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Not bad, not good for a Betty Grable flick. Story, like all the Fox musicals on the 40's is silly, but sometimes silly can be charming. PIN-UP GIRL focuses on Betty of course and those "million" dollar legs. The story of a want-to-be showgirl who is doing steno work could have somehow worked better with more fluid writing. A couple of good dance numbers, but nothing spectacular. Nice to see old timers Martha Raye and Joe E. Brown, but Martha plays a real witch in this one and takes the shine off her comedic talent. Too bad. Story itself does not focus and what happened to her girl friend, Dorthea Kent, who is in the first part of the movie, then is dropped like a hot potato. Her presence was missed as she was a good side kick to Betty. If you're a Betty Grable fan, and you must be to be reading about this movie, there are others a lot better. Too bad they're not available on DVD. By the way, the DVD transfer is quite nice.

Note that the legendary Hermes Pan is the guy dancing with Grable in the wild "Once Too Often" number. He was the guy who worked with Fred Astaire to choreograph and practice most of his dance numbers in the 30's Fred-and-Ginger films.

Perhaps back then this was seen as a bright and bubbly tribute to the Armed Forces everywhere, but surely BETTY GRABLE deserved better material for a musical with a title like PIN UP GIRL. She's pretty and pert as a secretary whose romance with a soldier goes from Boy Meets Girl, Boy Loses Girl, Boy Wins Girl in timeworn Hollywood fashion.

No help is the fact that MARTHA RAYE and JOE E. BROWN can usually be counted on to add gags and merriment to any film they're in. Here, they open their big mouths and nothing funny comes out.

The songs are weak, lacking interest even for Grable fans--with one exception. A nifty little number called "Once Too Often" has Betty doing a slit-skirt, torrid dance number with Hermes Pan, the famous choreographer who worked with Astaire and Rogers on many of their most famous routines. It's the only musical number worth staying awake for.

The climactic military number is a hoot, with Betty doing a parade of arms military drill that reminded me of my boot camp days.

Summing up: This is one you can afford to miss.

This musical/comedy fluff was harmless fun for a nation at war. We get the troop's number one pinup gal, big band music, song and dance numbers, a cotton candy plot, and it's all in Technicolor! Anybody interested in the WWII era will enjoy watching this film, just imagine yourself as one of the boys in uniform or as Rosie the Riveter. The final musical routine with Betty marching with & drilling 2 companies of military women is well executed and must have been just what America wanted to see at the time. Remember: Buy U.S. War Bonds. Available at this theater.

Splashy Technicolor musical with Betty Grable and Martha Raye has beautiful photography, Grable's incredible legs--although they're not featured as much as you'd think they'd be, considering they were what she was most famous for--and not a whole lot more. The musical numbers are for the most part uninspired, and the casting of unknown John Harvey as Grable's romantic interest was a big mistake. He's a bland, not particularly good actor who tries too hard to be the peppy "boy next door" type and has no chemistry at all with Grable. Dorothea Kent as Grable's sidekick is enjoyable but for some reason she vanishes about halfway through the film. Martha Raye, as always, gives it her best but the songs they stuck her with are, to be charitable, pedestrian and, in the case of "Yankee Doodle Hayride", downright stupid. Grable's "Don't Carry Tales Out of School" is boring--I have no idea why it's performed two different times in the film, as it doesn't get better with repetition. Raye's "Red Robins, Bobwhites and Bluebirds" is a juvenile time-waster and she looks almost embarrassed performing it--the lyrics are childish and the song makes virtually no sense. Just about the only number that has any spark at all is "Once Too Often", which Grable dances with the great Hermes Pan. It's not one of his or Grable's best, but compared to the rest of the numbers in this picture, it's a masterpiece. Joe E. Brown is an acquired taste, which I haven't acquired, but if you like him I guess this is as good a place to see him as any. The tap-dancing Condos Brothers are good, there's a campy but somewhat entertaining roller-skating number early in the film and a very bizarre and really out-of-place sequence at the end where Betty is a drill sergeant putting a female drill team through a series of complicated marching routines--it's almost surreal to watch her carrying a sword and shouting "Dress that line, there!" and "Hup, hip, hoop, harch!"--but even that dose of wartime weirdness doesn't do much for the picture. Overall it's a lower-rank, by-the-numbers effort from people who've done far better. Worth a look maybe just so you can say you've seen it, but other than that, there's not much reason to spend any time on it.