Show Boat

...but frustrating if judged as a talkie. I use the term "talkie" in the loosest of terms, because very few talking passages survive. In a tragic reverse of what is the case of many dawn of sound era films, the video film elements for this movie largely remain and do so in good quality, and the talking and singing passages largely do not. For example, you can find CDs of the entire soundtrack of 1929's Gold Diggers of Broadway - minus a very little - but it is the film itself that no longer exists with the exception of two reels. We owe this to the durability of Vitaphone discs and to the throw-away attitude that the film industry had towards these early talking and part-talking experiments.

There is a prologue at the beginning of the film in which stars from the Ziegfeld production do numbers from the musical, and the video portion of that is lost. Then the first half of the film is largely silent with synchronized sound effects. The second half of the film was largely synchronized dialogue, but the audio portion has been largely lost. All that remains where there is both video and dialogue are two short scenes between romantic leads Laura LaPlante (as Magnolia) and Joseph Schildkraut (as Gaylord Ravenal). Notice that the film has Ms. LaPlante billed ahead of the now well-known Schildkraut. LaPlante was a big star at Universal at the time having starred in films such as "The Cat and the Canary".

This incarnation of "Show Boat" differs from the 1936 and 1951 versions in big ways besides just the technical aspects. For one, a large portion of this film is devoted to the disintegration of the Ravenal marriage after the couple leave the Show Boat. Also, Julie is only a passing figure in this film, and Captain Andy has a completely different fate than in the latter two films.

In spite of all the odd decisions - to put the musical numbers associated with Ziegfeld in as a prologue, and to make this musical a part-talkie with non-musical stars in the first place, the film made money for Universal, largely outside the big cities where people had not seen Ziegfeld's Broadway version. In short, this is an example of a film that was dated in technique as soon as it was made, but was rushed out the door in order to cash in on the dawn of sound in motion pictures.

I was long curious to see this version of Show Boat and how it stood up against the two more well known versions that came out later. It's a curiosity and nothing more.

I'm willing to bet that the film was being shot at the time sound was hurriedly being accommodated for by the major studios. They had to make up for the fact they had hired non-singers for the lead roles so some dialog was added.

They would have been better keeping it a straight silent. Some of Broadway's best shows were done in acceptable silent versions. Kid Boots, Rose Marie, and The Student Prince come to mind.

First of all the whole subplot involving Julie and the miscegenation angle was completely eliminated. Considering that was a controversial theme in those days and gained Show Boat a pioneering reputation, why would you want to sacrifice it.

Laura La Plante and Joseph Schildkraut as Magnolia and Ravenal are acceptable enough. But when the Jazz Singer was made it was the musical interludes with Jolson that made it a hit. There was no rhyme of reason for the parts where dialog was included.

The best performance in the film was Emily Fitzroy who plays Parthy Hawkes like a stone-faced harridan. The later versions with Helen Westley and Agnes Moorehead gave her a trace of humanity. This was one witch of a woman and she never lets up either.

Now that Show Boat is an American classic and it's a classic because of the wonderful Kern-Hammerstein score, I'm not sure anyone would want to bother with this one.

This primitive Part-Talkie "Super Production" was thought lost until a few years ago, but the print that was eventually unearthed missed a sizeable portion of the dialogue and music track…so that, for about 30 minutes during the second half, it features no sound at all (which makes one wonder why underscoring was not employed by the 'restoration' team to counter this utter silence) – with the spoken lines being superimposed in the form of subtitles over the image itself!

Incidentally, I was under the impression that this was to be a Musical – since the coming of Sound ushered in a flood of such fare. However, it chose to follow the Edna Ferber novel and, consequently, differs to a considerable extent from the subsequent two musical renditions. The shooting incident during a performance occurs much earlier here; similarly, the Julie character gets ousted from the show boat while Magnolia is still a child; her fault in the eyes of her employers (whereas they would stick by her in later versions!) does not relate to race but rather morals, as she is eventually discovered to be the Madam of a clandestine brothel!; Captain Andy dies in a sea-storm in this case (while he is allowed to survive elsewhere) on the night Magnolia gives birth; the leading man's re-appearance at the end occurs on the riverboat rather than in a theater; most conspicuously, perhaps, the character of Joe (who sang the show's most enduring number, "Ol' Man River") barely registers this time around!

