Fred Astaire

Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town (1970)

Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town (1970)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On TV, December 2020) Not being a native Anglophone, I find myself with curious blind spots when it comes to “childhood classics that everyone knows.” I’m making an effort to catch up on some of it, though, and Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town popped up on the list given the TV Channel December schedules. It did immediately remind me of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer in that it, too, is a stop-motion short animation film with a delightfully tactile feel, as the felt-made characters are moved around with physical presence. I had a big smile during the first few moments, as an immediately recognizable animated Fred Astaire (also voiced by him) plays the narrator of the piece. Running at an hour-long length, it features a fair amount of plot, certainly more than the 30-minute specials: the film is an origin story for Santa Claus, with plenty of original material to go by. It’s a fun special, and I can certainly understand how it’s now been broadcast for fifty years.

Follow the Fleet (1936)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, November 2020) I’m watching Fred Astaire films in rough decreasing order of acknowledged importance, and it’s not a bad approach—his persona is best defined by his most popular films, and once you start plumbing into the lesser-remembers ones, you can hit some weird variations on his usual characters. I’m not going to forget a drunken Astaire smashing a bar in The Sky’s The Limit, but there’s something almost equally strange in seeing him play what’s supposed to be a rough-hewn Navy sailor in Follow the Fleet: Astaire’s persona was pure ballroom, not boiler room (although, yes, I also remember that scene in Shall We Dance), and it’s a very curious choice to structure a film (a peacetime film, no less!) around him being a swabbie at the service of Uncle Sam. Somehow, Ginger Rogers makes her way into the plot as a gifted hostess employed in a San Francisco ballroom -at least until Astaire barges in and gets her fired. There’s a B-romance as well, but we’re here for Astaire and Rogers and, fortunately, Follow the Fleet delivers on the dance front: There’s a ballroom duet sequence early in the film to reassure us that they’ve still got it. Later on, the action moves to ship decks in time for an Astaire solo tap number with sailors surrounding him. The third act has the big guns: A piano solo from Astaire, a deliciously funny duet (“I’m Putting All My Eggs in One Basket”) in which Astaire and Rogers intentionally dance out of step and then—as a big finale—an anthology-worthy return to pure class in “Let’s Face the Music in Dance” where we once again have a glamorous version of the duo doing their best in front of a very stylized art-deco backdrop. Nonetheless, Follow the Fleet isn’t quite better than the sum of its parts: while there are some great moments, the film as a whole seems less funny, less tight (at 110 minutes, many of them dedicated to a lacklustre narrative) and less purely enjoyable than other 1930s films featuring the duo. I still liked it based on its individual numbers, but I also liked their other films of the decade better—most notably Top Hat, The Gay Divorcee, Swing Time and Shall We Dance. But even a substandard Astaire still has moves impossible to duplicate by anyone but Astaire: let’s treasure what we’ve got.

A Damsel in Distress (1937)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, October 2020) One of the lesser Fred Astaire musicals of the 1930s, A Damsel in Distress takes us to England, where Astaire plays (as usual) a renowned entertainer trying to find love. He eventually finds it in the character of an English lady, although not without the complications that usually follow such narratives. The cast does offer some interest, with Joan Fontaine at the female lead, and comic characters played by none other than George Burns and Gracie Allen, the later being progressively funnier as a squeaky-voiced airhead. There’s the usual number and variety of dance numbers from Astaire, and while there’s nothing truly anthology-worthy here, two or three sequences still work really well: “Stiff Upper Lip” leads to a showpiece funhouse dance number, while “Nice Work If You Can Get It” leads to an Astaire drum solo played with a variety of appendages. Nearly everything about the film is perfunctory by Astaire’s high standards—Fontaine is not a particularly good dancer, the comedy is slight (aside from Burns and Allen) and the premise is a bit dull compared to other movies of the era. Those who keep a wearied eye on Astaire’s romantic persona (boiled down to “no means try again later”) will note an explicit statement of the persistence credo late in the film, where a character calls out Astaire for being too passive and to Go Get It. Modern audiences will groan at that moment—what works for Astaire would mean a restraining order and social media denunciations in real life twenty-first century. Still, A Damsel in Distress itself is not too bad, even though it is frankly one of the more easily disposable of Astaire’s black-and-white films.

