Strike Up the Band
Tags: romantic

Plot synopsis:
Jimmy Connors (Mickey Rooney), a student at Riverwood High School, also plays the drums in the school band, but dreams of playing in a dance band. He and his "pal" Mary Holden (Judy Garland) sell the school principal the idea of forming the band and putting on a dance. The principal is initially doubtful, but then agrees to buy the first ticket. The event is a success and the school's debt for the instruments in paid off.
Famous band leader Paul Whiteman (played by himself) sponsors a contest in Chicago for the best high school musical group, and Jimmy decides the band must compete. In three weeks, the kids write, plan, and put on a show. The melodrama, called "Nell from New Rochelle", is also a success and raises the money to go to Chicago, but they're still short. A loan from Whiteman himself solves that problem. But when a member of the cast is injured and needs a critical and urgent operation, the band gives the money up so that the injured student can be flown to Chicago for the operation.
The band raises the money anyway, competes in Chicago, and wins the $500 prize. To Jimmy goes the honor of leading all the bands in a grand finale performance.

Review: I can't help it, I love Mickey and Judy, and this is their best film together.
It has fun songs ("Our Love Affair" and "Do the La Conga" especially), good Busby Berkeley productions (both the aforementioned, especially the fruit-as-orchestra dream sequence!), but more importantly, it perfectly evokes the ideal small middle-American town, complete with understanding mothers and principals, swell fellas and gals, and a comforting everything's going to be just fine feeling.
I think Mickey Rooney outshines Judy Garland in this one (but that might be like comparing apples to oranges, which incidentally play a not incidental role in this movie).
Mickey plays the piano, the drums, sings, dances, pitches baseballs and jumps over fences and hedgerows....plus he's good to his widowed mother and turns up the "life's a gas" charm at the drop of a hat.
The teenagers in this movie, however, look like miniature adults, and moreover, some of Mickey's band members look a little long in the tooth.
Overlong but fun Mickey & Judy "let's put on a show" musical, directed by the great Busby Berkeley.
Drummer Jimmy (Mickey Rooney) and would-be girlfriend Mary (Judy Garland) try to make their high school band a success.
Along the way they deal with little personal dramas like Jimmy's mother wanting him to be a doctor, a new girl in town who captures Jimmy's eye, and one of the band members needing an emergency operation.
Mayer decided that a patriotic type theme was in order and after all MGM had bought the screen rights to the Gershwin musical Strike Up The Band.
Freed agreed, but in the Hollywood tradition only the title and the title song were retained for the screen.That was enough because the Mickey and Judy formula was by now established with Babes In Arms.
Here the two are a pair of talented musical kids and Mickey is the drummer in his high school band.
Mickey is filled with the new jive rhythms of the day and he'd like to use the other kids in the school orchestra to form a real band.
Leaders like Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey and Glenn Miller all who were sidemen with Whiteman and who kids like Mickey and Judy and the rest of the cast were listening to.If Strike Up The Band isn't exactly let's put on a show, it still is let's put on a concert and Mickey and Judy do have some shtick to perform, their Gay Nineties spoof is quite good.
Also the fantasy sequence of the 'fruit orchestra' doing Our Love Affair is also nicely done, it looks very much like Ray Harryhausen's claymation figures, but he wasn't involved with Strike Up The Band.Strike Up The Band won one Academy Award for sound and was nominated for two others.
And Edens and Georgie Stoll were nominated for Best Musical Scoring.Busby Berkeley directed the film and in the finale shows his fine hand for spectacle.
Remember this was 1940 and a lot of people were very afraid the USA was going into another World War. The finale with the title song was the kind of rousing patriotic spectacle that Hollywood would be doing in every studio after December 7, 1941.With Strike Up The Band Arthur Freed proved he was no flash in the pan as a producer.
After 70 years the film holds up well and the talents of Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland reign eternal..
I love the Mickey/Judy movies and this is a wonderful example of a superb one, but of the three "lets put on a show" type movies this is the worst.
