Evidently intended as a cheery pick-me-up in the immediate aftermath of World War II, Ziegfeld Follies is a plotless compendium-picture showcasing many of the leading talents from the 1940s stage and screen. Shot in vivid technicolour, the emphasis is on song, dance and comedy - the specialities of legendary Broadway producer/impresario Florenz Ziegfeld (1867-1932), as showcased in his Ziegfeld Follies revues which ran in New York from 1907 until 1931.
   The corny, rudimentary framing-story - indeed, so rudimentary that it only appears at the start of the picture, rather than bookending the "action" - sees Ziegfeld (William Powell) in heaven, where his "cloud" is apparently just next to those occupied by P T Barnum (fair enough) and William Shakespeare (rather faster company!)
   MGM's concept of the celestial abode is opulent but decidedly lonely, and, to pass the time, Ziegfeld dreams up the ultimate revue, featuring the greatest acts of the day, in the spirit of his own Follies - and illustrated by the ensuing 13 sections. The result is a startlingly eclectic mix of high(ish), middle and low culture - as, indeed, one might expect to find in a typical top-end Broadway revue of the early 20th century.
   This, and the presence of major stars such as Fred Astaire (who pops up three times, twice dancing), gives the film Ziegfeld Follies an enduring time-capsule appeal. But even taken on its own merits, this is a surprisingly entertaining hundred-odd minutes, while not exactly living up to the premise of its "heavenly" concept.

Prologue : **(/5)
   William Powell, as Ziegfeld, ruminates on his career in somewhat square and windy fashion. He recalls the very first night of his Follies in 1907 - visualised with the help of "Bunin's Puppets," creepy/charming stop-motion marionettes by Lou Bunin, better known for his more satirical/political skits.

Here's to the Girls ("Beautiful Girls" and "Wonderful Men"): ***
   Fred Astaire sings "Beautiful Girls", noting the prominence of same throughout the real Ziegfeld's oeuvre. This segues into a elaborate Busby-Berkeley-ish dance-number featuring Lucille Ball as a whip-cracking vision in flowing pink chiffon. Disconcertingly, given her later comic prolixity, Ball keeps her mouth firmly shut here - though there's the hint of a knowing smile at the absurdity of the wildly extravagang costumes and choreography (a parade of real white horses, including an unbilled cameo from the Lone Ranger's Silver; devilish cat-women emerging from "hell", etc) of this elaborate curtain-raiser which includes the balletic skills of a similarly-silent Cyd Charisse. No mistaking the parodic intent of the song which immediately follows - Virginia O'Brien's then-topical complaints about the shortage of eligible blokes remains amusing six decades on, delivered in full chiffon-flowing fig from the back of an obviously mechanical equine.

Number Please : ***
   So-so comedy sketch in which a very young-looking Keenan Wynn is stymied in his attempt to dial a local number - largely thanks to the inadequacies of operator Audrey Totter. The notorious film-noir bad-girl is unseen and unbilled here, but elicits nearly all the laughs in the segment with her robotically-clipped, monotonously-repeated "nahmba pliz."

A Water Ballet : ***
   Yes, a water ballet with Esther Williams - editing makes it impossible to tell how many takes were used, or for how long Williams was able to stay under while going through her sinuous motions. For the audience, however, it's a pleasing, undemanding "breather".

La Traviata : ***
   A somewhat jarring shift into "high" culture - well, Giuseppe Verdi. James Melton and  Marion Bell perform vocal duties, as well as swaying around in suitably extravagant costumes. Seemingly intended to attract a "better class of clientele" among the moviegoing public.

Pay the Two Dollars : ****
    Edward Arnold and Victor Moore in an old-school Vaudeville sketch about a harried businessman and his pompously prideful lawyer, whose determination to maintain a 100% win-rate drags his client through a Kafkaesque nightmare of humiliation and ruin. Pleasingly droll, with an economic use of stage-sets and effects.

This Heart of Mine : ****
    Astaire is back, this time dancing with Lucille Bremer in the wordless story of an opportunistic jewel-thief who crashes a high-society party and becomes smitten with a young lady. Astaire is on sparkling form here - one can easily spend the whole sequence simply watching his black, polished loafers - and it's interesting to see him with a female partner who isn't his sister Adele or his most famous co-star, Ginger Rogers. Bremer's career somehow never took off, but on this evidence this was very much the movies' loss.