The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle (1939)

The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle (1939)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On DVD, August 2020) While it’s always great to see another new-to-me Fred Astaire film, The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle does lead me once again (but not as strongly as in The Barkleys of Broadway) to state that having Astaire play a historical character is a waste—Astaire is Astaire no matter what his character’s name is. Still, this loosely adapted biography of the title characters does let Astaire do a few things—being in a loving relationship from the get-go with frequent screen partner Ginger Rogers, for one (none of that obsessively pursuing the girl until she says yes), playing in a more realistic film and—gulp—dying at the end of the movie. That last particularity isn’t as much of a downer for two reasons: for one thing, it’s historical fact. For another, Astaire is Astaire—he still had nineteen subsequent musicals to go, and it’s not a last-minute death in a minor film that would depress viewers. The lack of characterization may actually help in softening the blow here. Still, it does highlight that of all of Astaire’s musicals (and more specifically the ten Astaire/Rogers collaboration), The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle is a more grounded film, and a duller one as well: absent the genial comedy of Astaire’s other musicals, it feels longer despite the touches of humour and dance numbers. Said dance numbers owe more to the Castles than to Astaire, meaning that they’re more restrained and not quite with the razzle-dazzle of what Astaire pulled off in previous films. While it must have felt natural to cast a great dancing duo to play the roles of famous ballroom dancers, this film stretches the limits of Astaire’s dancing persona as far as it could go in that direction. Elements of The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle would pop up in later movies (having Astaire as a pilot in The Sky’s the Limit, having Rogers and Astaire as a real-life couple in The Barkleys of Broadway), but it’s a good thing that Astaire never once headed back in that direction. I still liked the movie (it’s really hard to dislike an Astaire film), but I would rank it firmly in the actor’s lower tier.

The Barkleys of Broadway (1949)

The Barkleys of Broadway (1949)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, July 2020) Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers are reunited for the tenth and final time in The Barkleys of Broadway, playing a married Broadway couple whose bickering gets out of hand, leading to strife and separation. The film’s production history tells us that Judy Garland was first slated to play the female lead but had to bow out and was replaced by Rogers, thus providing an interesting ten-year-later epilogue to the Astaire/Rogers professional duo. In most ways, it’s a classic MGM Freed production from the good years of the unit—where the focus on Broadway presenters means that there are plenty of diegetic occasions to present song and dance numbers. We shouldn’t underestimate the fun of seeing Oscar Levant in a role tailored to fit both his musical talents (as he plays a Tarkovsky piano concerto on-screen, hands flying on the keys) and his comic persona with a penchant for acerbic bon mots. Special effects make the “Shows with Wings on” sequence worth a look, as one of Astaire’s later-career solo numbers with a gimmick. Fittingly enough for an Astaire/Rogers finale, there is some great duet dancing here. Alas, as with many musicals, the balance of comedy to drama is not ideal in the third act—it’s not as if the resolution is in doubt. Even as a rather average Astaire/Rogers film, The Barkleys of Broadway is a lot of fun to watch for musical comedy fans. It also heralds, in its own way, a few spectacular years for MGM musical comedies.

Three Little Words (1950)

Three Little Words (1950)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, July 2020) The mini wave of composer biopics meets Fred Astaire in Three Little Words, which goes back to the Tinpan Alley era to present a biography of songwriting team Kalmar and Ruby. Astaire (as Kalmar) stars with Red Skelton (as Ruby) and the always-beautiful Vera-Ellen as Kalmar’s wife in what’s probably one of the healthiest on-screen romantic relationships in Astaire’s filmography. (There’s no creeping insistence in this specific romance, although the 22-year age gap remains significant.) Also notable is that Astaire does a lot more singing than dancing here—this is a biopic that’s not quite built to accommodate his usual dance performances. There’s some built-in drama (which wasn’t always the case in other composer biographies), as the two partners argue. While Three Little Words is adapted from real historical figures (ones that Astaire even knew personally), it’s difficult to see anyone but Astaire and Skelton rather than their characters. But that’s fine—both actors have a much better chemistry than you could expect from their specific comic styles, and it helps that Skelton keeps his wilder comic instincts under control here. As composer biopics go, historians tell us that Three Little Words is considered one of the most accurate depictions of their subject—although with plenty of Hollywood enhancements. But while not a bad jukebox musical in itself, it’s a bit of a disappointing entry in the Astaire filmography: it’s an early example of him trying to stretch beyond his dancing abilities (something that would become more frequent as he aged) and there’s nothing wrong with that, but it means that Three Little Words should be assessed more along the lines of a composer biopic (where it is, in fact, funnier and more charming than most) than an Astair musical (which it is not).

