It's a Great Life

Rosetta and Vivian Duncan have always done things together. When Rosetta gets fired for being a little free in her vocabulary, Vivian quits. Fortunately, agent Benny Rubin has seen their act at the company show. Along with Lawrence Grey at the piano, they are a hit in vaudeville. But Rosetta thinks it's all them, so Grey gets downgraded... until Vivian marries him. That breaks up the act, and neither is particularly good without the other.

The Duncan Sisters had commitments that made them unavailable for THE BROADWAY MELODY, so MGM made this diagetic musical for them You can see what made them a starring pair in live performances in their performance of "I'm Following You". There are also a couple of two-strip Technicolor sequences for the big production numbers. They definitely were crowd pleasers, but given the advances made in movie musicals over the years, they haven't aged particularly. Even so, it's a decent if unremarkable movie, and excellent for 1929. With Jed Prouty, Oscar Apfel and, I am told, Ann Dvorak in the chorus.

IT'S A GREAT LIFE is a one-of-a-kind comedy-musical-melodrama starring the legendary The Duncan Sisters, one of the few vaudeville headlining acts to be given a chance at major film stardom. MGM appears to have spared no expense at attempting to showcase the Duncans to best advantage and while the end result unfortunately did not result in screen stardom for the gals (the Duncans never again appeared in a feature film although they would make a musical two-reeler and several appearances as themselves in short films over the next decade) they are utterly charming though surely more than a little eccentric to modern viewers.

Sisters Casey (Rosetta Duncan) and Babe Hogan (Vivian Duncan) work at a major department store. Babe is sweet on the store's pianist for the sheet music department, James Dean (!!!) (played by Lawrence Gray). For reasons never quite clear, Casey hates him with a passion and constantly makes him the butt of her humor. Ill-humored Casey is a sarcastic cutup and ultimately her mockery of the store's "theme song" during a store musical production ends up getting all of the trio fired. Fortunately, a pal of Jimmy's, a talent agent, has seen the act and launches them on a successful career as vaudeville performers but the fighting between Casey and Jimmy only escalates and when Babe and Casey sneak off and get married, an infuriated Casey breaks up the act leading all of them down the path of failure.

Rosetta Duncan is a riot as the sassy older sister, she's a fantastic comedienne and her mocking, disrespectful humor seems astonishingly contemporary today even while the movie itself creaks like many early talkies. She also is a delight with a comic song. The talents of the (considerably) prettier Vivian Duncan are more modest although she is an endearing presence and sings lovely harmony with her sister. The sisters, both into their thirties at the time, are quite effective as their "little girl" personas in several song numbers as they no doubt were even more so on the stage at the time.

The movie seems a bit long with it's slender plot and small speaking cast and the turn toward melodrama was at least for modern audiences was a mistake, but the movie has still has much to recommend it with it's vivid glimpse at 1920's New York, a "flapper" fashion show, appealing two-strip Technicolor sequences, quite good songs and numbers and above all the two and only Duncan Sisters. As Babe Hogan would put it, this movie is quite "sweet".

A sister act finds IT'S A GREAT LIFE in show business as long as they can stick together.

MGM crafted this confection as a showcase for the talents of the Duncan Sisters, of Vaudeville & Broadway fame, and as such it's an interesting relic of its era. The sound quality is remarkably good, considering its age, one of the songs is quite good, and the antique color, which highlights a couple of stage sequences, is very pleasing to the eye. As a vehicle for screen stardom, however, the film proved a disappointment. The Sisters' movie career was over almost before if could get started.

Rosetta (1900-1959) and Vivian (1902-1986) do quite well as siblings who rise from performing in retail follies to the Vaudeville stage. Vivian, the pretty one, gets most of the film's few romantic moments, but Rosetta, who was an true clown able to do hilarious things with her face & body, steals the picture. When allowed to be silly she is enormous fun to watch. The script, unfortunately, keeps her character in a bad temper for much of the time, eventually wearying the viewer with her interminable fuming. She's so much more enjoyable when in a jolly mood, especially when teamed with sister Vivian. Their lovely duet, "I'm Following You," is a genuine heartwarmer.

