Christmas in July was the first Preston Sturges film I ever saw. By that time I had seen many of the other canonical comedies of the time and had read a lot about Sturges. But the film flummoxed me. What on earth? I laughed a lot but couldn’t get a handle on what I wasContinue reading “Christmas in July (1940)”
Category Archives: Dick Powell
Shipmates Forever (1935)
Shipmates Forever isn’t really a comedy but it was deceptively marketed as one by Warner Bros. It may even have been originally conceived as one. It stars Dick Powell and Ruby Keeler at the peak of their popularity. It has tunes by Warren and Dubin, Dick Powell’s regular providers of hits in his crooning comedies.Continue reading “Shipmates Forever (1935)”
Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933)
Gold Diggers of 1933 — directed by Mervyn LeRoy and spectacularized by Busby Berkeley — has been more thoroughly watched, interpreted, contextualized, explained, poked, prodded, and dissected over the years than any other comedy of the era. It has been glossed in terms the male gaze, the commodification of women, the reduction of female bodiesContinue reading “Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933)”
42nd Street (1933)
42nd Street was the first of the four monumental musicals associated with Busby Berkeley in the miracle years of 1933 and 1934. (The others were Gold Diggers of 1933, Footlight Parade, and Dames.) For a long time they were lumped together, as if they were parts of single artifact, the revolutionary Busby Berkeley spectacle-film. ContemporaryContinue reading “42nd Street (1933)”
On the Avenue (1937)
On paper, On the Avenue looks like a great classical Hollywood musical. All the songs are by Irving Berlin. It’s directed by Roy Del Ruth, an unsung master of the genre. It stars Dick Powell, Alice Faye, and Madeleine Carroll. The script is by two good writers, Gene Markey and William Conselman. Lucien Andriot wasContinue reading “On the Avenue (1937)”
Thanks a Million (1935)
Thanks A Million is, like most of the Dick Powell comedies of the mid-1930s, a pip, a perfect example of a neglected gem. It fits somewhere on the line of Depression-era political satire-comedies that stretches from Washington Merry-Go-Round (1932) to The Devil and Miss Jones (1941). In many respects it follows the template of theContinue reading “Thanks a Million (1935)”
College Coach (1933)
William “Wild Bill” Wellman’s College Coach is a bona fide piece of work — and not in a good way. It’s an exceedingly strange comedy about a college whose trustees decide that they can save the school from financial ruin only by perking up its loser football program by hiring a notoriously shady, publicity-hound coach-to-the-highest-bidder,Continue reading “College Coach (1933)”
Twenty Million Sweethearts (1934)
I obviously have a soft spot for the Dick Powell comedies of the Thirties. I have no explanation for it. I didn’t see any of them until I was middle aged. Twenty Million Sweethearts is a generic Dick Powell movie, other than that his female lead is Ginger Rogers, not the animatronic Ruby Keeler —Continue reading “Twenty Million Sweethearts (1934)”
Colleen (1936)
Colleen, the last film that Dick Powell and Ruby Keeler made together (of seven), is a strange disaster — and a great example of what happens when a studio throws a lot of previously proven elements together without any inspiration and ends up with nothing. The plot is complicated enough, replete with suckers, con-artists andContinue reading “Colleen (1936)”
Broadway Gondolier (1935)
I’m very fond of Broadway Gondolier. It’s probably more responsible for my getting into this blogging project than any other film. I recorded it from TCM one night many years ago for later watching. When I got around to seeing it, I was thoroughly charmed. I’d never heard of it before — but that’s noContinue reading “Broadway Gondolier (1935)”