Mickey and Judy Great but Film a Bit Too Much!.
"Strike Up the Band" is another teaming of Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland who are of course put in the position of putting on a show to save a band, a school program for children, a school from closing, etc.
It is very enjoyable with great musical numbers for Mickey and Judy; but there's just so much of everything here, making it two whole hours, including a over-the-top tongue-in-cheek save-the-damsel production in the middle of the movie, lasting 15 minutes itself.
One of the many team-ups between Mickey Rooney & Judy Garland.
The great Busby Berkeley directed this 1940 installment which finds Rooney out of sorts w/the direction the school band is trending to.
Judy's songs " drummer boy" and "our love affair" are wonderful in this film.
And Judy doing "La conga" is great, and she helped open the doors for the Latin style music that was to come during the 1940s with musicians such as Xavier Couget, who was in numerous films with the wonderful Esther Williams.
Micky Rooney and the others, such as June Priesser are great in this film too, although Mickey gets a little too hammy in a couple of scenes, like in "Babes in arms" when he gets so hyper excited when the studio director offered him $100.
Judy's song "I've got nobody, and nobody got me" tugs at the heartstrings, sort of like "I'm just an inbetween" in "Love finds Andy Hardy" and "But not for me" in "Girl crazy".
& The BEST ENDING I LOVE seeing Mickey playing the Drums, i wish THAT he would have done it MORE often than in this film & in (1951)'s B-Movie "The Strip" which isn't a bad movie in itself either.
Despite the excellence of dance, music, singing, acting--though one always suspects the combination of Rooney / Garland was more being themselves than acting--the movie cannot transcend its severe limitations.
Despite Freed, Busby Berkeley, Paul Whitman, and the singing and dancing of Rooney & Garland-- the movie fails.
Of all the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland musicals, this one does the least to effectively showcase their musical talent.
Mickey is allowed to conduct a band as if his life depended on it, even though he's shown to be an extremely talented guy with drums and other musical instruments.And the story is strictly '40s corn about a talented youth who wants to achieve success with his own band and succeeds in attracting the attention of Paul Whiteman who wants him for a big radio show contest.The songs are given short shrift in favor of a creaky melodramatic skit that is allowed to run far too long in the middle of the picture.
Only a couple of songs are given fair treatment by Judy and Mickey.A good script was badly needed to show these two performers at their best.
Being a huge lifelong fan of Judy Garland, with a voice that you can listen to for hours and tire of, and who likes her paired with Mickey Rooney (a multi-talented performer with a tendency to overdo it), 'Strike Up the Band' was definitely something that couldn't be missed.To me, 'Strike Up the Band' is the second best of their four "backyard" musicals.
The dialogue warms the heart and moves sometimes but the silly corniness of some of it is cringe-worthy.Lastly while the cast are mostly splendid, there is one exception and that is the terribly annoying June Preisser (just as much as in 'Babes in Arms'), enviously athletic dancing is not enough for an obnoxious character played far too broadly to unbearable degrees.However, even when not in Technicolor, 'Strike Up the Band' still looks lovely in crisp black and white and with elegant production design.
As said, on the musical front (production values, songs, vocal performance, arrangements, choreography and dancing) 'Strike Up the Band' fares significantly better.
The three best songs being the plaintive "Our Love Affair", the exuberant "Drummer Boy" and the barn-storming "Do the La Conga".Busby Berkeley's direction and how he stages the songs are not quite as imaginative, witty or dazzling as some of his other films, but it doesn't come over heavy-handedly and it has charm, tenderness and energy, particularly in the aforementioned three songs.
The story is unexceptional but is full of energy, fun, heart and charm, palling only in the non-musical moments of the middle third.Rooney and Garland make 'Strike Up the Band' especially worth seeing, they are both on top form and their chemistry irresistible.
