Product: The Mickey Rooney & Judy Garland Collection (Babes in Arms / Babes on Broadway / Girl Crazy / Strike Up the Band) (2007)
Rating: 5.0
Give these a try!
I was a bit doubtful about these at first. I'm a huge fan of the MGM musicals of the 40s and 50s with Gene Kelly and an older Garland, as well as Howard Keel and the rest. But these movies are just wonderful! The writing is actually fairly fresh and witty--each movie has a nice balance of drama and comedy, and each has some truly moving scenes. There's no doubt that the basic plots of "let's put on a show" are all pretty much alike, but the movies are still very, very entertaining.I think that what I loved about the post-war musicals was the dancing--in these it's the music and vocals that make magic. Gerschwin tunes and others--it's about creating a mood rather than the athleticism that I love in Gene Kelly pictures and Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. The instrumentals of the soundtracks are as lovely as the musical numbers themselves.Mickey and Judy light up the screen--I found the two of them just breathtaking. You can tell that they're both going to be big stars--the acting is absolutely top knotch from this pair. They look like the teens that they were instead of twenty somethings. Judy is acting every second that she's on screen, conveying a whole gamit of emotions all the time. Mickey's charisma is very powerful--I'm not surprised that he married 5 times!As for special features, you can read about the wide range of them in the other reviews, and I'll just say that I would have bought this set for the Judy Garland songbook alone with musical numbers that span her career from beginning to end.I wasn't sure that these would be my taste--but I just loved them. They have a very different feel than the adult Astaire/Rogers and MGM musicals to come. I enjoyed them all immensely, and I'm sure that I'll watch them again and again. You can't go wrong with this set--4 great films, shorts and cartoons, commentaries, radio spots, trailers, a book and postcards: this is a little snapshot of the history of an era. Buy this!!!