Thousands Cheer [VHS]
The second half of this 1943 Technicolor musical is an excuse for MGM's contract talent to perform songs and sketches in a big show at an Army base. Unfortunately, more than an hour passes before the show arrives, stranding the viewer with a thin service comedy about an opera singer (Kathryn Grayson) tagging along to a military camp in hopes of reuniting her estranged parents, whose names are Bill and Hillary (no comments, please). Romance comes in the form of private Gene Kelly, a former trapeze artist who misses the glory of his former life. Grayson warbles, and Kelly has one nifty solo dance (with a mop and broom), but the all-star revue is the movie's main attraction. The song selection is generally poor ("I Dug a Ditch in Wichita" is performed twice), with Lena Horne's sultry take on "Honeysuckle Rose" an exception. She's backed by Benny Carter and His Orchestra. Specialty player Virginia O'Brien delights with one of her deadpan numbers, Eleanor Powell tap dances, and Judy Garland delivers with a boogie-woogie lilt on "Jumpin' Down at Carnegie Hall." Comedy sketches with Red Skelton and Frank Morgan are stubbornly unfunny. Then there's  José Iturbi, the Spanish-born conductor, making his film debut at the  beginning of his run as MGM's supposedly cute highbrow. Director George Sidney  would team up two years later with Iturbi, Kelly, and Grayson inAnchors Aweigh, a much more enjoyable musical confection.--Robert Horton