Lawrence Gray, who had made a name for himself in comic Silent film roles, makes the most of his somewhat thankless part as the piano player who captures Vivian's heart. Jed Prouty, as the department store manager who quietly loves Rosetta, and Benny Rubin, playing a Vaudeville booking agent, both do well with their small roles.

The opening scene, with the Sisters madly dashing down the street to work, hotly pursued by a cop and a mob of excited New Yorkers, is one of the movie's best and gets the proceedings off to a frenzied start.

The Warner Archives got this one right. The last time this film was shown in its entirety on TCM back in the 1990's, the color finale was still lost. After it was found, the restored film was never shown on TCM to my knowledge, but the discovered color finale was often shown on Turner Classic Movies under its "One Reel Wonder" series between films. The Warner Archives DVD-R release restores the color finale to the film itself, so we get to see it as it was supposed to be seen and was seen in 1929.

The story involves sisters Babe and Casey Hogan, (Vivian and Rosetta Duncan), salesgirls at a department store, which is ruled somewhat like a banana republic in that store employees are required to assemble and sing the store song each morning. The girls have been orphaned since Babe was a child, and Casey is the older sister. Thus Casey is accustomed to looking after sister Babe and deflecting the advances of Jimmy Dean (Lawrence Grey), who has a strong romantic interest in younger sister Babe. This was the Duncan Sisters' only sound film, and they come across oddly on camera. Vivien is somewhat like a husky Anita Page, and Rosetta reminds me in voice and actions of Lucille Ball, although Rosetta does not have Lucy's delicacy of features.

Pieces of this story looks like it inspired Singing in the Rain. For example, there is a show by and for the department store employees about half way into the film that includes a fashion show. A song is sung by a male tenor as each girl steps down a staircase to present the latest in flapper fashions - much like the Beautiful Girl number in Singin in the Rain. Also, Babe gets deathly ill towards the end of the film and goes unconscious, allowing a couple of over the top musical numbers that are the highlight of the movie - "The Hoosier Hop" and the recently found finale "Sailing on a Sunbeam". These numbers are supposed to be Babe's hallucinations as she lies unconscious. These numbers rather reminded me of the long "Broadway Melody" number in Singin in the Rain, with its wild colors and big sets in that film within a film.

Recommended for those who enjoy the early sound films.

I love old movies and have a very high tolerance for old fashioned style films, but "It's a Great Life" was very, very hard for me to watch. When seen today, you wonder how the Duncan Sisters could have been such a successful stage act, as they are, at times, godawful and hard to take.

When the story begins, Casey and Babe (Rosetta and Vivian Duncan) are working at a department store and hate the job. Once thing they like, however, is the upcoming store talent show. Unfortunately, the acts bomb one after another and it culminates with Babe performing a terrible song. To try to save it, Casey goes on stage and tries to inject some laughs into the act...and it is a hit. Soon the sisters plan on doing a vaudeville version of this act but this plan is scuttled when Babe gets married...and Casey absolutely hates her new husband, Jimmy. So Babe and Jimmy try their hand at performing...and fall flat on their faces. Casey does better but longs to get back with her sister....but her hatred of Jimmy stops any chance of reunification. What's to come of this?

The main problem with this film is that the singing is just horrid...so bad that it's painful to watch. Some of the acting isn't especially good either (the end with Casey and Babe is just horrible) but frankly these non-singing portions are the highlights! Overall, a curio...just not a very good one. And, frankly, I cannot understand the reviews giving it scores of 8-10. This is NOT another "Broadway Melody" and is best seen for it's historical importance and NOT its entertainment value...which is nil.

Incidentally, if you subject yourself to this one (DON'T!), you'll get to see a couple two-color Technicolor sequences.