The Band Wagon This isn't just another "let's put on a show" plot, it's Singin' in the Rain only set on Broadway. Let me cut to the chase, The Band Wagon was directed by Vincent Minnelli. Minnelli is great for taking really creative ideas and killing them with blatantly stupid decisions. Take for example the first preview. (And I'm telling you, if you've seen Singin', you can follow right along.) we see everyone go in all happy. The doors close. The smart creative decision is to reopen the doors as if time as passed and watch all the smiling faces march out in frowns. And Minnelli does exactly that. EXCEPT... in between the two beats there are three dissolves to pencil sketch concept drawings of the show. Kills the whole effect of the time cut and the images don't even fit in with the show we've been led to believe they're watching.
He makes very frustrating decisions. You wait for Fred Astaire to dance with Cyd Charisse and he doesn't just draw out the anticipation, he tries your patience. Two easy and obvious "they should dance here" moments pass by. It's a musical that feels like it's missing a bunch of songs. And what's here isn't all that great. The most well known is "That's Entertainment", which is a standard but one of my least favorite from the classic musical catalogue. "Louisiana Hayride" is fun and "Triplets" is known cause it features Astaire and a couple of others dressed up as babies and dancing on their knees.
The finale is
Smooth Criminal a mean a film noir murder mystery in jazz. Again, some marvelous ideas, but while this predates The Red Shoes it also shows that Minnelli is no Powell/Pressburger. Some good moments among a lot of bad decisions. I felt bad for Astaire, who I think took the job just to dance with Charisse. He suffers a lot of barbed attacks at his fading career and they don't feel in jest, just kinda mean.
GRADE: *1/2MRS. 1SO:
Boy did she hate this movie. Her biggest problem was that none of the supporting cast were the least bit interesting, and the egotistical actor/director and the husband writer were annoying. (I used the photo above because the shoe shiner, played by Leroy Daniels was her 2nd favorite performance). Very little was said except to wonder if it was over yet. Right now she's wishing we'd dug up some more stuff from the 30s and 40s. She thought I picked this one as a joke. Didn't like the songs. Wanted to see more tap dancing.
GRADE: 1/2p.s. Mrs. 1SO has come to really love Betty Hutton and the songs from Annie Get Your Gun. She's forgotten a lot of what she didn't like about that one and finds it to be the most memorable of the marathon so far.
[tinypic isn't working so I'll have to properly upload these images later.]