DVD The Goldwyn Follies
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Review(s): DVD The Goldwyn Follies | |
A lavishly corny confection. In this one, producer Adolphe Menjou seeks the advice of an average American girl (Andrea Leeds) concerning the qualities of his shows. The pluses this film has to offer include the ballet sequence, which is definitely a matter of taste, some fairly comical lines and the colour photography, which was the best yet in its day, because it wasn't considered "obtrusive". A rather inane script has Leeds fall in love with a greasy spoon cook and wannabe singer (Kenny Baker, who warbles LOVE WALKED IN about a dozen times) Leeds says zestfully: "I love hamburgers".........The very fact that Goldwyn put his name in the the title of a movie indicated that he considered it an extravaganza and a masterpiece (if not the greatest movie-musical ever made). Wrong. Granted, the musicals that were churned out at an alarming rate by Fox were fast and cheap, studded with vaudeville; they simply collapsed from sheer overkill. In his search for a formula, Samuel Goldwyn first paid three writers, including Dorothy Parker, $125,000; he then tore up their script and hired Ben Hecht. A curiousity from the thirties.
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| Entertaining but disjointed |
"The Goldwyn Follies" has not fared well with critics even from the time it was first released, some of whom have called it one of the worst films ever made. My own personal opinion of this film isn't quite so jaundiced as that. Part of the problem seems to be that Samuel Goldwyn attempted to out-Ziegfeld Ziegfeld, and in the process released a film that, while entertaining, seems rather disjointed. In certain respects "The Goldwyn Follies" stumbles & staggers like a car with a bad transmission. Perhaps it would have been better had this film been done in a revue form similar to the Ziegfeld Follies style. Having said all this, "The Goldwyn Follies" is still worth viewing for all the varied & various entertainers who appear: ballerina Vera Zorina, Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy, the Ritz Brothers with their own particular brand of insanity, popular singer Kenny Baker (a regular on Jack Benny's radio show at the time), opera star Helen Jepson, vaudevillian Bobby Clark (who for some reason was not permitted to use his trademark painted-on glasses), and radio comic Phil Baker. The film's plot involves film producer Oliver Merlin (Adolphe Menjou) whose movies fail consistently at the box office. While shooting a film on location with his temperamental star Olga Samara (Zorina), Merlin overhears Hazel Dawes (Andrea Leeds in her first film following her triumph in "Stage Door"), a young woman who watches the film shoot with a friend & comments about how less than human the characters seem to be. Mr. Merlin follows Hazel to a drugstore soda fountain where he hires her to be "Miss Humanity" and critique his ideas for film scenes but not to associate with actors so as to lose her down-to-earth qualities. Eventually Hazel meets a prospective movie singer (Baker) who runs a lunch counter, and a love interest develops between them. "The Goldwyn Follies" features music by George & Ira Gershwin as well as choreography by George Balanchine. The former's contributions include the song "Love Walked In" while the latter's include a "Romeo and Juliet" sequence resembling a competition between "The Nutcracker" and "West Side Story" as well as a ballet featuring Vera Zorina as a water nymph who ascends & descends from a pool. For all the problems this film may have had, in the end it isn't a total washout. P.S. Keep your eyes open for an appearance by a young Alan Ladd in a bit as an auditioning singer.
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| VERA ZORINA`S FIRST FILM |  |
When Ingrid Bergman published her memoirs in 1981, Vera Zorina found herself unfavourably mentioned... In 1942 she was up to do Maria in FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS, but was replaced because of tip-toing through the mountains... In an un-authorised biography of Bergman, Paul Henreid quoted Bergman saying "Zorina can`t act... I hope they find out how terrible she is..."However. Such greats such as Richard Rodgers, Leonard Bernstein and Bob Hope have all praised her acting gifts. In THE GOLDWYN FOLLIES she stars as the love-sick temperamentel Olga Samara - and indeed - it is a a Russian Scarlett O`Hara we are given.
The film is a great comedy and satire of the Hollywood system and the music and performances are all great.
But it is Vera`s picture.
Look for her in ON YOUR TOES, I WAS AN ADVENTURESS and LOUISIANA PURCHASE also:)(:
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