The Sky's the Limit

Very much in the Fred Astaire canon of the 30's-40's (Fred meets girl, Fred exasperates girl, Fred wins girl over on the dance floor), THE SKY'S THE LIMIT - although uneven - contains some of Astaire's best and most unusual moments on film. It's worth getting past a few jarring notes to access them.

In almost every one of his musicals, Fred plays some extension of the same character: the lovestruck, earnest but insouciant sophisticate, and for some reason the standard formula required Fred to annoy the object of his affection upon their initial meeting - and often for some time after. This picture frequently carries the gimmick to inexplicable extremes.

The recipient of Fred's love at first sight is magazine photographer Joan Leslie, who although not quite a triple-threat (her singing voice is courtesy of Sally Sweetland, but she could dance and handle both comedy and drama; call her a two-and-a-half threat) is generally up to the task, and projects a maturity far beyond her 18 (yup: 18) years. Supplying able assistance is Robert Benchley as Joan's editor and would-be suitor, who has moments hinting at more depth as an actor than he was usually given an opportunity to display.

With Fred portraying a Flying Tiger ace who skips out on a PR tour to enjoy a few days of fun before returning to duty, there are elements of wartime morale-boosting, but only around the edges, and in what sometimes is an almost subversive vein. After enduring a discourse on "how to win this war" from the man who has given him a lift to town, Astaire's only response is, "What's your classification?" "4-F," the man answers, to which Astaire replies, "That's what I thought."

In an odd bit of casting, Robert Ryan appears as one of Fred's Air Forces buddies, but takes the script's intended mischief a bit too seriously. In scenes that call for him to merely tease, he practically drips with menace. That quality would serve him well in subsequent films, but here it's one of the aforementioned jarring notes.

There's still plenty of fun along the way, and the script is sprinkled with in-jokes, such as references to some of Astaire and Leslie's costars in earlier films, or Benchley's series of celebrated two-reel shorts for MGM in the 30's (Joan tells of a wedding proposal from him that digressed to a lecture about "the sex life of a polyp"). Indeed, Benchley delivers one of his trademark disorganized addresses at a fete honoring an industrialist, and while it brings the story to a halt for a few minutes, you won't really mind if you're a fan.

The crown jewel of THE SKY'S THE LIMIT is one of Astaire's best vocalizations of one of the best songs ever written for him, "One For My Baby (and One More For the Road"), along with one of his most adventurous dance solos, in which a night of bar-hopping after a falling-out with Leslie culminates in an explosive choreographic release of frustration and fury, at the posh nightspot where they first met.

This may not become one of your favorite Astaire pictures, but there are rewards if you can overlook a few rough spots.

This may conceivably be THE most under-rated film of all-time... NO ONE seems to love it as much as I do. Maltin, etc. all consider it one of Fred's worst movies. I don't understand why! He's great, Robert Benchley is on hand (doing one of his best patented befuddled speaker routines), and Joan Leslie is beautiful, sharp, and a great dancer (she really keeps up with Astaire, which is hard to do!) On top of that there are two immortal songs ("My Shining Hour", and "One For My Baby). It's not really a musical though, more of a romantic-comedy. Astaire and Leslie have a wonderful chemistry, especially in their debates over the importance of work in a man's life (Astaire is practically playing a gen-xer here!) Don't listen to the critics, watch this movie, it has biting wit, good music, and will leave you wistfully happy!

Joan Leslie is one of my all-time favorite classic actresses (it's mainly her wholesome pretty looks) and Fred Astaire's dancing is always entertaining.....but this film is only so-so. Perhaps one reason is there aren't enough song-and-dance numbers. Leslie only dances with Astaire once. The few songs that are in here, however, are good, and Fred's dancing is never anything but superb.

It was interesting to see such a young-looking Robert Ryan, who has a minor role. I wish Robert Benchley's was smaller as his humor did nothing for me. Storywise, this is a typical Astaire film which means a bit sappy and filled with people who are not telling the truth or holding back the truth. That theme gets so tiresome.

THE SKY'S THE LIMIT (RKO Radio, 1943), directed by Edward H. Griffith, returns song and dance man Fred Astaire to the studio where history was made with his on-screen partnership opposite Ginger Rogers in their nine musicals from 1933 to 1939. Ten years since his introduction to the screen, and having acquired new dancing partners ranging from Eleanor Powell at MGM and Rita Hayworth at Columbia, Astaire takes a sentimental journey back to where it all began, with Joan Leslie, on loan from Warner Brothers, as his co-star in a war-time theme quite popular in the 1940s. A routine story that could very well have been used as any one of the Astaire and Rogers collaborations, THE SKY'S THE LIMIT, minus the lavish sets, with an in-joke reference to Ginger Rogers, is a shining hour and a half of old-fashioned screen entertainment.

