FOOTLIGHT PARADE

I'm still in that musical frame of mind after reviewing "G.I. Blues"; so I thought to myself why not review another musical classic from Hollywood. But being that there are hundreds of them, it's almost hard to pick one? Well I assure you that it didn't take me long to think of one to review because after purchasing a collection of films with dance sequences choreographed by the ingenious Busby Berkeley, there was only one film in that collection that I wanted to watch and review right away, and that's...

Apart from musical fantasy's that were made during the 30s like "Babes in Toyland" and "The Wizard of OZ", this film would be my first exposure to traditional classic 30s musicals that I remember enjoying very much as a kid. It stared one of my favorite actors James Cagney, I was entertained by the story, and the last three song and dance scenes that took place in the last half of the movie made my jaw-drop for how amazing they looked. And though I'm sure the musical sequences in the film still hold-up since they're considered to be some of Hollywood's greatest, my real question is how is the film that ties those scenes together? As much as I remember its general premise and some of the performances, I don't remember them as much as I do with the scenes that make the film famous. Are they worth remembering, and as entertaining as I remember them to be, or were they nothing special to begin with? ON WITH THE REVIEW!

James Cagney stars as a Broadway musical director, who lost his career from "Talking Pictures" becoming the new source of entertainment for theater going audiences, until he discovers that movie theaters are showing short live musical acts called "Prologues" before the feature presentation. Cagney gets into the business as quickly as possible to direct film prologues, but gets himself into a lot of stress and pressure when he plans to market prologue shows nationwide, while also trying to hatch up different ideas each week only for them to be stolen by his off-screen rival or be turned down because of censorship rules. Eventually Cagney is given a big opportunity to work for a famous producer if he can impress him with three grand scale musical numbers for three theaters within three days. And being his last chance to make his prologue shows a success, he takes drastic measures to make it perfect by locking himself and staff inside the dance studio for the next three days so that he doesn't risk his ideas getting leaked outside to his competitors.

Much like "Holiday Inn" and "G.I. Blues", this isn't really a musical that heavily relies on story. If anything the bits without Busby Berkeley's choreography only exist to tie these sequences into a full length movie as opposed to passing them off as short films. But being made during a rough time for America when audiences went to see musicals on the big-screen to escape their harsh reality, the bits do what they're intended to do, and that's to entertain. Furthermore, there are things in the first hour and so minutes of the film that I do find to be admirable. The set-up for instance is an intriguing one. I'm not 100% sure if this is accurate to how people in theater at the time were threatened by "Talking Pictures" taking over the entertainment industry, but whether if this was an actual concern for the time or not, it still makes for an interesting story to keep your attention none the less. It's engaging and even a bit inspiring to see a person who has a passion for directing live shows to not give up because of a new art form that threatens his business, and is determined to find a way of working with the new medium while still being able to do what he admires doing. And when the going gets tough, he has to keep pushing harder and harder to the point where he has to use methods that are not usually of  common practice, which I feel is where the film's premise really started to get good. The concept of Cagney turning the dance studio into a Boot Camp for showgirls, as he's suspicious of who's selling him out to his rivals is a brilliant way of keeping the audiences hooked as it's building up to its three part musical finale! However, that part of the story only lasts for less than 20 minutes, which I feel could've worked for most of the run time for the film's story. And it gets even more degrading when this excellent set-up that can really play on the stress and insanity of doing nothing but working and dancing in a secluded environment for three long days is hardly played up. We get a 5 minute or so montage of how these girls go through their day in the studio, but aside from that, the film barley focuses on it. This scenario can even play out for some good comedy like in the rehearsal scenes that happen before Cagney's big decision, and yet the film throws those possibilities away like his bad prologue ideas.

 