You Were Never Lovelier (1942)

You Were Never Lovelier (1942)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, July 2020) As far as Fred Astaire movies go, You Were Never Lovelier is roughly in the unremarkable middle. The humdrum plot sees Astaire as an American expatriate in Rio de Janeiro being pressured into courting a businessman’s daughter. It’s not bad, but its origin in an earlier Spanish-language film does seem to limit its nature: rather than something custom-made for Astaire’s strengths, we have something that approximates other better Astaire films without quite giving him something particularly distinctive to do. Many (most?) of the dance sequences appear to be in the same ballroom, for instance—it’s a nice set indeed, but it does contribute to the film’s featurelessness. Fortunately, one distinction is the gorgeous Rita Hayworth, holding her own as Astaire’s dance partner and looking substantially sexier than many of his other co-stars. Astaire dances like the movie legend he is, with the requisite solo number and the courtship duet. The Latin American location adds a little bit to the result. The love story, built on false pretences, is also very familiar (especially to modern audiences having overdosed on “seducing for profit, surprised by honest love” tropes)—although—and I realize how crazy it sounds—there may be a bit too much plot to support it. Still, You Were Never Lovelier is fun viewing: its unremarkable nature is only true if you’re used to Astaire’s dancing, which remains astonishing on its own terms.

Dancing Lady (1933)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, June 2020) While Dancing Lady is technically the first of Fred Astaire’s movie musicals, his fans should keep in mind that it took him a few movies’ worth of scene-stealing appearances before getting his first lead role, and so this film sees him relegated to a climactic showcase number, as himself, dancing with Joan Crawford. Not that he’s the only one making early appearances here that now overshadow the leads of the film—An early iteration of The Three Stooges also shows up, plus later star Nelson Eddy, making this film’s supporting cast far more remarkable than nominal leads Franchot Tone and Clark Gable. (I would add “…and Crawford” except that she looks absolutely spectacular here—although not much of a dancer, especially around Astaire.) As an early Pre-Code musical of the early sound era, Dancing Lady is still quite rough around the edges: even the narrative doesn’t go too far away from its Broadway inspiration by featuring a making of a musical as its narrative foundation. It feels a bit short at 92 minutes, but that’s probably because we’re expecting more Astaire. While Dancing Lady is perfectly watchable, it’s probably more of interest to Astaire fans and cinephiles tracking the evolution of the early musicals… although the Pre-Code attitude does make it more interesting than most.

The Belle of New York (1952)

The Belle of New York (1952)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, April 2020) If you run down the list of Fred Astaire musicals, The Belle of New York runs the distinction of being one of the least distinctive ones. Here, Astaire plays the playboy who falls for the holier-than-thou Vera-Ellen against a stylish backdrop of turn-of-the-century Manhattan and a fantastic illustration of love as making characters weightless. Despite the whimsical conceit, the film itself is slightly too staid to be wholly enjoyable. This doesn’t mean it’s a failure, though—compared to a few other lower-end Astaire musicals, The Belle of New York certainly has its attractions. It’s not churlish to note that it benefits from being shot in colour, and that Vera-Ellen, despite her age difference, is a better-than-average dance partner for Astaire (her “Naughty but Nice” solo dressing room number is nothing short of whew!) The film also demonstrates Astaire’s career-long intent to dance at the edge of special effects technology—here, a lot of green-screen work may not have aged particularly well (part of his face disappears in one shot), but still has quite a bit of charm. Then there’s also character actress Alice Pearce being very funny (and rather cute) in a comic relief role that even includes a brief song. Despite those elements taking The Belle of New York at least to the mid-tier, there is a sense that the film is spinning its wheels. The songs are hardly memorable, and don’t quite bolster the numerous dance numbers. From a plot perspective, the film hews a bit too close to the least admirable aspects of Astaire’s persistent-suitor screen persona, even if it does play a bit with deconstructing that archetype. I still liked it, but Astaire completists are definitely advised to keep The Belle of New York for later in their explorations of his filmography.

