1h 34min | Musical, Comedy | 29 June 1943 | Color
Director: Edward Buzzell
Stars: Lucille Ball, William Gaxton, Virginia Weidler, Harry James, Chill Wills.
Charles Walters ... dance director
Stanley Donen ... assistant: Jack Donohue (uncredited)
Jack Donohue ... dance director (uncredited)
Watched online; good print,
11 songs, 9 written by Martin & Blaine.
First film for June Allyson, Nancy Walker & Stanley Donen.
I feel like I've been here already, with the film Too Many Girls (1940), but at least that was a COLLEGE, and LB was an actual student. This is a military prep school, she's invited to a HIGH SCHOOL prom. She accepts the invitation as a publicity stunt, because her studio has just released her from her contract. She's known as the swimsuit girl, and now sarongs are the thing. But her character is named Lucille Ball. I doubt that I'd like this any better if the name were different, but I'm offended for her.
We get some group/ensemble movement, but not sufficiently elaborate or interesting for me. This feels like a Mickey Rooney movie without him, which shows me that it's not just MR that I don't like. The whole film being focused on teenagers bugs me.
The thing that offends me most is the crowd ripping the dress off LB. Somehow they manage to stop once she's down to her slip, and she doesn't appear to get scratched. But seeing a crowd go into a frenzy like that is deeply disturbing. Explaining it as souvenir hunting is no excuse, especially since the first rip is in anger. (I can think of 2 other instances, both with Gene Kelly, where this is used for humor: Singin' in the Rain ('52) and What a Way to Go ('64). In the first, his jacket gets ripped, but he retains most of it. In the second, the crowd kills him; but that's 'funny' because the movie is all about a woman marrying men with tragic/comic deaths, and he turns into an enormous heel before death.)
Cut to an enormous dorm room, where LB is still in her slip. So they walked her across campus without offering a coat? After a while, she's offered (and accepts) a bathrobe. The scene that follows should be funny, but I find it really annoying. The dorm room has 3 interior doors (closets?). People keep arriving, and before each arrival, all but LB's 'date' scrambles for cover. If this were a Marx Bros movie, I'd enjoy it. But somehow here, it's enormously grating, and goes on too long.
I previously rated this 4, decided to give it another chance; am willing to upgrade to 5, mostly for Harry James' music. But this is truly irritating.
MGM, dir. Buzzell; 5
