Review of Born to Dance (1936) by Daniel K — 13 Mar 2010

2: I'm not sure having Jimmy Stewart sing in a musical entirely agrees with my notion of proper cinema. Eleanor Powell is a different story of course. She simply exudes wholesomeness and can't seem to be anything but the girl-next-door, which means she's no Cyd Charisse, but she's still quite good.

I don't think we see Stewart dance one step, which leads me to believe he must really be an awful dancer. Funny. I'd say I prefer him when was a more seasoned actor in later pictures like Vertigo, Rear Window, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence, or The Naked Spur.

Obviously he had some good pictures in the 30's and 40's as well (Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, It's a Wonderful Life, Destry Rides Again, The Shop Around the Corner, etc), but he's a bit too wide-eyed to be taken seriously at times.

This film brought a rather obvious notion to mind, namely that I'm most definitely not a fan of musicals, but rather a fan of good musicals. I'll take a great Astaire/Rogers, Busby Berkeley extravaganza, or any solid variation of Astaire/Caron/Kelly/Charisse/etc, but I could do without mediocre musicals.

This one left me a bit indifferent for the most part, esepcially the music, lyrics, and dancing, which is kind of what a musical is ostensibly all about. Blondes really seem to have been given a pretty bad rap in early Hollywood pictures.

For the most part they're either funny/unattractive or they're up to no good. Even the stars, like Jean Harlow and Lana Turner, seem to often be more along the line of femme fatales than anything else.

I'm sure there are many counterexamples, but they aren't immediately coming to mind.