I suppose the main reason why the film doesn't want fully exploit this fascinating scenario is because the film throws a ton of subplots at us. Apart from Cagney stressing about his new business as his ideas get stolen, we get our lead in the middle of a love triangle between his secretary (Joan Blondell) and her gold-digging roommate Vivian (Claire Dodd); a romance between a juvenile dancer (Dick Powell) and an ex dancer who turned secretary (Ruby Keeler) where they at first don't get along, but are going to be later seen happily singing together in the end; Cagney's ex-wife (Renee Whitney) returns for some unfinished business; and one too many bits of Cagney working with his overworked dance director (Frank McHugh). There's a little way too much going on. It can fill-up the 102 run time for this film, but since we have at least 30 minutes of musical numbers that don't tie into with how the characters are feeling, it's a little too much where the film pretty much rushes through most of it. That's not to say that I don't understand why most of these subplots exist because I do. Obviously there needs to be some kind of connection between Powell and Keeler since they're both shown to be singing at the end. And with all the suffering that Cagney's character goes through, there needs to be some kind of sweetness in his life that he's overlooking. But here’s the thing, since we're already seeing Cagney dealing with one too many issues already, story elements like the love triangle that he's in, his ex-wife returning, and the love relationship between Powell and Keeler could easily be cut out. I don't mind him having a love interest, but I think him ignoring her as she shows feelings for him is more than enough to cover it. I know that Powell and Keeler are talented stars and that they perform together in the end, but why need to give them a love relationship, just because the characters are playing a romantic couple when they sing on stage, that doesn't mean that the characters themselves have to be romantically involved (wouldn't it be more interesting if they didn't get along at all, and that Cagney has to try deal with them and convince them to stay since they're irreplaceable). On top of the fact that this film is convoluted with way too many things happening, half of the characters and performances, though not bad, are forgettable and not all that interesting. I thought Keeler was fun as the snooty secretary who keeps brushing Powell off (that is until she changes her appearance to hook-up with him). Joan Blondell plays her character as tough as Cagney is. And Frank McHugh delightfully plays out his stress of working in the business for laughs. But aside from them, there's nothing about the supporting characters or performances that truly stand-out. 

Now it’s important to know that before this film was made, Cagney was best known for playing the ultimate tough guy on-screen who would mercilessly shoot and rob people, and distastefully smashed a grapefruit into poor Mae Clarke's face. He did one or two comedies, but they were overshadowed by his wise guy image that shocked audiences at the time. I bring this up because the idea of casting an actor who usually gets typecasted as the bad-guy to be the leading man in a lighthearted and gay musical comedy where he's required to sing and dance seemed to be an odd choice. But in the end, it turned out that casting Cagney in his first musical picture became one of the best things that this film has going for it. They still maintain his tough guy approach by casting him as a curt and demanding boss who's determined to keep his business going for his love of showbiz, but they don't shy away from moments where he has to demonstrate what he wants his girls to do by dancing for them a little bit, or giving him scenes where has to act eccentric as he's coming up with one crazy idea after another. And with Cagney being the magnificent well rounded actor that he was throughout his film career, he plays out all those characteristics naturally. I never once got the impression that he's hamming-up any of this stuff out. Every ounce of stress and passion that comes out of Cagney's performance for this character makes me believe 100% that he genuinely loves showbiz and has been in the business for a long period of time, and is about to fall apart from all the pressure he's given to work with, where I find myself feeling nearly as stressed out as he is.

Upon watching this movie again after so long, one of the things in the movie that made my jaw-drop as much as seeing the musical numbers, and Cagney dancing and starring in his first musical is how suggestive and adult the humor in this film is. The film was made during the Pre-Code era for Hollywood when Hollywood films at the time wouldn't be as severely censored as they would be after July of 1934 until 1960 when the Production Code collapsed. When seen from a modern day perspective, it's not that shocking since there is a restraint to it, but for a film made in the early 30s, it's still quite surprising and at the time risqué. Hearing some of these subtle yet suggestive things that the characters say I couldn't believe I was hearing in a 30s film, and that I didn’t pick up on any of this when seeing this film through my Middle School and early High School days. One of the many examples that come to mind when discussing the film's dirty humor is in the scene when a cop walks into the studio as the girls are rehearsing, and reacts to them with a big grin on his face exclaiming "Seeing all these girls gives me a lot of ideas". The best of the film's adult sense of humor involve Joan Blondell's beef against Vivan for trying to steal her man. Blondell nearly calls her Miss Bitch on one occasion instead of Miss Rich. And given the character of Vivian's seductive nature, Blondell assures her that “As long as they have sidewalks, she's got a job"! But if you think the film is just raunchy with its dialogue, the film itself gives us some pretty naughty visuals as well. We get tons of that stuff in the musical sequences (that I promise will get too very soon), but there's enough perverted material to go in the bits with the characters interacting outside of singing, that again mostly involve Vivian. She at one point is seen reading a pornographic magazine about women titled "Naughty Stories". And towards the end of the scenes of the film’s story, she and a man are seen to be laughing as she's feeling him up in a way so sexual that if he wasn't wearing pants this scene would've been instantly cut! I shall not dare forget the bit when the film heads into gay humor (and I don't mean it by its original meaning) that involves Powell and McHugh holding each other closely as they sing "Ah, The Moon is Here" for the girls who are auditioning to sing with Powell, as Cagney just sits there and giggles at how dedicated these guys are of demonstrating what they want. But if any of this doesn't at all sound that dirty or anywhere near offensive to you modern folks out there reading this, there is at least one joke in the film that would certainly not fly by today's standards for how offensive it is. What is it you may ask? Well when Vivian (yes, it involves her again) tells Cagney about a book she read about women being slaves in Africa, he comes up with the idea for a prologue of having dancing girls dress up as slaves from Africa in blackface and have white-men hunt and capture them. I'm soooo happy that Cagney never took this idea into action! Just him telling her that idea alone is cringe worthy enough.

