Product: Birth Of The Blues/Blue Skies - Double Feature (1941)
Rating: 4.0
nostalgic double feature--even if it is embarrassingly dated at times... (3 1/2 stars)
This DVD gives us two musicals starring Bing Crosby; although there are no extras many Crosby fans will want this in their collections! Some of the material is embarrassingly dated; but still musical fans and Bing Crosby fans will like this anyway. Fred Astaire fans get to see him work with Bing in Blue Skies.Birth Of The Blues is a musical vehicle for the great Bing Crosby. This plot may be fictionalized but you watch this film for the song and dance numbers. The convincing acting held my attention all the way; and the plot moves along at a good pace.When the action starts, a young Jeff Lambert is getting the spanking of his life from his father--for being caught playing jazz. However, this has little effect on Jeff--he grows up to want to have the first all white Dixieland jazz band. He and his musician buddies soon meet a sharp coronet player named Memphis (Brian Donlevy) and by chance they bump into a young lady named Betty Lou Cobb (Mary Martin) who has a great singing voice.Memphis and Betty Lou join the band and after a few flops things begin to take off for Jeff and his crew. They get their first big break at a club run by a thug boss named Blackie (J. Carrol Naish) who doesn't feel like letting them go to a more profitable job. Blackie has his "boys" trying as hard as they can to keep Jeff, Betty Lou and the gang all playing at his nightclub and his nightclub only.Will Jeff and the gang ever get away from Blackie? What about Betty Lou--both Jeff and Memphis want her hand in marriage; but of course she can only marry one of them. Which man will Betty Lou choose?The cinematography and choreography work well in crowd scenes like the nightclubs and the fight scenes.Overall, Birth Of The Blues is good but far from the best from the golden age of Hollywood--the dialogue weighs it down a bit and there are offensive references to African-Americans.Blue Skies is a fantastic cavalcade of song and dance numbers--even if it is held together by the thinnest plot I've ever seen in any movie! The musical numbers are sublime! We get Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire singing and dancing up a storm. The plot (or action, since the plot is so thin) moves along at a good pace.The action when Jed Potter (Fred Astaire) has his eyes on a beautiful chorus girl named Mary O'Hara (Joan Caulfield). However, Joan isn't truly all that interested in Jed--she much prefers the company the Jed's buddy Johnny Adams (Bing Crosby). The two men vie for Joan's attention and her hand in marriage; and along the way we are treated to upwards of two dozen magnificent musical numbers.Over time, Mary and Johnny do finally wed--much to the chagrin of Jed Potter. Nevertheless, there's still one major fly in the ointment for Johnny and Mary: Johnny isn't very "stabile;" he likes to bet on the horses and he always winds up having to sell his nightclub business to pay debts and then he starts over in a new city--dragging Mary along with him. Mary tolerates this until a child is born. Now their marriage is in considerable trouble.What happens between Mary and Johnny--will they be able to stay together or will they divorce? Even if they split up, will it be forever--or will Mary finally break down and marry Jed who still loves her after all?Blue Skies is one movie you watch for the musical numbers. It's fantastic to see Fred Astaire dance--especially in the scene that has miniature Fred Astaires on the screen dancing behind him! Bing sings beautiful number after number.Blue Skies is best viewed as a musical with just enough of a plot to get the musical numbers on the screen. I highly recommend this classic movie musical; and people who like Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire will never be disappointed.