A Sweepstakes Ticket : ****
    The only one of the film's stars who actually appeared in original Ziegfeld Follies on Broadway, Fanny Brice milks the laughs in shamelessly broad fashion in this tried-and-tested comedy-sketch about the efforts of a middle-aged couple to retrieve the winning sweepstakes (i.e. Irish lottery) ticket they've foolishly given to their landlord in lieu of rent. Hume Cronyn is the husband, William Frawley the landlord, and all three play it as if they're on stage rather than on screen - Brice's mugging gets out of hand on several occasions. It is all still pretty funny, however - which, for this kind of material, is very much the main thing.

Love : ***
   Marvellous to see Lena Horne in her late-twenties splendour - just a pity that she's stuck with (A) a pretty dull song, and (B) a somewhat insulting blacks-only Caribbean-ish nightclub setting to sing it in. Trouper that she is, Horne gives it all she's got - but it's no surprise to learn that she was decidedly displeased with the results.

When the Television Comes : *
   Comedy generally ages less well than dance or song, and this one-joke skit with Red Skelton - spoofing TV shows and their advertising - is very much the weakest link in the Ziegfeld Follies chain. Saving grace: it isn't especially long.

Limehouse Blues : ***
   Fred Astaire and Lucille Bremer team up again with rather more mixed results in this fanciful evocation of London's "Old China Town", a picturesquely foggy riverside locale populated by all manner of Cockney stereotypes - including a Pearly King and Queen and their Pearly Family (daughter wields a guitar!) who are the picture's comedy highlight, albeit unintentional. Done up in dodgy yellowface and supposedly dressed in "oriental" attire (with his black hat, sallow face and tight-fitting suit, he looks more like William Burroughs playing Dr No) Astaire is a lovelorn "Chink" whose attempts to do a good romantic deed lead to dire consequences - and a crazily elaborate 'Eastern' dance number involving the dextrous manipulation of fans. Decidedly dated in its racial attitudes, but certainly not dull.

[A Great Lady Has] An Interview : ***
   Weird musical satire featuring Judy Garland as a pretentious Hollywood actress who's tired of perpetually chasing Oscars and respectable projects and craves a bit of on-screen fun. Her fancy pad is visited by a dozen dancing/singing "journalists" in an imaginative, ambitious and likeably daffy litttle number - involving, among other things, the invention of the safety pin - that doesn't quite hit the mark, but gets by on Garland's game spirit, fluent vocal stylings and loose-limbed sex-appeal. Tilda Swinton might perhaps consider hommaging this routine.

The Babbitt and the Bromide : ****
    The film's USP is the sole on-screen pairing of the screen's two greatest dance-icons, Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly - apart from a mid-seventies novelty when both were long past their prime. This sequence, in which a pair of pals keep bumping into each other and never get past exchanging platitudes, wouldn't be classed in the same league as their own "solo" projects, but it's still pretty magical to see the duo together, their rather different styles (Astaire harking back to more formal modes of the 1910s and 1920s, Kelly pointing ahead to more "modern" forms) complementing rather than jarring with each other.  

Beauty : ***
   Kathryn Grayson rounds off the movie with a solo number that's no more notable than the similarly blandly-titled song that Lena Horne was saddled with earlier on. Pleasant enough on the ear, the segment is notable for the dream-like, moodily-lit visuals of sunsets and dramatic skies through which Grayson sails - and also the clouds of foam which reportedly led to all manner of technical problems on set, but which give proceedings a nicely surreal, even Dali-ish touch.
   Pic should still have ended on the Astaire/Kelly high, of course - as FZ would surely have advised.

Neil Young
6th July, 2009

NB : the "running-order" as given above is approximately correct - hard to be exact, as online resources are somewhat incomplete.

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directors : Vincente Minnelli et al*
country : USA
year : 1946
run-time : 110m approx (BBFC timing of 1945 submission)







seen : 5th July, 2009
cinema : The Star and Shadow cinema, Newcastle
format : 35mm
paid : £4

MVP : Fred Astaire
respected second opinion : Alex, The Homoerratic Radio Show