The Sky’s the Limit (1943)

The Sky’s the Limit (1943)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, April 2020) You won’t find The Sky’s the Limit ranked very high on any list of Fred Astaire’s films, but fans may find it interesting to see him playing something slightly different than usual. The most distinctive aspect of it is that the film in unabashed wartime propaganda, and that Astaire plays a military pilot! Not a very dutiful one, mind you—he escapes his own morale-boosting tour to go have fun in New York City, meets a girl and the film gets back on the tracks of Astaire’s usual romantic comedies. While the songs and dances are sparser than usual, Astaire’s character is written, as usual, as a persistent stalker when it comes to pursuing girls. To make up for fewer musical numbers, the romance is more front-and-centre than usual, even if the match between Astaire and Joan Leslie (both of them playing characters with their first names) doesn’t quite gel. The film gets better during the pair’s first ta-dancing duet, but eventually the romance hits its usual third-act wall. This temporary break-up leads to the best sequence in the film—and one of the highlights in any serious Astaire anthology: the “One for My Baby (And One More for the Road)” number, in which Astaire’s drunk character lashes out at his frustrations at a hotel bar by tap-dancing and kicking glasses and bottles at the mirrored bar wall. It’s a shocking, violent, and completely off-persona sequence for Astaire at the time, even though it portends Astaire’s wide-ranging post-musical acting career. The film could have ended on that note, but there are still a few minutes for a wholly unsatisfying happy ending that feels trite considering the rest of the film. The Sky’s the Limit is, to be sure, an interesting film for Astaire fans asked to accept him as something else in a film that doesn’t particularly use his talents very well in service of wartime propaganda. But it’s not a particularly good film. For fans only, and even then—steel yourself the moment you see Astaire acting drunk.

Roberta (1935)

Roberta (1935)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, April 2020) In assessing Roberta, it’s useful to be reminded that even if this was the third Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers film, the pair wasn’t nearly as famous as they’d become the next year with the success of Top Hat. Their roles in the film are important but not dominant: There’s also Randolph Scott and Irene Dunn having nearly as much screentime as the busy plot tries to have two romances going at once. The disappointment continues with the relatively few musical numbers and their impact: While Roberta is professionally produced, the songs aren’t that memorable (although I do like “I won’t dance”) and neither is the choreography. While Astaire and Hermes Pan were getting up to speed, we’re still far away (well, aside from the hand-piano bit) from the high-concept sequences of Astaire films to come. If you’re a fan of those later movies, Roberta feels familiar—not terribly special, but comforting nonetheless. The plot itself is a bit dull, and is largely led by Scott and Dunne—something about an American ex-football player (Scott) inheriting a fashion house in Paris while his friend (Astaire) plays in a band. There are a few good barbs, but the plot gets shoved away quickly when Astaire and Ginger get their dancing shoes and start tap-dancing away: they’re always fun even when Roberta is determined not to give them too much time. But that would quickly change in the following months, and give us the film that ensured their long-lived popularity.

Shall We Dance (1937)

Shall We Dance (1937)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, March 2020) As much as all Astaire/Rogers romantic comedies are to be treasured forever, not all of them are created equal, and Shall We Dance is definitely in the lower tier. The plot is just as typically irrelevant as in their other films, except that it’s convoluted and uninteresting. Worse, the musical numbers tend to be underwhelming and forgettable. Only a few—like the roller-skate sequence—stick in mind and few of them are anthology pieces. One interesting exception is the “Slap that Bass” sequence (never has a ship’s engine room has been so clean, nor so art deco!), which showcases Astaire’s ideal of racial integration in a way that’s more easily digestible than other attempts involving blackface.  The relationship between both lead characters also seems healthier than the norm for Astaire films—something probably motivated by the growing rapport between the two. Still, there are plenty of missed opportunities and underwhelming execution here: the pacing is slow, it takes a long time to see the two leads dancing, there isn’t much of a romantic duet, and the comedy is lacking. Shall We Dance is still worth a watch (1930s Astaire on an off day is still superhuman), but it does fall short compared to their other movies of the time.

