Getting Involved Is So, So Involving: On The Town (1949)

I have already watched High Society as part of this month of musical, wherein a variety of stars coalesced together to make an enjoyable, but somewhat less than realized musical.  In contrast, is On the Town, a film that included a considerable amount of people working both in front of and behind the camera who were still establishing themselves in the entertainment business.  This establishment, however, does not equate to underwhelming delivery on any of their parts, indeed, Gene Kelly and Frank Sinatra put on career defining work, all the the swell of Leonard Bernstein compositions.  This alone would make for a noted and wholly engaging piece of film, but add Stanley Donen to the mix and it becomes a thing of sheer beauty.  The version of this film that I was able to catch up with was a digitized version of the VHS copy, which meant a bit of blurriness and weird fading in and out throughout, but like my copy of Pather Panchali which suffers from the same issues, this still worked beautifully.  The swagger that is seemingly inherent within Frank Sinatra's music pushes some of the numbers to new heights and an extended ballet sequence affords Gene Kelly a chance to shine, moving madly through the space as though it were foolish to even confine his dynamism.  It would be one thing to just sing the praises of the visual elements of the film, which are extensive and noted, but it also manages to also be an incredibly funny film, one that plays into the absurdity of heteronormative ideals in the musical, while also knowingly ascribing to them to avoid any confusion.  It is perfectly post-World War II in its composition using the narrative of a few Navy guys on leave to push for a stranger in a strange place narrative that also refers back to the down on their luck girl in the big city that made for a narrative in nearly every Busby Berkeley musical of a decade earlier.  I could sit here and pick apart every single thing that works about On the Town, but it would ruin some of the surprise, or worse would contradict the perfect simplicity of the film, using basic cinematic language to lovingly move through a stylized and sensational version of New York City.

On the Town works in a cyclical narrative focusing on the arrival of a group of Navy men on leave.  The Navy guys include the somewhat brutish but well-meaning Ozzie (Jules Munshin), the curly haired and dashing Chip (Frank Sinatra) who wants nothing more than to explore the city his father has spoken so fondly about.  Finally, there is Gabey (Gene Kelley) the everyman sailor who is simply along for the ride.  When it is Gabey who encounters Ivy Smith (Vera-Ellen) a local model and ballerina who Gabey assumes to be famous as a result of her being on the billboards of Subway trains.  Gabey is smitten with Ivy, but she flees the scene to return to her rather desolate life as a student/exploited worker for the maniacal Madame Dilyovska (Florence Bates).  Recruiting his pals, Gabey, Chip and Ozzie take it upon themselves to search all of New York City for the model.  Along the way the each member meets their romantic parter, Ozzie coming to be a point of desire and fascination for museum curator Claire Huddesen (Ann Miller) who compares him to a primitive male on display in the museum.  While, Ozzie is initially confused by such an assertion, he also enjoys the advances of the attractive Claire.  Chip meets up with the local cab driver Brunhilde "Hildy" Esterhazy (Betty Garrett) whose wild-mouth and assertive nature lead him to enjoy her company in a roundabout way, only spurred further by her near textbook memory of all the spaces in New York, thus making his tourism more well-executed and updated.  Yet, Gabey is still struggling to find Ivy a quest that is greatly shortened by a happenstance encounter.  Ivy explains that she is also quite attracted to Gabey, but her point of employment proves rather problematic since it involves burlesque dancing for the Madame Dilyovska who uses the cost of her ballet lessons over the young Ivy.  Agreeing to meet on the top of the Empire State Building things become complicated when Ivy must return to her work, the determined Gabey seeks her out, nonetheless, all the while the group must run around the city police force that have taken a stand against their various accidents and inducing of trouble.  The groups concerted effort does allow for the two to unite, in the process discovering that they might have been far closer together than they ever imagined.

This film, as I noted borrows from the Busby Berkeley narrative of woman in the big city, who is struggling in her place of employment, while also hoping that they can snag a man for their point of escape.  Furthermore, given that it involves a group of Navy men navigating New York City it also takes on a layer of the homosocial bond, their own engagement with the girls becoming a point of this shared desire.  What becomes fascinating though is that both group are played at odds to one another in a very heteronormative manner, the girls looking at the men as a bit ruff and tumble, particularly since they are Navy men, although in non-diegetic sense both Frank Sinatra and Gene Kelly exert more feminine identities at this point in their careers.  In contrast the men see the woman as things "to be saved" although it is rather clear that both Hildy and Claire possess jobs that are financially independent and of which they are quite proud.  Indeed, Hildy even makes a note of her distinct difference to the other male cabbies in New York.  It is a film that carefully crafts the two gendered and genre spaces together, at times making a clear distinction between the two.  There is a particular dance and musical number with the men praising the life of the Navy that allows them to constantly philander about never needing to settle down.  In yet another knowing moment the choreography has the women look at the camera asserting their own knowledge of this reality, while also seeming to suggest that they can end these wily ways by a mere flashing of their eyes.  The narrative pushes to have these unions be somewhat unconventional, pairing the oafish Ozzie with the intellectual Claire and the travelled Hildy with the somewhat sheltered Chip.  It would seem like it is a suggestion that all women are capable of finding a man, without expecting them to be a fabrication of themselves, again terribly heteronormative, but understandably so for the era.  I would seem this is the case, but it would negate the unfortunate experiences of Lucy Schmeeler (Alice Pearce) a comedic point of contrast to the "beauty" of the other women.  None of the men even acknowledge her as a sexually attractive individual.  Even though Gabey asserts that she will eventually find her partner, his conviction seems particularly uninspired.

Key Scene:  Frank Sinatra singing "You're Awful" is just about the most delightful song I have heard in quite awhile.