From personal opinion, of the four Rooney-Garland "back-yard" musicals (despite 'Babes in Arms' being the one to get the Oscar nomination) this contains Rooney's best performance of the four, his role really plays to his strengths and even stretches him in showing more talents that one never knew he had (i.e. didn't know he could play the drum so well).
Garland is as ever radiant and deeply touching, "Our Love Affair" being one of the most poignant renditions of any song in a film she starred in (very near the top too, and the list is long).
When I decided to get this movie from Netflix, I think this was the only one of the Mickey Rooney-Judy Garland musicals I had yet to watch as I remember seeing the others of theirs years ago.
I loved the "Do the La Conga" number Mickey & Judy do.
This is a high energy film about music, talent, success, family, imagination, fun and teenagers growing up in a "typical" Midwestern town of the time.
Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland were 20- and 18-year-old actors who had proved their talent.
She had some songs in a couple of small musicals and sang two numbers in the 1938 Andy Hardy film, "Love Finds Andy Hardy." Then she made the classic fantasy adventure musical, "The Wizard of Oz." To round out 1939, the two were paired as the leads of a comedy musical and they scored a smashing success in "Babes in Arms." So, MGM had all the proof it needed for future box-office success with this dynamic duo.
The talent in "Strike Up the Band" isn't only in the music – the performances and numbers headed by Rooney and Garland, or in Paul Whiteman's Orchestra.
It has a big-name band, great imagination, and wonderful musical numbers.
As for Rooney's high energy that some may find over the top at times – it was as much a part of the story and movie as all the other pieces that, put together, add up to a very good comedy musical.
Sadly, this is by far the best aspect of the movie and the rest is a dated film that pleased crowds back in 1940 but which is a much harder sell today.Jimmy Connoors (Mickey Rooney) is the drum playing leader of a swing band made up of high school kids.
Overall, this is my least favorite of the 4 B&W musical comedies, from '39 -'43, starring Mickey and Judy.
Hence, extensive portions deal with the teenagers, usually led by Mickey, with Judy's support, having to beg permission from authority figures, including their parents, to put on a musical or dramatic show, and the practical problems of securing financing and an adequate place to put on the show.In this one, Mickey, as the bored drummer for the High School band, leads a crusade to form a school-sponsored dance band, providing an opportunity for the other bored band members to play current pop music, and hopefully making some money for the school and themselves.
There would be the roughly equivalent manic production "Hoe Down" at this spot in the subsequent "Babes on Broadway" Meanwhile, Mickey talks to his 'pal' Judy about the problem of his mother expecting him to become a doctor, like his dad, while he thinks he's cut out to be a musician.
Later, when the Paul Whiteman band miraculously shows up in town for Barbara's birthday, Mickey is given an opportunity to turn professional when one of Whiteman's sidemen decides to form a new band.
Initially ecstatic, Mickey's mother reminds him that he is the leader of the HS dance band and their ambition to win Whiteman's content on his radio show.
Before this episode, her father arranged for Whiteman's band to play at Barbara's birthday party, giving Whiteman a chance to hear the dance band, who play "Drummer Boy" with Whiteman's instruments, Mickey being the manic drummer, of course.The biggest problem with the film is the long, mostly boring, New Rochelle archaic drama, in the middle.
The most popular original song in the film: "Our Love Affair" is redone, with 4 large harps near the relevant Mickey-Judy couple.
The first time this was played, Mickey wasn't thinking of Judy in a romantic context.
This earlier rendition also included an animated nuts and fruit orchestra: a rather novel gimmick for its day.This was the second and last time in this film series that dimpled, baby-faced, June Preisser played the obnoxious superrich siren competitor with Judy for Mickey's attention.
Her film career ended in the late '40s, when she was no longer wanted to play sexy high school girls.Ann Shoemaker switched from playing Judy's mother in "Babes in Arms" to being Mickey's mother in this film.Be sure to see the hilarious musical cartoon "Romeo in Rhythm", accompanying the current DVD..