Royal Wedding (1951)

Royal Wedding (1951)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, March 2020) For fans of classic films, it’s a bit of a generational shock to realize that the Royal Wedding in 1951’s Royal Wedding has to do with Queen Elizabeth II—another piece of evidence about her incredibly long reign. Otherwise, though, I suspect that most viewers will focus on the one thing in the film that hasn’t aged—Fred Astaire’s performance and he tap-dances and sings his way through this movie musical. Astaire was a practised professional at that time and the film sports most of the specific trademarks of his performances—the quirky solo number (this time dancing with a hatrack), the funny duet (as the ship’s deck rolls under them), the innovative special-effects dance number (the film’s most famous sequence, as Astaire dances on the walls and ceiling of the room, filmed from within a rotating set), a sequence coming from a show (with Jane Powell), a big ensemble song-and-dance finale (“I let my hat in Haiti”) and so on—the only notable omission being a romantic dance duet, somewhat explained by how the only dancing partner Astaire has here, Powell, plays his character’s sister. The other thing missing is a big finale: After the ensemble song-and-dance, Royal Wedding still has five minutes filled with stock footage of Elizabeth II’s ceremony and a perfunctory double wedding to wrap things up. In the pantheon of Astaire’s musical comedies, this is solidly middle-tier material even if two of the sequences (the hatrack and revolving-room sequences) are literally anthology pieces in the That’s Entertainment series. Compared to the average movie musical of the period, though, Royal Wedding is still very much worth a watch: Director Stanley Donnen and Astaire are old hands at what they do best here, and if Jane Powell is a bit bland here, she does fill the shoes required of an Astaire screen partner (although, significantly, she’s not featured very much in the dancing). I liked Royal Wedding quite a bit (it helps that Astaire’s caddish persona is toned down slightly, as is his no-means-try-later persistence) but I can definitely think of many better entry points to his filmography.

Flying Down to Rio (1933)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, February 2020) Everyone’s got to start somewhere, but for any viewer since 1934 it’s still a bit strange to see Fred Astaire in a supporting role in his first feature film Flying Down to Rio. It wasn’t his first feature film, but only by a technicality: A month earlier, Astaire showed up on screens for a single scene (playing himself) in Dancing Lady. Considering that there wasn’t anything to play in the earlier film, you can consider his supporting character role in Flying Down to Rio to be his first movie role as an actor—and more significantly, the first of his legendary pairings with Ginger Rogers. Any Astaire fan can clearly see that Hollywood didn’t know what to do with him yet—being relegated to a romantic subplot is something, but the way the camera captures his dancing (full frame but not full body, often obscured by others and relegated to the background, clearly not commanding the screen like he would in later films) is somewhat atypical for him. Still, Flying Down to Rio’s breezy fun still makes up for the less-than-reverent place given to Astaire: as a slightly naughty Pre-Code musical comedy that can escape to the exotic atmosphere of Rio de Janeiro, the film often feels significantly more risqué than the rest of Astaire’s career—the “Just a Gigolo” number is amusing, and his later films would most definitely not feature a dark-haired beauty lead actress in a two-piece bikini. One more thing distinguishes this early effort from Astaire’s later romantic-cad persona—his character shows up as a fiancé rather than going through the persistent-suitor routine… and I count this as an improvement of sorts. Aside from Astaire, Flying Down to Rio has a few other assets: the lead couple’s romantic adventures are entertaining, lead actress Dolores Del Rio is underused, Etta Moren is lovely as “the colored singer” (this is a direct quote from the credits) and the film ends on a very high note with an early special-effects showcase featuring a line of dancers on planes flying high above Rio. Still, the film’s most convincing asset here remains Astaire, who makes the most out of a secondary role and clearly shows his chemistry with Rogers. No wonder that by the following year, The Gay Divorcee would launch a long series of classic Astaire films, with or without Rogers at his side.

Broadway Melody of 1940 (1940)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, January 2020) The Broadway Melody series goes out with a bang in the fourth and final instalment Broadway Melody of 1940. If you want to talk about individual films leaving a legacy, consider that this is the only on-screen pairing of two of the era’s greatest dancers at the height of their powers—Fred Astaire in fine youthful form, and the equally-impressive tap-dancing sensation Eleanor Russell. They share two dancing numbers, and they are both terrific: the first number is loose, flirty and fun, while the second is polished (musically and visually) and carefully controlled. Other delights abound; the film gets started on a strong note with a dual-tap dancing sequence featuring Astaire and George Murphy. Then there’s a fun ball-balancing act. The nautical stage number is a prowess of set design. The Broadway-themed plot shows up just enough to string along the dancer numbers, and that’s all we need. Movie musicals historians will tell you that this was Powell’s last major film, the first of Astaire’s second MGM contract, and the last big black-and-white musical from MGM. But what’s important is that Broadway Melody of 1940 captures some incredible performances and can still be watched with great interest eighty years later. Now that’s a legacy!