: The Broadway Melody :
This film starts out with very rough cinematography, especially the aerial shots of New York, and continues into a high-budget musical with over-zealous acting and bad dialogue. I didn’t recognize any of the actors or actresses by name or face, not that that’s a big surprise.
A quick google search of this movie will show that it “did not stand the test of time.” I would agree with that but there was also something about this film that a lot of modern movies don’t have. That made it an interesting film to watch. What it has is an emotional maturity between the lead characters, two sisters trying to make it on Broadway. They honestly care about each other and try to protect each other. A love triangle develops and instead of turning into something sordid and dirty, it turns into a situation that the characters of the movie can be proud of. And that’s rare. For that reason I found this film an interesting blast from the past.
Filmsite reports that:
The films nominated for this year’s awards were some of the weakest films in the history of American cinema, reflecting the chaos of the transition from silents to sound films.
I would not watch this movie a second time but I appreciate the sisters respect for their relationship and I’ll remember this film and the emotional maturity that was the basis of it.
As I watch these older flicks I find myself thinking a lot about my grandmother on my mother’s side and what she would take away from these films. My grandma was devoutly Christian without being the least fanatical and blended her sense of humor with both well-honed ladylike sensibilities and a mature woman’s knowledge of how the world works. I remember once calling her in an uproar while I was reading the story of David and Bathsheba in the bible she’d given me, complaining about their illicit beginnings. “What was David doing with Bathsheba?” I demanded to know. “What was Bathsheba doing on the roof?” She responded. That was my grandma. Practical and full of common sense.
I never knew her to be petty, mean-spirited, or unthinking. She was kind and loving, matured by a life that included great loss in her personal world as well as the Great Depression and WW II, but not embittered by it or made mean.
I think grandma would have appreciated these sisters love for one another and the sacrifices they made for each other’s happiness. In this case, I think the behavior was more foreign to me than it would have been to her. They make less room for emotional maturity in movies in my generation. I don’t know if that says something about society or movies or just how society likes its movies now but this film felt fresh to the modern eye.
: The Wind :
Filmsite.org said that The Wind, which was not even nominated, should have won for this year. My friend Betsie got ahold of a copy for us to watch on VHS only to have us discover that our VHS player, which we haven’t used in years, is permanently out of commission.
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