Samba d'amore

The film, not surprisingly, is set in Greenwich Village, New York (actually a sound stage at Twentieth Century-Fox) and begins with an eager young composer, Kenneth (Don Ameche), arriving in town--hoping to make it big. Soon, he meets up with Dan (William Bendix) and his friends at Danny's Den--the strangest speakeasy in Hollywood history. At this 'joint', Carmen Miranda and Vivian Blaine perform. After hearing some of Kenneth's music, Danny decides to put on a show to showcase his sweetie. The problem is that this sweetie (Blaine) might just be in love with Kenneth AND some sharpie (Felix Bressart) is interested in having the music performed instead by a big-name director instead of on some stage show in the Village. What's next? See the film....or not.

I am glad I watched this film when I did, as I had just finished watching a GREAT MGM musical, "Anchors Away". Although both films were in color, there weren't too many other similarities. "Anchors Away" had great music, singing, plot--everything. And, by comparison, "Greenwich Village" just looked tired and second-rate...which, is what it was. As for Carmen Miranda, she seemed unnecessary to the film and a bit lost. Additionally, fair tunes and the studio's lesser singers (Alice Faye was out on maternity leave), the film never really hit the mark and is a few steps below the average Fox musical of the period. And, when it was over, I couldn't remember much of anything about it. Adequate and no more.

By the way, I was VERY surprised to see Ernest 'Sunshine Sammy' Morrison in the film dancing and singing a musical number with a number of other black entertainers. While I was VERY familiar with him as a member of Our Gang (since its beginning) and the East Side Kids, I had no idea he was so talented in other ways.

There are plenty of amiable performances in GREENWICH VILLAGE, all involved in making the most of a very light script about struggling singers and songwriters and producers in the Greenwich Village of the 1920s. But it's strictly fluff--an excuse for some bright song and dance routines with CARMEN MIRANDA stealing the spotlight.

WILLIAM BENDIX is the producer of a night club revue who needs more money to put on a show. DON AMECHE is a man they think is a rich guy because he has a $100 bill when he pays for his fortune from Miranda who charges $5 for a reading. Bendix and his gang hang onto Ameche and he soon gets involved with the songstress of the revue, VIVIAN BLAINE.

Blaine came along at a time when Fox needed a back-up for their temperamental Alice Faye and Betty Grable, who were fed up with doing musicals like this and insisted on better scripts. Unfortunately for Blaine, although she's got natural charm and photographs beautifully, this film didn't do it for her. She had a few more roles in Fox musicals but she had to wait until she found better material on the Broadway stage in GUYS AND DOLLS.

Songwriter Betty Comden can be seen as a hatcheck girl who performs in one of the revue numbers. Judy Holliday's scene was cut from the revue but she does appear briefly as an extra in another party scene.

It's got all the Technicolor trimmings one usually gets in these gaudy Fox musicals--and there's a terrific song and dance number by the Four Step Brothers.

Not really bad as far as these backstage musicals go, but very little invention involved in the script which is strictly a by-the-numbers sort of thing. Don Ameche is as pleasant as ever as Blaine's leading man.

Greenwich Village of 1922. The living is easy and the speak-easies are in abundance.

A music instructor, Don Ameche, comes to town to get his concerto played and in the process meets up with Bill Bendix, Carmen Miranda and Vivian Blaine. Bendix is a small time hood with a funny heart who runs a joint. He likes Ameche's music and thinks that he can use it in a show that he is planning. Comically, Bendix thinks that he is in competition with Florenz Ziegfeld.

This movie makes for very light musical fanfare. The songs are great, especially Blaine belting out whispering and Bendix is a riot in a Roman toga dancing and singing around. Miranda, a musical dancing genius, is at the top of her game as well and Blaine sings Whispering with that soft voice.

The film is quite entertaining and a joy to watch.

There are three excellent reasons to settle in with this Technicolor extravaganza: Carmen Miranda, Carmen Miranda, and Carmen Miranda! The "Brazilian Bombshell" is at the top of her dazzling talent and is featured in three production numbers, each with it's own nutty, colorful and surreal style--she never disappoints! The musical itself is a slight bauble about a classical pianist finding his heart in a speakeasy (Don Ameche has written a classical concerto with themes from the pop song "Whispering"!); Vivian Blaine, billed as the "Cherry Blonde," is so obviously an Alice Faye stand-in, doing her best to establish herself in the Fox Pantheon along with Faye and Grable; there is lots of dense color saturation in many scenes, making this a visual candy-colored treat, even if the material is lightweight wartime fluff. I never found it dull, and was always entertained; I gave it an "7" not because it's a deep or particularly thoughtful film, but because it accomplishes what it sets out to do perfectly. Entertain. Sometimes you just need a break

Anyone looking for the Greenwich Village of bygone days will be sadly disillusioned by this film. The area known for all time for its Bohemian atmosphere and now for its outrageously overpriced just about everything will not be found here. Club owner William Bendix isn't even fond of bootleg whiskey in his joint as he's continually throwing out bootlegger Tom Dugan from his place. Of all the places in New York State during the Twenties where Governor Alfred E. Smith stated publicly he would not enforce prohibition, Greenwich Village was the area that flouted the Volstead Act the most with impunity and flare.

The score for Greenwich Village is made up mostly of old standards and the film was an opportunity for Darryl Zanuck to launch a new musical star in the tradition of Alice Faye and Betty Grable. Vivian Blaine was 'introduced' in Greenwich Village and in film she never quite got the success the other two ladies did. She did best on Broadway, most unforgettably as Adelaide in Guys And Dolls. The new songs were nothing to remember.

Young Don Ameche arrives in Manhattan from Wichita, Kansas where he was a professor of music there and he's written a concerto. No big market for concertos, but there's a passage in the concerto that sounds promising to William Bendix. It turns out to be the big hit song from the beginning of the Roaring Twenties, Whispering. Bendix has big ideas wanting to put on a big revue and if he can't get Ameche's bankroll which he's carrying, he'd sure like a loan on his talent.

It's all an excuse to put on a lot of numbers, but Greenwich Village seems to lack the creative flair of 20th Century Fox's earlier films with Betty Grable and Alice Faye. William Bendix, borrowed from Paramount where he mostly played good natured mugs, just does not strike one as a would be Ziegfeld. Carmen Miranda is just Carmen Miranda and she's the best thing about Greenwich Village.

Just not the best musical Fox ever put out.