When we're in the studio with the characters, the film knows how to make the location visually interesting by creating a festive and hectic environment full of all kinds of different rehearsals and auditions going on at once. But they obviously don't hold the same candle of visual appeal as the sequences choreographed by Busby Berkeley, and this film offers 4 of them. The first one happens at around the 40 minute mark during a rehearsal scene for a song called "Sittin' on a Backyard Fence" that involves girls dressed up as cats dancing in an alley, as a romantic cat couple sing and cuddle together on top of a fence. Being that the song is in the middle of the film and is shorter when compared to the last three numbers presented together, this one seems to be overlooked by many. And I can understand why. It's definitely the weakest out of the four song and dance numbers that the film offers, but it's far from bad. The cat costumes on the girls look sexy. The song is catchy. The images of these cat-women dancing on top of a fence, and surrounding a wild clown-like face with a girl dancing on top of it are cool. Ruby Keeler and Billy Taft (who's revealing his legs just as much as the girls are) cutely work-off each other as they sing. And seeing a kid dressed up as a mouse as high jinx ensue him is adorable (Fun fact, that kid is a young Billy Barty, who you may know him as the tiny camera man Noodles in Weird Al Yankovic's "UHF", or the voice of the purple dragon Figment in the original version of the famous Epcot ride "Journey Into Imagination"). It may not be the film's strongest for how brief it is, but it certainly gives us a small taste for what lies in store for us much later on!

The closest that I ever came to noticing any of the film's vulgar material when I saw this as a young teen was the first of the three musical sequences that close the film "Honeymoon Hotel", given that it's about a couple (Powell and Keeler) that just want to have sex as things get in the way from their love, such as an unexpected check-in from their family, and little Barty stirring up trouble. The lyric that has always stayed with me since I saw first saw this sequence that winked at the naughty things  that go on in this hotel is "I'm the girl in charge of conversation, I hear things I wouldn't dare to tell". Now that I'm looking at this again, it’s much more suggestive than I remember it. One of the Hotel staff members sings “Bridal suites are never very idle"! The kid is gazing and chasing after sexy women. It ends with a couple lying in bed together with the covers over them, that then leads to an image of a magazine right beside them opening up to show a picture of a toddler, indicating that they’re having sex. Stuff like this was very ballsy at the time, not to mention that this was a film that families were allowed to see. However, as adult as the material in this sequence is, it still tones itself down enough for kids to easily miss out all the innuendos. If you're expecting to see showgirls dancing in this scene, you're not going to find any of that here. It's more heavy with singing and visuals, then it is with dancing. But the way it's staged, sung, and shot are so incredible that it makes up for it. As for the song, well I'll just say this about the songs in this film in a nutshell (with the exception of the audition song), they'll never leave you once you hear them for how catchy they all are. But if you were going to ask me which song is the one that will never ever leave your brain for how unbelievably catchy it is, its hands down this one. Why you may ask, because this film loves to milk the name of this fancy no tell Hotel as much as they possibly can!

Following the "Honeymoon Hotel" is the film's most iconic sequence "By a Waterfall", which is easily the most bizarre musical sequence that the film has offer. It starts out with a couple (played again by Powell and Keeler) sitting in a garden romancing until Powell falls asleep and dreams of his lover with a ton of bathing beauties by a waterfall, that then suddenly turns into a fantasy art deco swimming pool where the girls form patterns in the water as they swim together, and concludes with them emerging out of the water lined up on a swirling fountain. It's as surreal as it sounds, but by god is it beautifully breathtaking for how spectacular it is! Everything from the choreography, to the camera work, to the sets, to the costume designs, is ssssooooo dazzling to look at for how dreamlike and gigantic it all is!  I'll even go as far to say that this is Berkeley's best work! It's one of the definitive examples of what the art of film can do with a musical that the stage can't do! I did say that "Honeymoon Hotel" is the catchiest song in the film, but "By a Waterfall" is the most enchanting song in the picture. And do I need to talk about the sexual imagery that goes on in this sequence, I think the concept of women swimming in bathing suits (intentionally clothed for them to appear naked) up close and showing off their legs speaks for itself.