Plot Summary: Set during World War II, Fred Atwell (Fred Astaire), a Flying Tiger pilot, along with his buddies, Reginald "Red" Fenton (Robert Ryan) and Dick Merlin (Richard Davies), becomes a celebrated war heroes and center of attention in a ticker tape parade. Because they are scheduled to do personal appearances during their ten day leave, with no time for themselves, Fred breaks away from a national tour on the next train stop, hitching rides into the city, changing into cowboy attire and having a perfect furlough for himself. He later encounters Joan Manyon (Joan Leslie), a photographer on assignment at the Colonial Club, and takes an interest in her. Coping with Fred's constant annoyance to get acquainted, she has her work cut out for her with her employer, Phil Harriman (Robert Benchley) who keeps her from important overseas assignments in order to keep her near him with the hope she'll say yes to his marriage proposals. As a toss-up, Joan starts dating Fred, who by now has moved into her apartment building to be near her. By the time Joan starts showing an interest in Fred, "Red" and Dick step in on Fred's territory, Dick dancing with Joan while "Red" forces Fred to do a snail dance on top of the table in public in order to keep Joan, who believes Fred to be an unemployed drifter, from learning his true identity. A strain in their relationship takes its toll with Joan wanting Fred to find work, but when he turns down good job offers, she starts doubting whether Fred cares for her or not.

The motion picture soundtrack with songs by Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer include: "My Shining Hour" (sung by Joan Leslie); "My Shining Hour" (sung by Fred Astaire); "I've Got a Lot in Common With You" (sung and danced by Astaire and Leslie); "My Shining Hour" (danced by Astaire and Leslie) and "One for My Baby" (sung and danced by Astaire). While "My Shining Hour" received an Academy Award nomination as best song, it's "One for My Baby" that's as memorable as Astaire's now classic solo dance number. For an Astaire musical, the songs are few and far between, with the emphasis striving more on plot than music. An old song standard, "Three Little Words" can be heard instrumentally as dance music conducted in the night club sequence by Freddie Slack and his Orchestra.

The supporting cast consists of some familiar faces, including Elizabeth Patterson (Millie Fisher, the landlady); Marjorie Gateson (The Canteen Hostess); Clarence Kolb (Harvey S. Sloan), along with Paul Hurst, Olin Howland and Clarence Muse in smaller roles. For anyone familiar with the Astaire & Rogers musicals of the 1930s might get a feel of nostalgia seeing their co-star of five musicals, Eric Blore, working opposite Astaire for the last time, appearing briefly as Jackson, the valet, or as he phrases it, "a gentleman's gentleman." Blore's cameo lasts slightly over a minute and goes without any screen credit.

In spite of Astaire's name heading the cast, it is evident by the film's conclusion that THE SKY'S THE LIMIT belongs to Joan Leslie, a very popular leading lady during the World War II years. Still in her late teens and assuming the role of a woman in her twenties, she handles her assignment well, although she's much too young to be having the likes of middle-aged Benchley and slightly younger Astaire going after her. Nicely paced at 89 minutes, it's only slow point goes to humorist Robert Benchley acting as guest of honor of a Sloan Air Craft benefit where he attempts reading a 1936 chart to the guests, a routine reminiscent to one of his many comedy shorts that doesn't seem to work well by today's standards.

As entertaining as it is underrated, THE SKY'S THE LIMIT, distributed on video cassette through Turner Home Entertainment during the 1990s, and formerly shown on American Movie Classics prior to 2001, can be seen periodically on Turner Classic Movies. (***1/2)

This is a romantic comedy on the surface, and it's not a bad one at all, with sharp dialogue, surprising transitions where the characters switch from being the cat to being the mouse and vice-versa, and dancing and music and fun and silliness.

I also found it surprisingly poignant. It covers a lot of the same ground as films from the same period like "The Clock" and "Since You Went Away" - a compressed courtship between a soldier and a civilian, where they have a very short time between meeting as strangers and the soldier going off to war. These films (which aren't just Hollywood fantasies, they would have been happening to millions of people in real life) have two sources of dramatic uncertainty - firstly the uncertainty about whether they're really getting to know each other or they're just on an emotional roller coaster; and secondly the uncertainty about whether it's fair to get married and run the risk of the civilian being left a widow or spending the rest of her life looking after a severely injured husband. These issues aren't explicitly discussed in "The Sky's the Limit", which is still a romantic comedy, but they're alluded to sufficiently clearly that a contemporary audience would have understood that Astaire's character was very confused, unsure about whether to hit the accelerator or the brake, and wound up enough that he could have gotten drunk and smashed up a bar.

Another striking scene in the movie was a comment Astaire's character made about how one might go to war not for any grand cause but to preserve one's freedom to be a slacker. He was behaving consistently with that declaration in (at least initially) wanting to spend a few days out of uniform, joking around and having fun with a pretty girl. There are questions about whether an actual WW2 fighter pilot on leave would behave that way - I don't know, within the film, I find it plausible enough for suspension of disbelief, and if nothing else it's a nice way of inserting a "why we fight" message about the United States not being a nation of full-time uniformed soldiers, but of civilians who occasionally put on a uniform to defend life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.