In this one, they're high school teenagers who change their high school band to a dance band and then want to go to Chicago to enter a contest sponsored by Paul Whiteman.The directing by Busby Berkeley couldn't be better.
His discussions with movie mother, Ann Shoemaker, are memorable as well as poignant as they discuss the meaning of life, what's right and all that other stuff of the times.Garland looks and sounds like she just came out of Oz in 1940 clothing.
The drummer boy is of course Mickey Rooney who even today is still drummin' out small appearances in movies.
In fact, that cake, with a bunch of fruit ends up an orchestra of its own playing "Our Love Affair" in one of the most imaginative sequences on film.
After earlier dancing to the "La Conga" (where some of the high school dance band members appear to be a bit older), they now perform "Drummer Boy", and knock Whiteman's socks off.
Whiteman wants them on his show regardless for a contest of all the high school bands but when their pal Larry Nunn all of a sudden needs an operation for a broken arm, there goes to $200.
Those bosses must have been blind to really see how lovely she was, funny considering that half the movie, Judy is trying to wake Mickey up to see her for who she is over the rather obnoxious Preisser.
The recent TV movie about Judy Garland had director Busby Berkley demanding to see Judy's eyes, and she really shows them here.Most famous of course is the duet of "Our Love Affair", but the over-the-top finale even outdoes the one of "Babes in Arms".
Like many Broadway musicals, it even features reprises of most of the movies' songs.
Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland are just superb and are helped by a sweet June Preisser.
Rooney and Garland make a good team in this fun musical..
But Jimmy really likes music, he is a percussionist with his high school band but really wants to be the leader of a dance band.
(Rooney was probably 19 during filming.)Judy Garland is Mary Holden, fellow high school senior and Jimmy's "best pal".
(Garland was probably 18 during filming.)In the high school band many are getting bored with playing marches and patriotic music, so Jimmy has the idea of forming a dance band, with Mary as their singer.
Famous band-leader Paul Whiteman (playing himself) and his Orchestra are holding a contest to find the best high school dance band in the USA and Jimmy thinks his band can win.
Here Jimmy must come to grips with balancing his ambition with his promises to his friends and fellow band members when he is offered an immediate job as a drummer with a new band.Good movie, and being a Busby Berkely movie, several very elaborate song and dance production numbers..
I do love the great Technicolor musical film extravaganzas, but this was not to be had, here.Mickey and Judy were childhood entertainers.
Of course, the parts where Mickey and Judy double dance together are quite excellent.
He was the real life father of Mickey Rooney.Finally, don't say that the U.S. thought a world war would happen soon.
World War Two ended the Great Depression.Mickey Rooney would join that war, and his later career would suffer because of his absence.Films like this one soon would be helping a war-weary America find some kind of happiness, in a growing dark and dreary time period.
1941 was war time for the U.S., not ending until 1945.You know that song and dance films are my utmost favorite, but I despise black and white -- ugh!!
Mickey Rooney, Judy Garland, and the Oscar winning song "Our Love Affair".
Like Babes in Arms (1939), this musical comedy starring Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland was directed by Busby Berkeley.
John Monks Jr. and Fred Finklehoffe wrote the screenplay; the George and Ira Gershwin title song is used in the musical finale.James 'Jimmy' Connors (Rooney) is a high school drummer that's bored with playing the same old songs, like the national anthem; so he organizes late night jazz jam sessions with his friends.
Jimmy's widow mother (Ann Shoemaker) has always wanted him to go to college to become a doctor like his father, but his real passion is his music.
But Jimmy gets it together and, with Mary's and Phil's help, he and his Riverwood High School pals produce and act in a musical play for the local Elks Club, raising $150 towards the $200 they need to get to Chicago for Whiteman's contest.
The public wanted Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland so that's what MGM gave them.
All of their movies together were variations of "let's put on a show." At least this one has Gershwin's music which I love.The downside is Rooney has to be the center of attention.
Yes, he was the star but you'd think he was the only boy in town.......leader of the he band, lead in the school play, boyfriend of the most popular girl.