There are three -- no, four people I wanted to be when I was a kid: Cary Grant, Errol Flynn, Ted Williams and Gene Kelly.
Oh, I flirted occasionally with Joe DiMaggio, James Cagney, Steve Van Buren, Johnny Lujack and a few others, but those were my top four.
Favorite movie to me is one I could watch over and over and over. Some of the great ones mentioned here, Judgment At Nuremberg, Citizen Kane, Godfather, are all wonderful films. One recently that had great impact on me was Lives Of Others.
But for me, I'm going to classify a favorite movie as one I could watch repeatedly. Over and over. I could see, and will see the above mentioned films again, but Singin' In the Rain is one I could and have seen over and over and over. And its star is a guy I wish I couldda been, and the several times I met him, the feeling was reinforced.
But to the film. There's hardly a performance in it that isn't delightful and on the mark, from Jean Hagan's squirley voiced Lina Lamont to Kelly's resolute leading man, Don Lockwood. The story lays out perfectly in classic fashion. Boy meets girl, girl gets angry at boy, boy loses girl, boy explains, girl comes back, girl and boy win each other, all seamlessly interwoven in the larger story of movies making the difficult transition from silent films to talkies, with all the BS of that industry's infighting.
Then there's spunky Debbie Reynolds as Kathy Selden. Can anyone believe this girl was only eighteen or nineteen when she made this film? Where did this talent and understanding of show business come from in a life so short at that point?
The songs were performed and danced beautifully. Fit as a Fiddle (And Ready for Love), All I Do Is Dream of You, Beautiful Girl, You Were Meant For Me, Good Morning, You Are My Lucky Star, Make 'Em Laugh and the glorious title song, Singin' In the Rain.
The film bespeaks the monumental talents and craftsmanship of everyone involved. Donald O'Connor's Make 'em Laugh is a marvel of singing, dancing and sight gags made all the more remarkable in that it all was done in one or two cuts. Watch it! This guy did the whole thing in a few takes and they took the whole take, with a cut to another one to finish it out.
In fact, most of the numbers seem to have been done in one shot or two. Expert directing by Kelly and Stanley Donen and precision by everyone involved. That's how they did it in those days.
The timing, the direction, the preparation, the craft. How can one not grin from ear to ear watching this marvelous magic!
All of which leads up to Kelly's signature song, Singin' In the Rain. Again, very few cuts. Singing, dancing, rain, puddles, umbrella, waterspouts, all integrated into one glorious musical number.
How did they do it? How did they manage to make such a wonderful piece of work?
The usual answers -- talent, hard work, preparation, craft, etc. But I'm reminded of the old joke about a tourist in New York who goes up to a homeless guy playing the clarinet on a streetcorner for nickles and dimes and asks him, "How do I get to Carnegie Hall?" And the guy says, "Practice, man, practice."
That's what it looked like to me. Effortless entertainment that was made possible only by practice, practice, practice and presented for our entertainment. And I can be entertained by it over and over and over, still imagining myself as Gene Kelly.
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And let's not forget Kathleen Freeman as the dialogue coach. Hilarious turn.
I heard that Gene Kelly actually had a bad case of the flu when the title song was shot. We should all be so sick.
Jean Hagen is a jewel. I loved her in this, and as another ditsy b-girl, in Adam's Rib. The brief exchange between her character and the Spencer Tracy character in the hospital room is classic.
It's hard NOT to love this film. And what a career Kathleen Freeman had. The woman never stopped working and handled everything given her with extraordinary comic timing. I'm going to sound like a dinosaur, but they don't make 'em like that anymore.
Now, let's analyze T.S.'s two picks. Lawrence and Birdie. No conflict at all, IMO.
Happy Oscars, everyone.
We've come along way since Hellman. A know very few contemporary gays who take to the rope.
and Lena's "Well o' course we talk, don't everybody?" She looks so good, and then she has to wreck the illusion by talking.
I always love Donald O'Connor's "Make 'em laugh" and Gene Kelley just getting himself gloriously wet in the title song.
Good review, rated. =o)
Gene Kelly is awesome. Brigadoon was another movie where he was so good. I remember watching it with my mom and her swooning over Van Johnson - I didn't know who he was but I knew Gene Kelly. Oh, and Xanadu - he blew Olivia Newton-John out of the water.
Great post, thanks!
And a young Rita Moreno was Lina Lamont's gossip girl.
Kaysong ... Netflix the Three Musketeers with Kelly as D'artangan. Great movie. He was fantastic.
This should inspire all of us to always reach for the best we can do; it is only through those efforts that we can ever aspire to greatness.
As for Jean Hagan, she makes the film work because her performance makes us dislike her while admiring her enormous comedic talents. What ever happens on the screen is because of her so we "see" her when she is not on screen. And as one of your readers note the writing is perfect and given the fact that they were given old MGM melodies the script is to be even more revered. (The only new song is "Moses Supposes")