Dixiana

As other comments on this site will tell you, this film is either an "antique treasure" or a "pre- historic turkey" ...(that is so hilarious! I laughed for days at that description) .... well like many others in the warbling yelling cast, I shall declare my love for DIXIANA, albeit from 79 years away. I am quite fascinated with the period of 1927-1935 and to see this sumptuous RKO production filmed in late 1929 with its lavish Technicolor finale is a dream and a thrill at the same time.. (remember those dreams?). Also Bebe Daniels is simply awesomely beautiful. As a production it is massive and atmospheric... I read somewhere this film actually captures the deep south of the 1860s which I believed I could actually feel. Also the limelight vaudeville scenes at the hippodrome and the interiors of the steamy mansions with riverboats gliding by and willows overhanging transported me to that period quite effectively. The presence of Wheeler and Woolsey and their rudeness added many laughs... in fact in Australia most of their films were released on VHS tape and quite often they play on national television on the late late show. I have quite a few and in Sydney, HIPS HIPS HOORAY and MUMMY'S BOYS have been seen a lot....and DIPLOMANIACS is an absolute scream of a comedy just like DUCK SOUP. ..anyway in DIXIANA they almost overshadow the film. The 1929 sound is really loud and clear with some really lusty operatic singing and plenty of lavish sets and art direction to enjoy. The most constantly dazzling aspect to this expensive film are the costumes, in particular the many jaw-dropping gowns and the riotous Technicolor Mardi Gras finale. The added dancing (minus his feet!!!) of Bill Robinson is a cropped treat, but the color and the spectacular lavish set and dressings add the thrill of endless beauty back into the enjoyment most effectively. Yes DIXIANA is an antique treasure for me, so if you get to see it, watch it with someone who appreciates the elements listed above.

This was the first movie I purchased with Bebe Daniels! It is pretty good considering when it was made! The jokes never stop and the inuendos are way ahead of their time! I was totally amused with the interaction between the prospective groom's father and stepmother in this film! As I said earlier, the double entendres were plentiful in that relationship! The comedy team of Wheeler and Woolsey were just downright hilarious and the tapdance sequence in technicolor (Bill Robinson, "Bojangles") was absolutely wonderful! Such a rare opportunity to see something like that! The Mardi Gras finale is also rare as it was cut from TV prints for a long time! That is in technicolor also! I ordered the DVD, so if anyone is interested, please email me and I can tell you where to find it online for a very reasonable price!

Forgive my Southern accent but this one darlin' is jes' plain awful. Typical of its time,1930--the early days of the talkie--this hodgepodge of comedy and drama is a Ziegfeld-style extravaganza that mixes bad melodrama and mediocre operetta songs with lots of very pretty girls in outrageous costumes. The plot, if you choose to call it that, is interrupted on occasion with feeble comic relief, mostly by the great team of Woolsey and Wheeler trying their best to make something out of little, and by a Dutch comic, Joseph Cawthorn, speaking in a Jewish accent. (He even calls his son, the Metropolitan Opera baritone Everett Marshall, a schlemiel.) On the plus side, Bill "Bojangles" Robinson dances for three minutes, and Max Steiner ("Gone With the Wind") did the orchestrations for which he received his first screen credit. The film was a big flop and lost RKO studios 300,000 dollars. Fortunately, W&W went on to do better things, and a few years later King Kong and Fred and Ginger came along to make up that loss.

DIXIANA is a jumbled, messy early musical. The comic relief sections tend to be more lively than the central romance, which is only salvaged by the charm of Bebe Daniels, though your taste for non-screwball 1930s comedy will ordain how much you will or will not enjoy the movie as a whole. The drama is pure hokum, all about a circus performer falling for a rich heir to a plantation and trying to "leave him to save him from social disgrace"-- if you've seen a good deal of 1920s-1930s Hollywood movies, that plot and the characters found therein will be very familiar.

As an early talkie, the film has some fluid camerawork, such as a tracking shot through a gambling house, though the dialogue scenes are static. Apparently, the ending was shot in two-strip Technicolor, but the print I saw was all in black-and-white. As it was, the film ends quite abruptly anyway, so color would not have improved my feelings on this historically interesting but ultimately forgettable piece of movie history anyhow.

Back in 1930 RKO was like all the other studios, churning out musicals to please an audience hungry for the new rage of talking pictures. 'Dixiana' was meant to cash in on the success of 'Rio Rita', the Ziegfeld show that became a movie in 1929, and used many of the same cast - the lovely Bebe Daniels in the title role (very like Jeanette MacDonald in this), plus comic relief from Wheeler and Woolsey and pretty Dorothy Lee. The big mistake was in casting Met star Everett Marshall as the male lead; an opera singer with an excellent voice but no acting ability whatever.

Add to this mix Joseph Cawthorn and Jobyna Howland as Marshall's parents (Ms Howland goes to town with her over-acting!); plus Mr Bojangles in his debut film appearance (a 3 minute solo); and a two-strip Technicolor finale. The musical numbers are fine (mostly for Everett Marshall and Bebe Daniels; although there's a cute song for Bert Wheeler and Dorothy Lee about halfway into the film).

I've seen this film described as a 'prehistoric turkey', but I wouldn't put it down that much. It has its high points (the colour sequence looks great and is a hoot) and it is about as complete a restoration as you could ask for. And it is the only Wheeler and Woolsey currently on DVD; we need more of their mad movies commercially available. 'Dixiana' is patchy but it isn't prehistoric!