The Duke Is Tops

An unusual film for an audience outside the USA. Lena Horne looks fabulous and so does Ralph Cooper. There is not added background of tap steps as in other musicals so you do not hear the beat of the taps which is great realism. Music is muted to hear what dancing steps there are. Acting is a little stilted and the casts speak slowly so that you think the movie is older than it is. Costumes are daring for the time in the dance routines at the end. Often feels like you are part of an audience at a stage show. What furniture you see is very modern which adds to the movies feeling of other worldliness. A must for all film buffs.

Black cinema has done far better than this. Even allowing for the constraints imposed by a low budget, there is very little here of entertainment value. The story lacks originality, the acting is stiff and self-conscious, the direction devoid of imagination. A half-dozen "specialty" acts are no better than passable; a very young Lena Horne had yet to develop her star qualities. The chorus girls' costumes looked suspiciously familiar (Warner Brothers?), and the two or three steps they learned for their routines have likewise been seen elsewhere. I hope the price of admission was cut-rate, too. Otherwise, the audience was short-changed.

I watched this on CUNY TV. I was curious and stayed because it had enough elements to be entertaining. Ralph Cooper is handsome and likable. I didn't even realize that Lena Horne was the beautiful singer. I thought she was a Lena Horne knock off. She seems to have been required to slim down and had better glamour treatment in Hollywood films. Interesting because of its use of black actors and performers in ways they couldn't be shown in film other than those made for black audience. Talented singers and dancers and a window into what the TOBA houses were like in the south. And an extended snake oil routine of the rural south. Even the diner with its ham and eggs special is interesting as an historic window on life eighty years ago. I'm glad Lena Horne was able to make it out of this niche market even if she was still relatively isolated in the roles she could play.

Duke Is Tops, The (1938)

** (out of 4)

Decent race movie has producer Duke Davis (Ralph Cooper) breaking it off with partner Ethel Andrews (Lena Horne) so that her career will have a chance to take off. He hits the hard times before eventually getting what might be a break by bringing Andrews back to form. If you're familiar with race films then you know they don't feature the style, budgets or talents of those films being released in Hollywood. You also shouldn't go into a Musical like this expecting something like you'd see from MGM. With that out of the way, this is pretty much what you'd expect as we get a straight-forward story without any twists or turns and a predictable ending that you'll see coming from a mile away. There's really nothing overly special here but people will want to check out Horne who made her film debut here. I don't think anyone could watch this and see the talent that would come in future films but at the same time this was her first stab at acting. The screenplay really doesn't do her any justice but she does have that wonderful voice that she gets to show off several times. The songs themselves aren't going to be found on Horne's greatest hits package but they aren't too bad. I thought Cooper was pretty good as well, although, again, the screenplay does his character no justice. While the part wasn't the best written I thought Cooper kept things moving and made his character fun to watch. There's not too much imagination in terms of direction but I'm sure a lot of this could be blamed on the screenplay and the fact that there wouldn't have been much time to shoot this thing. The low budget is very apparent with several dance/musical sequences, which just come off looking very cheap. The numbers aren't overly bad, it's just that they aren't impressive either. Fans of race movies or those wanting to see the 21-year-old Horne might want to check this out but others should stay clear.

A great look at the black entertainment industry in 1938. A young Lena Horne shines in her performance as Ethel, a singer who makes her way to the 'big time'. Ralph Cooper plays her boyfriend Duke who is also involved in the entertainment business. As the film progresses, Duke and Erthel are separated and Duke throws his lot in with a travelling medicine show with the esteemed Doctor Dorando, played wonderfully by Laurence Criner. The time with the medicine show is one of this movies treasures as it gives the audience a rare look at how an actual medicine show operated around the South back then. Special musical guests are presented (great guitarist featured by the way...), the spiel is given and the medicine sells.

As one of the stage performers shown on stage early in the movie, look for the fantastic moves of "Rubberneck Holmes". Don't worry, you will recognize him.

A lot of these 'race movies' are a fantastic look at wonderful performers that were never presented in mainstream Hollywood. This movie is worth seeing.