movie never repeats itself with each number being pulled out of a different style (...)

Exactly. This is the best musical to my eyes because it is every kind of musical and contains an example of every aspect that defines the genre. If you could only keep one musical to preserve for and explain to future generations this genre, The Band Wagon's it.

[knives]

Well it never becomes rock opera. So at least one other film should be preserved.

[domino harvey]

Every kind of musical in the Altman sense (Folk, Show, and Fairy Tale)

[knives]

The silent opening to Guys and Dolls is just amazing and that the film has any momentum after that is the biggest compliment that one can can give Mankiewicz here. It really disproves even more strongly than All About Eve that he was just a writer who lucked out. There's an amazing amount of talent on display here that messes with the format as much as it stays within it. There's a level of perversity to making a film this colorful and music filled one about gangsters let alone playing the genre so straight, but not for a second did I fail to believe what was being shilled out to me. Part of that I think is that he forgoes post-Underworld conventions and instead goes back to stuff like Regeneration and the Browning films. It uses the genre, but such an obscure version of it that he can paint however he pleases.

With that element of unbelievability out of the way an other comes up with how to make singing dancing goons threatening and here too the film excels simply by going down the unlikely route. These aren't really gangster actors being cast and definitely not typical musical actors at least in the supporting roles which are all that matter anyway. It's more like the casting of a comedy. It's a good way to lower defenses and the first act builds this up to so that when things get really serious it comes as a shock and touches personally. The emotions run real because the essence of reality they are eventually shown in shouldn't happen in the film we're introduced to. I'd hate to exaggerate so I'll keep it to like saying this is a structural Romeo and Juliet.

To get back to the acting the real shock here was how much I like Brando in this. Even in the best of films usually I can just tolerate him, but this is one of those rarest of occasions where he's used perfectly and everything hits it's mark. He's the first real hint that the film has something else up it's sleeve. He gives this feeling that he's a creep and villain in just the way he speaks. When he goes to Simmons the first time it's hard not to feel for her just because they share the frame. Though when he sings the illusion cracks slightly because of how out of place it is. He's not a bad singer, but it just doesn't look right sometimes. Speaking of Simmons has a great personality about her and shows a lot more strength than her character has. Her eyes are always on fire and to contradict my past sentence she's the only person who seems to be able to go toe to toe with Brando. All of the character dynamics are pretty unique and going through them would make this boring thing I'm typing even worse so I'll just talk in general terms about the other two leads who are as different from the other two as can be. Blaine's the true stand out of that relationship with a hilarious voice that the music uses perfectly (more of that later) and while the character is mostly played for laughs I almost feel guilty for doing such given the pitiable personality she's given. She seems like a genuinely good character and not worth this gangster junk she's been thrown into and her sole want seems more and more like a tiny thing as the film goes on. Just marry her Sinatra you wimp. Yeah, I was amused that he's a full on loser here too. The identity of young and old Sinatra are drastically different if these films are any indication. He's so likable as the loser though that he just disappears into the role like Sinatra was never a person. He's accidentally cruel and petty basically only redeemed by Blaine and the goons. It's an interesting set up that the story exploits to it's fullest. I don't want to waste reading time, but I would be horrible not to mention the great job done by those two goons especially the fat one. Its an absolutely memorable performance that helps the other characters feel like people while being fairly interesting in his own right. He's a definite thrown into greatness type bumbler. What a fun performance.

Like a couple of things the film blows it's wad early with the musical numbers. It begins with this Altman-esque singing over each other thing that made me expect something truly revelatory. It slowly becomes more typical as the film moves along, but fortunately doesn't get bad and there are a number of truly great pieces scattered throughout (fat man gets the shinning moment again). Staying with that first number though the biggest strength throughout the film is it's use of chorus. The more the merrier is the best way to look at the numbers I guess. It never goes anywhere less than excellence even if it doesn't really live up to it's potential.