The DVD for this is cheap enough to suggest buying, but renting might not be a bad approach as it is admittedly not the lavish musical some might initially apply to a Stanley Donen work.

I Never Even Learned Short Division: Alexander's Ragtime Band (1938)

I would appear, at least according to IMDB, that any film that has won a an Oscar tends to get incredibly high ratings, all the more so when that film was released prior to say 1988.  While it is likely that the amount of people rating these films, are low and directly tied to those impassioned enough to go through thirties era films and make ratings erroneously high.  This is the case for the early version of Cimarron as well as films like Wings.  I go on this aside because while I am aware of quite a few films from this era that I actually adore, there seems to be something about the combination of Oscar winner plus thirties era that just do no mesh well.  Wings is not an outright terrible film, but it is not a piece of cinematic magic that having an Oscar should attain and that is certainly not the case for the musical Alexader's Ragtime Band as well.  Working from the music of Irving Berlin, it is indeed only the musical numbers that carry any weight and those elements could easily be gleaned from simply listening to the recordings detached from any moving images.  Suffice it to say, I was not impressed with Alexander's Ragtime Band and simply found much of what it had to offer a bit predictable and decidedly safe, even shooting itself in the foot further by including necessary images of performers in blackface.  I accept that this was a reality in most early musicals, but here they simply exist as background figures, not even relevant to the music at hand.  I would assume that much of the failing of Alexander's Ragtime Band comes from the director,  Henry King, attempting to use the same methodology as Busby Berkeley, wherein, lavish musical numbers were intercut with simple stories, the problem here however, is that there is no discernible rhythm for the various musical scenes and, indeed, the moments in between are often quite bland, consisting of half realized dialogue and a variety of less than fully realized acting moments.  Trust me, I wanted nothing more than to wholly embrace this film, but it simply proved to be a back drop for the swinging tunes of Berlin and the one or two moments of actually well-executed musical cinema were lost in the milieu of middle-of-the-road thirties studio mediocrity.

Alexander's Ragtime Band focuses primarily on the musical endeavors of violinist Roger (Tyrone Power) who sick of his bourgeois lifestyle seeks out solace by playing with a ragtime band at a local shipyard saloon. Along with the aid of his pianist and friend Charlie Dwyer (Don Ameche) Roger seems set to achieve moderate success playing popular tunes.  However, when the group plays one song by Irving Berlin titled "Alexander's Ragtime Band' it stirs up the frustrations of Stella Kirby (Alice Faye) a singer who had used the same song in her own repertoire.  Intervening in the performance by simply hopping on stage and sing, the combination of Roger's musicality and Stella's singing cause the audience to get ecstatic, being invited to perform an encore immediately after the show by the saloon's owner, much the the chagrin of Roger, who becomes in the moment known as Alexander and Stella who has no desire to work with the group.  Yet, the success cannot be denied and the two make amends, eventually coming to find each other very attractive, creating a burgeoning romance in the process. However, Stella is offered a lucrative solo career, which she jumps on immediately, leaving the band although promising to return for them once she accrues enough success, wherein the heartbroken Roger joins the military and works as a band leader and morale booster, although most just as a point of pride for the Army over the Marines.  Whilst away, Roger also gets married, leading to the now equally heartbroken Stella marrying Charlie in turn.  Thus the two create diverging musical lives, both with considerable success, although it is Roger and his turn as Alexander that proves slightly more productive, even attaining sold out shows at large musical halls.  Hoping to meet him one last time, not aware that he and his wife had attained a mutual divorce, she arrives at his sold out performance, only to hear him cue up "Alexander's Ragtime Band." Jumping at her chance to rekindle the flame Stella enters the music hall and is invited by Roger to join in singing.  The two share a tender embrace in the closing moments of the film.

In a variety of senses, Alexander's Ragtime Band is a film about appropriation.  In so much that it is borrowing, sometimes knowingly, other times, without awareness from other cultural institutions and points of popular reference to create a narrative anew.  This is not to be confused with say the post-modern use of reappropriation, wherein the same elements are used but to make a divergent, if not purposefully oppositional statement with the material.  Here, the most obvious appropriation comes in the way of the literal appropriation of the Irving Berlin songbook, the music in use almost arbitrary as long as it proves appropriately up temp or slowed down in regards to the point of reference in the film, it is only the title song and one other song within the film that seem to have definite relation to the larger narrative.  Indeed, even the entire sidewinding plot involving Roger's time in the military seems appropriated, as though the success of other war based musical numbers justified an entire bit about the beauty of the YMCA and waking up to walk of to war.  Sure the war element is present, but only in so much as it is meant to be a point of separation for the narrative to be resolved with unity.  The military appropriation is indeed so arbitrary to the plot as to almost feel exploitative.  I am not doubting that the intentions of the filmmaker and producers were not well-intended, but would also posit that such a wild redirection could only work as a result of it occurring right before the onset of World War II wherein all military imagery would have fell within quite strict use and regulation.  Of course, the most offensive of all appropriations comes in the unnecessary and outright exploitative use of blackface in this context.  I want to assure that I will not defend it as an institution within the classical entertainment industry, but I can accept that it was a popular medium of performance in vaudeville, here blackness as appropriated with absolutely no context, not even a racist one, although its inclusion merely for aesthetic completion and without any acknowledgement beyond this might be all the more racist.  Alexander's Ragtime Band is all about borrowing things, but none of it is done with a shred of skill.

Key Scene:  I really enjoyed the "Walking Stick" number but that is only a result of me doing a queer reading of the moment, although a completely obvious one if I do say so.

There are better thirties eras to watch than this, might I direct you towards Astaire and Rogers films.