Even if we do get to see the heroine – a rather unlikely Laura LaPlante, best-known as the imperiled heiress of THE CAT AND THE CANARY (1927; itself a studio-hopping warhorse) – performing and strumming on a banjo a couple of times, these turn up during the stretch where the soundtrack goes missing! Ironically, though most of the songs were dropped, this still emerges as the longest version at 119 minutes; the IMDb lists an even longer running-time of 147 and, since only 2 of the 5 announced songs are heard during the "Overture" (one of which features Helen Morgan, the Julie of James Whale's 1936 remake!), this may well be true. Given the straightforward narrative in this version, the inherent mawkishness (what with Magnolia's insufferably prudish mother) of the unfolding drama is much more to the fore now. Still, the money problems afflicting the hero (nicely played by Joseph Schildkraut, from Whale's THE MAN IN THE IRON MASK [1939] and which I also viewed recently!) are better delineated here than later – while sets and expository footage came in handy when dusting off the property just 7 years afterwards! That said, the last act feels just as rushed as always.

I am not familiar with how SHOW BOAT passed on to MGM (from Universal) but the closing title card, obviously bearing the epithet "The End", of this particular version is unaccountably accompanied by the Metro logo – for the record, a similar situation exists with respect to the 1931 Paramount version of DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE! Finally, comparisons between the 1929 and 1936 movies unequivocally favor the latter, which is stylish where this is generally stodgy. For the record, I own another film by the same director – UNCLE TOM'S CABIN (1927), based on yet another chestnut – with which this also happens to share its Southern setting.

I had thought this little gem completely lost and was delighted to spot it on TCM. The restoration is quite good considering the missing soundtrack for a long sequence toward the end. The plots of all three movies differ. This one may be more faithful to the book. The acting is especially good and the drama plays out much less superficially than the later versions.

For future restoration work, it seems to me an awful lot more of the spoken dialog can be recreated with very modest lip reading. I was delighted to realize that the retiring Magnolia, singing unknowingly to a tear-stained Ravenal in the audience, is in fact singing a slow Lena Horne-ish "Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man of Mine". If they can't find that soundtrack, I say, what the heck, see what Marni Nixon's doing these days and give her the job! The haunting Kern-themed orchestral score works just right.

While I agree with the critics here who question the absence of the racial subplots, the scenario holds up very well on its own.

Interesting but flawed part-talkie version of the great musical based on the novel by Edna Ferber.

There is a long "overture" that features songs from some of the original Broadway cast (including Helen Morgan singing "My Bill") and most of the film is silent. There are a few talking sequences but one track is lost (though recently rumored to have been discovered).

But being silent is this film's problem. What's really wrong is that the racial part of the story, much of what drives the plot in the stage version and the 1936 and 1951 versions is missing. In this version Julie (Alma Rubens) is fired from the show boat because Parthy (Emily Fitzroy) is jealous of her affection for the daughter Magnolia. In the other versions Julie is discovered as a black passing for white and married to a white man--a criminal offense in the 19th century South.

But most of the rest of the story is in place as grown-up Magnolia (Laura LaPlante) falls in love with her leading man Gaylord (Joseph Schildkraut) and leaves the show boar for a fast life in Chicago, where the husband's gambling reduces them to poverty and breaks up the marriage. Magnolia goes on the stage and becomes a hit as a "coon shouter," a white singer of black music.

This version also features a drowning that does not appear in other versions of the play.

LaPlante is good as sympathetic Magnolia, but Schildkraut is a tad gay as the husband. The changes in plot require Fitzroy to play Parthy as a raving hag. Rubens is touching as Julie; she would make one film after this in 1929 and would be dead in 1931 from drugs. Otis Harlan plays Hawks. That's it. The rest of the cast is made up of bit players.

No one sings "Old Man River." Stick to the superb 1936 version starring Irene Dunne, Allan Jones, Charles Winninger, Helen Morgan, Helen Westley, Donald Cook, Hattie McDaniel, Paul Robeson, Queenie Smith, and Sammy White.