Review of Babes in Arms (1939) by Kenneth E — 25 Feb 2013

A charming and generally upbeat movie with good pacing (not too short or long). Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland had great performances even at such young ages; they were very animated and put a lot of effort into their roles. Rooney was frighteningly energetic, almost like a puppy dog, but at the same time he could be sad and depressed as well.

I felt like I was going back in time as I watched Babes in Arms, but in more ways than one; it was surprising and disturbing to suddenly come across a minstrel show (within the barn musical) with Garland and Rooney unapologetically pretending to be stereotypical black people, using blackface. It really reminded me that this was a movie from 1939 and people actually put these sorts of spectacles in their movies in order to sell tickets. Not having seen the original musical (but I have read the plot summary), I wonder whether this blackface musical number had anything to do with the musical at all. Seeing as the song "My Daddy Was a Minstrel Man" was not one of the songs from Babes In Arms (the musical), I doubt it very much.

In fact, very few songs in this film were from the original musical. The only ones that are actually sung are Where or When and Babes in Arms which is quite pathetic. My intent in watching this movie was to see the musical Babes in Arms and hear the song My Funny Valentine which is a gorgeous piece, but instead it was a corporate MGM bastardization of the original. Granted, there were some nice songs like Good Morning and I Like Opera/I Like Swing but if this is the only film version of the musical they should try to follow the plot much more closely and absolutely include ALL the original songs. Why even call it Babes in Arms if you're going to do something completely different from the musical?

It was fairly enjoyable to watch but very disappointing if you are at all familiar with the original musical.