Spring Parade

I purchased a VHS copy from Movies Unlimited that was in new condition. The tape however had some flaws, possibly related to the source material. It looked like there was a few seconds missing between a couple of reel changes and a dropout possibly due to missing material or a bad master. It's difficult to tell. The footage/sound was also distorted at times for some of the songs, which could be due to my tracking on my VCR. I had to set the tracking manually to get the best picture and my VCR won't go to auto track once a manual setting is set. My parents have a cheaper VCR and played the tape with auto tracking. The tape had a bit of fuzz near the bottom of it but the audio may have been a little better with worse video. The transfer was produced by some small company with "Hollywood" in their name. It was better than not having access to the title. Of course I wished for better footage.

As far as the theme and subject of the movie, this movie is almost in the same vein as the original Good Fairy, in that the actress in both films is playing a country girl with little experience going to the big city. This in a sense is a type of variation in the Good Fairy theme with different typical Deanna Durbin musical twists. If your a fan of Deanna Durbin films you'll find this has all the typical things that happen in one of her musicals. When there's a problem, she'll usually end up singing her way out of them. In this case there are a few minor plot differences and twists that aren't in a typical Deana film, yet enough of the same types of things that a fan will feel at home in watching this movie. This movie might rate as one of the top 5 or 6 of her films. And I give it a high rating, SK "skuddles" is in a typical role as well. I think other criticisms of this film are to harse. I think this is a fine light Deanna Durbin film with enough quality to make it rate highly in a film you should watch if your a fan of her movies. The only problem is the transfer and copy that's available. I own a nonlinear editing system and wonder about the chance of finding a 16mm copy of this and maybe actually making an attempt at a transfer and edit into the other copy giving me a better master for my own home use. I almost feel like going after this as a personal restoration project, but I'm afraid there isn't decent source material to be found and think that the one out there is probably/unfortunately the best source available.

These kinds of things happen. Of course you have to rate this within a mindset of when it was produced and the type of movie it is. This is from a different era and to a large extent based on themes in Deanna's other copy of "The Good Fairy" movie theme, mixed in with a little bit of "the shop around the corner". It's a good theme mix. In some ways it's almost a perfect composite of other Deanna and other classic films, because it has so much other little things put in. Having so many little things in it, makes the film appear and actually looser in it's script, it's not as tight a script, but it can't be because it's more of a mix of other film themes all thrown in together. But even with it's loose plot it fits together pretty well.

I've put in my opinion without putting in enough to create a spoiler. I think it's worth watching and owning. If it came out from a good copy of 35mm inter-positive, wow I'd be really happy. I don't know if I can find better audio from her "audio" CD recordings that might be edited into a working dub, but I'm tempted to look.

Why do I watch these films. Well I put them together for my mom mostly. She likes light musicals with good singing and many of Deana Durbin films fit that bill very well. This film rates up there just below her best films in my opinion. There are 21 of her films out there. Many can only be had if you buy the PAL UK version of the DVD collection and do your own conversion to NTSC using a DVD player that can play Europeon PAL and trans-code it back to the USA standard. Some of the PAL titles have distorted sound as well, probably because the loss of decent film source copies of the movies. Truly a tragedy. Thank God for folks like Keno who try to restore and offer rare films before they are completely gone.

Also one more correction. Deanna Durbin films being Black and White are not "rare", all of her films were "black and white" except one. This is due to her high popularity and the studio had to cut corners to afford to have her in the film, so they cut by not shooting in color for all of her films, except one.

If your looking for an awesome older musical with charm, check out some of her movies. Totally family friendly with some great film moments in many of them.

Thought I reviewed this the other day, but apparently, that never posted. This is probably Deanna Durbin's best effort. She is most natural in the role; one suspects that the director brought out the closest expression of the real girl, here. It gains further power from the remarkable performances of a strong supporting cast. For example, the Baker--played by a well known supporting figure in movies over a couple of decades, also seems most natural here, compared to any other role, in which this reviewer has seen him. His story nephews, here, are far more natural, far better developed than they were in a W.C. Fields movie released in the same era. So too, are other familiar performers from the same era. Was Deanna, the Director, or a combination, the spark that brought out the best in almost everyone? Who can say. But the movie, on a modest budget, perhaps, communicates real joy to the viewer--real cinema magic, that has held up for me from the time I saw it first (seven times) at age 6 1/2 and 7, till I bought DVD's for myself and some other members of my family, within the past year.

It was my favorite movie in 1941. Viewed again, frequently, over the past seven months, it remains my favorite movie. (And that despite the fact that I am usually not that great a fan of musicals!)

My only complaint is that the film itself needs a good restoration to bring out the award-nominated cinematography of SPRING PARADE--and a minor complaint is that DEANNA DURBIN should have had at least two more songs to sing. Otherwise, it's a complete delight.

Her catchiest number is "Waltzing On Clouds" which is reprised at the finale and used for the big ballroom scene. It's a sort of Cinderella story set in Vienna, about a naive country bumpkin who meets her Prince Charming (ROBERT CUMMINGS) who happens to be a drummer in the local band. He's also a musician and love develops when Deanna backs his musical aspirations in a most unusual way.

S.Z. SAKALL stands out as the local baker who employs Deanna in his shop. As in most Durbin films, a series of mishaps and mistaken identities run through the story, only to be patched up before the windup. HENRY STEPHENSON, REGINALD DENNY, SAMUEL S. HINDS, ANNE GWYNNE, FRANKLIN PANGBORN and others help keep the story bubbling along with pleasant performances.

Henry Koster gives a sparkling touch to all the musical moments and Deanna is in fine voice. Robert Cummings again displays comic finesse as he always does in light romantic comedies.

One of Durbin's best films from the early '40s and it should be available on DVD.

One of the few Deanna Durbin films, almost all shot in black-and-white, not available on commercial video as of this writing. That's a shame. Universal needs to finally release this film as well Deanna Durbin's HERS TO HOLD, the final chapter in her THREE SMART GIRLS trilogy. SPRING PARADE is a charming and delightfully dated fairy tale-like film and makes a great companion to classics such as Danny Kaye's HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSON, Shirley Temple's HEIDI as well as Sonje Henie's series of films.

Deanna Durbin signs her heart out here as the Hungarian peasant "Ilonka". She's been told by a fortune teller that happiness is looming - and she reckons that might just have come true when she encounters "Harry" (Robert Cummings) - a drummer in the Imperial army. Meantime, though, he is fond of writing music, a skill prohibited in the military so she determines to somehow get his works in front of the Emperor (Henry Stephenson). Creatively, she takes to hiding them in the salt sticks that her boss the baker (S. Z. Sakall) makes daily for the court. That's quite a risky tactic as those who surround the throne worry that this could be a plot to poison their ruler and so the baker finds himself incarcerated, and "Ilonka" has to make a tough - and brave - decision. It's quite a charming mix of musical and romance this, with a bit of chemistry between Durbin and Cummings and with the scene-stealing Sakall and Stephenson also on good form guiding this gently evolving storyline towards it's inevitable and pleasing conclusion. "Waltzing on the Clouds" has the germ of an ear-worm to it - you might find yourself humming it long after the film has ended!