Springtime in the Rockies

I've just viewed the video of 'Springtime in the Rockies' for perhaps the 50th time and it just keeps getting better. My video runs for 87 minutes; just what is in the missing 4 minutes, if the stated 91 minutes running time is correct, I wonder?

What do I like about this movie? It is beautiful to look at with superb sound that sweeps you back to the 1940s. John Payne and Carmen Miranda never made a better movie. Harry James wisely performs with the band and has few lines. But, if I have to pick out one actor, it is the wonderful Charlotte Greenwood, she of the L O N G legs. Her solo on the dance floor is the highlight of the movie. Betty Grable is nice to look at as well, of course! Then we have Edward Everett Horton and a number of other fine supporting actors who go to make up one of the best musicals to come out of the war years.

Singer/dancer Betty Grable (Vicky) has an offer from Cesar Romero (Victor) to join him in his show in the Canadian Rockies. Romero wouldn't mind a bit of romance as well. However, Grable has her heart set on her singer/dancer partner John Payne (Dan) if only he would stop seeing other women. Well, it seems he can't do that so Grable goes to Romero and they produce successful shows together, even getting engaged. Meanwhile, Payne isn't doing so well on his own so shows up in the Rockies to see if he can get Grable back as his partner. In a stroke of genius, he also picks up Edward Everett Horton (McTavish) as a butler and Carmen Miranda (Rosita) as a maid on his journey out there. Harry James and his orchestra play the music and all ends happily.

It's a great cast with entertaining singing and dancing. My favourite song is the opening song sung by Grable and Payne – "Run, Little Raindrop, Run" – and we get a couple of crazy Carmen numbers as well which are always entertaining. There is also a nice song – "I had the Craziest Dream" – sung by Helen Forrest who was the singer with the Harry James Orchestra. The secondary cast are amusing but the film does lose its way a bit with the romance and Romero is just too nice a guy in the way he takes it all.

The Technicolour here isn't the rich colours that you see in "Cover Girl" but a softer shade. I've never been to Canada, but the presence of Carmen Miranda, the way Helen Forest is made-up for her song and the setting of the venue and the music gives it a South American feel. They could have thrown in a moose or two to keep reminding us that we're in Canada.

There are several musicals from the early 1940s with overlapping cast memberships and similar plots. Among these are Down Argentine Way (1940), Week-End in Havana (1941), The Gang's All Here (1943) and this one.

This is my favorite of the lot, and here's why. Carmen Miranda and Edward Everett Horton.

Carmen Miranda was in all the movies I named above, and she steals the show in every single one of them. But in this one, she has a larger part.

The pairing of Carmen with Edward Everett Horton was sheer genius. The talented Horton had a wide range, from serious parts such as Lost Horizon (1937) to being the narrator of "Fractured Fairy Tales" in the 1960s. His best roles, though, were probably his comedic ones, and he was rarely better than here.

Carmen's wild attraction to Horton is funny enough in itself, simply because it is so unlikely. She is head-over-heels for him and throws herself at him in a way only the Brazilian Bombshell can do. Combine this with the diffident Horton's hesitancy, embarrassment and overall dignified befuddlement and you've got a love story the like of which has never been filmed elsewhere.

Don't get me wrong -- this is not the front story, which takes place between Betty Grable and John Payne. It is a secondary subplot. And the story itself is secondary to the music and dancing.

Still, for me, Rosita and McTavish are the sine qua non of the film, and make it my favorite movie in which I have seen Carmen Miranda.

If I didn't read it somewhere, I'm sure I'd appropriate the assertion myself: "Technicolor was invented for Carmen Miranda." That fabulously talented lady from Brazil possessed a sense of humor which brightened many an hour for me. (Yes, she was assisted by scriptwriters and directors who knew how to showcase her gifts, but her personality simply leaps from the screen and into all those receptive hearts who so regret her untimely passing.)

This is one of the better films in which Carmen appeared (Luvved her character's moniker: "Rosita Murphy" - What fun!) and other comments on this site aptly point out its delights. Everyone in the cast gets to add to the pleasure and let no one cast aspersions on Miss Betty Grable - her verve and naturalness were one of Twentieth-Century Fox's most valuable assets, especially during those difficult WWII years. A friend of mine, whose youthful cinema-going was considerably less supervised than mine, was absolutely besotted with Betty's blonde beauty and bounce. I believe he saw everyone of her films first-run, when he was barely old enough to enter a theater unaccompanied, as he did, and he insisted I catch TV showings of those Grable gems (and her fabled gams) whenever he saw a broadcast listing. Each time I was able to follow his recommendation, I was not in the least sorry. And with Senorita Miranda to whip this confection into frothy perfection...well, as the saying goes: "They don't make 'em like that anymore."

I wouldn't argue with anyone who said that Springtime in the Rockies might just be Betty Grable's best film. It certainly has a lot going for it.

The plot's a skimpy one as these types of films are. Betty's in love with her act partner John Payne who says he reciprocates, but can't get pinned down for marriage. After a performance in their show, she and Payne get into one fight too many and she takes off for an engagement with her former partner Cesar Romero in a resort on the shore of Lake Louise in those beautiful Canadian Rockies.

No one got near Lake Louise from 20th Century Fox. A few establishing shots of the lake with the mountains behind are all you see. Of course John Payne chases after her with some mixed motives. He wants to marry her, but he also wants her for a new show. He takes his own scenic route to Lake Louise, flying under his own power as well as by plane and finds when he both arrives and sobers up he's hired himself a secretary in Carmen Miranda and a valet in Edward Everett Horton.

Betty gets to make her first appearance on screen with her new husband, Harry James and his orchestra. Just prior and during World War II was the era of the big bands and all the studios tried to sign them up and shoe horn them into films. It was an easy fit in this case for Harry James.

Especially with a score from Harry Warren and Mack Gordon who provided James with one of his biggest hits. I Had The Craziest Dream. Played by the band with inimitable James trumpet and sung beautifully by Helen Forrest this was one of the biggest song hits of the World War II years. It still plays beautifully today.

Carmen Miranda does a couple of numbers in her unique style, you haven't lived until you've heard her do Chattanooga Choo Choo in Portugese. And in this wonderful cast in a small role is Jackie Gleason as Payne's agent. It's sad that in this wonderful cast, Gleason had a most nondescript part that shows absolutely nothing of his comic abilities.

There's nothing deep about Springtime in the Rockies, it's just fabulous entertainment with a cast you could never assemble like this today.