Glorifying the American Girl

I would give this colossal and fascinating time capsule musical a 9 for entertainment value and a 2 for the DVD quality. I was so keen to see every frame of this film, having already goggled at THE SHOW OF SHOWS and Broadway MELODY OF 1929...but the DVD I found has the final reels hacked about and urrrggghhhh NOT in the 2 color Technicolor that I was drooling about expecting. I could faintly see the B&W rendition but I knew it was in color so I was really irritated with the DVD people for releasing this great and amazing film in such a chopped and pale way. Prior to the grand finale, the rest of the film is quite interesting as a story and compelling for the visuals and clunky sound of real people and normal city life in the 20s. Sub leads Olive Shea and Edward Crandell are actually more interesting than the lead, Marilyn Miller, and the gorgeous fashions, street scenes, department store settings etc kept me fascinated. I am so keen to see this film properly with the color scenes. as a production and a vintage musical it is extraordinary and beautiful..so please check out the quality and the completeness of the finale before you purchase. If anyone has a good copy to share, complete and with color scenes they can contact me via the message boards on this site. I am so keen to see it properly...and so should you be if you really love sumptuous 20s life on film. Early in the film there is a wonderful outdoor picnic with a stage show...like a delicious 1929 picnic version of '"This Is Our Once A Year Day" from PAJAMA GAME of 1958. Just charming!

For Ziegfeld research it's a must, and you get to see many of Ziegfeld's stars perform, but the sound is poor and there isn't a whole lot of conflict to drive the plot....

As a woman, it's nice to hear Mary Eaton speak frankly to her boyfriend (a dreamy Edward Crandall) about wanting to live a little and see what she can do before settling down and raising children. He's hurt, but not petulant or insulting (like every boyfriend/husband in ZIEGFELD GIRL and THE DOLLY SISTERS). He does wait for her and seems genuinely supportive of her success, before eventually settling for girl-next-door Gloria Shea -- who actually is treated pretty badly by the film, abandoned and hit by a car! Eaton discovers her boyfriend's moved on just as she goes out for the finale in the Follies, and you see the emotions hit her as she struggles under the weight of an enormous headpiece that cascades around her like a fountain.... OK, so it's not exactly heartbreak, but at least she doesn't die of alcohol poisoning or get slapped around like in the exploitational ZIEGFELD GIRL.

The production numbers are tame by Hollywood standards, and we wait the whole film to finally see one of Flo's evolving stage contraptions. Most of the numbers are arranged in tableau including a gorgeous "painting" of a mermaid being pulled from the sea in a fisherman's net as the Pope and neoclassical figures stand by. Tableaux don't make interesting cinema, but I was happy to see some man flesh in these scenes too as nearly nude males (like Johnny Weissmuller here) were apparently excised from the later interpretations of Ziggy's stagework -- ironic since Ziegfeld had his first success displaying the muscular Sandow, so you know he wasn't shy about it.

Eddie Cantor has an overly long vaudeville scene as a Jewish tailor, but is actually funnier in a brief exchange with a haughty showgirl, Rudy Vallee might have been a somebody back then but he sure doesn't show it here. Helen Morgan sings her signature torch song from atop a piano (a schtick she invented by necessity as she was too short to be seen in many music halls). She is excellent in the film APPLAUSE which also came out in 1929 where she played an aging showgirl trying to keep her daughter out of theater life, but unfortunately her performance here suffers from the antique recording.

Ted Shawn is the imaginative choreographer who arranges the dancers as exotic animals, graceful swans, and nouveau beauties clutching glass globes. Shawn would create the Jacob's Pillow dance festival and was instrumental in forming a uniquely American branch of Modern Dance.

There's a lot of history here, and the opening montage is almost Fritz Lang-esquire, but I wouldn't try to show the whole film to any of my friends. The film quality is terribly uneaven, suggesting inconsistent filmstock. Silent footage from a premier was spliced in so we can get a glimpse of Ziegfeld and Billie Burke, as well as other Broadway dignitaries of the age. It's a tragedy the technicolor scenes are lost (at least, not a part of the Alpha Video release). All-in-all it's not a bad film, the pre-code heroine isn't "punished" for having career ambitions but she experiences some bumps and bruises along the way (by her selfish mother and an unscrupulous manager). She loses the cute guy but he comes to congratulate her when she stars in the show and that seems like a fair compromise; much better than the plots that would slap down any woman who dared to have her own goals in later films.

If you want to catch a viewing of this film in nearly all of its "Glory" -- 2-Strip Technicolor and all--simply get on a plane to Los Angeles and taxi over to the UCLA Film Archives in Westwood. Oh...you'll have to make an appointment well in advance...for "Scholarly and/or Academic Pursuits Only"...for a private screening, as this film resides in the vault. It is rarely screened, except for Film Preservation Retrospectives... or is occasionally loaned out to "your town"...if you happen to live in NY State, or Australia, or Europe. All versions on VHS or DVD are poorly duped dupe-of-a-dupe copies of badly battered eminent domain prints, but unfortunately, that's all there is "out there" until UCLA decides to release their terrific library of 2-Strip Technicolor films onto the world some day! For a couple of swell Technicolor scenes of the film's finale, I suggest that you visit the sensational, stupendous, colossal "Vitaphone Varieties" website run by Jeff Cohen at vitaphone.blogspot.com/.

There are two levels to this film. First is your chance to get a glimpse of history. You get to see an example (brief) of what one of the Ziegfeld Follies was. In the process of that you get a chance to hear and see Rudy Vallee and Helen Morgan sing, and see one of Eddie Cantor's skits. You also get a feel for the pomp and extravagance of the follies. What a difference to today's entertainment. In a sense, the folllies were a preview of what became the variety shows on television. And, those shows are gone too. And the movie catches how interested the general public was when a show opened. There was no tv in 1929 so radio went on the air describing all of the people who were attending the opening.

The second level is a fairly decent and interesting story. A story of a young woman who wanted to achieve success. And, in her drive for that success, we see the life she leaves behind and the effect that has on people as she drives forward. Part of that drive comes from her mother who wanted to be a part of that success. It is interesting how she also tries to drive Mary Eaton into making the decisions that she wants made and how she tries to manipulate those decisions. The movie does get across that there is a price to pay for success.

An interesting movie and worth seeing for a glimpse into the late 20's.

The opening sequence of the picture is quite a sight to see, the way it was edited, the positioning of the sets and actors featured in the opening, and to top it all off, a few short clips from Ziegfeld's best known music from his best known music numbers (including "A Pretty Girl is like a Melody"). The rest is for all of you to see. It is available from Alpha Video and maybe a few public-domain distributors (do not expect to find it on DVD, it is a fairly rare film and I was lucky to get mine). The scenes that were shot in Technicolor are somewhat visible if you squint real, real hard. This is a 75 year old picture we're talking about here, it's amazing how much footage of Technicolor has survived since then, because there is so little of it. I originally purchased this picture to see what it's Technicolor sequences look like. I was very suprised though with how it turned out to be. Whoever did the choreography for this picture was a genius because the dancing is very well done. Adding it to your collection (whether or not you chose to do so) will certainly be worth your money.