 

"By a Waterfall" became such a major staple in Hollywood's musical history that Disney included it for the first film that guests pass on "The Great Movie Ride". In my tribute to the ride, I said that I consider it to be the weakest part of the attractions (that involves animatronics) since we're just staring at lifeless Mannequins behind a scrim of Kaleidoscope patterns formed by the dancers from both the film and Busby Berkeley's other works. But when it first came out, it wasn't like that at all. The fountain that the girls were on originally spun around as the water installed inside it would sprinkle around in a neon-lit art deco room with three other mannequins standing on their own separate diving boards. But since the fountain effect was always breaking down, Disney decided to change the entire portion of the ride all together to give guests a false impression of what the rest of the ride was going to be like. But I'll give it this, at least it captures the spirit of the scene, it would just be more fitting for a Hollywood wax museum as opposed to a Disney attraction.

With a sequence as magical, gigantic, and awe-inspiring as "By a Waterfall", does the last musical portion of the film top it? No, but it makes for a fitting conclusion to the movie in terms of plot. Before the song begins, Cagney is fighting with an amateur performer who refuses to perform because of his stage fright. The two get into a struggle until Cagney falls onto the stage in-front of the audience, and signals the orchestra to play the film's final song "Shanghai Lil" with him as the leading man instead. The number is simply about a sailor looking for an Asian prostitute named Shanghai Lil (played by Keeler in yellow-face, that comes complete with a phony accent) in a brothel/opium den because he has legitimate feelings for her. The two eventually run into each other, and celebrate by dancing and marching away with the army. Exactly like the "Honeymoon Hotel", the premise has plenty of adult material surrounding it, but there's still a restraint to it to keep it from being too adult. And though Keeler made to look Asian isn't quite PC, I didn't think it was that offensive, I've seen much worse than this. Besides she doesn't take up as much screen-time as Cagney does, its Cagney who's the real star of this number, and his ability to sing and dance is phenomenal, which I bet really blew people in the cinemas away when they found out that a hard-boiled actor can also be musically gifted. He and Keeler seriously hit it home when they are seen tap dancing together on top of a bar and a table. Berkeley also doesn't stop hitting us with dozens of eye appealing visuals either. You'd think that the entirety of the number is just going to take place inside this sleazy joint, but no! The set for the brothel then becomes a large city full of marching soldiers that's as gloriously synchronized as the swimming for "By a Waterfall", that contains an overhead shot of soldiers holding giant cards that form the American flag with Franklin Roosevelt face attached to it, and them colliding close together to form into the NRA's Blue Eagle as they all fire their guns. Its adult rated, the song is unforgettable, it's patriotic, and James Cagney shines through and through exposing a hidden talent that will later be much more celebrated in a musical film that is ten times more patriotic than this sequence "Yankee Doodle Dandy" as George M. Cohen.

So all the musical scenes in the film directed by Busby Berkely are still as epic as I recall them to be, but there's one major problem, in the context of the story these scenes are made for a theater audience! When I talked about "By a Waterfall", I said that it exposes what the art of film can do with a musical that a stage can't achieve, but since all these numbers are supposed to take place on a stage in front of a live audience, half the effects and tricks they do make no sense within that context. How does a live show present bits of animation for a live audience (yeah, did I mention that these scenes have a few tiny bits of animation)? How can the theater audience see any of the creative close-ups, angles, and dissolves that you can only see on the big screen? And how could they have possibly installed such humongous sets to three small theater stages in such a small amount of time (and without even rehearsing on the theater stages with these sets mind you)? In terms of storytelling, this makes no lick of sense at all! But since all these scenes are so astounding, I'm too busy being blown away by what I'm seeing than I am trying to put myself in the position of how the audience in this film are able to see half of this stuff. It's simply one of those cases of suspension of disbelief at its strongest. I acknowledge the illogical aspect of it, and don't mind at all pointing them out, but at the end of the day, I don't find myself caring or being bothered about its factual errors for how grand they are! And apparently neither does the majority of people that saw this movie.

OVERALL THOUGHTS

The film isn't as flawless as many fans and historians make it out to be, because in terms of plot there's too much going on, and most of the characters that we spend time with aren't all that interesting. However, as weak as it is in those aspects of the film, there's more than enough great material in the film to overlook it. The set-up is still entertaining and captivating. Cagney gives the same amount passion to his performance as his character's passion for directing live shows. Blondell, Keeler, and McHugh though not as charismatic as Cagney is are still excellent performances. The film's vulgar style and sense of humor is impressively ahead of its time. And the musical sequences directed and choreographed by Busby Berkeley are ultimate showstoppers! The Busby Berkeley scenes are obviously the parts of the film that make the film so famous and widely recognized, and can be equally enjoyed on their own. But the bits without the characters performing, though not as epic and flawed in places, are still just as much fun, especially when you have Cagney in the center of it all!