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On the Town

On the Town

List Price: $19.98
Your Price: $15.98
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 5 stars
Summary: One of the Best!!!!!!!!!!
Review: This is a really great movie. I think this movie is better than An American in Paris. The movie is about three sailors named Gabey (Gene Kelly), Chip (Frank Sinatra), and Ozzie (Jules Munshin) let loose on a 24 hour leave. On a subway Gabey sees a poster of "Miss Turnstiles of the Month" named Ivy Smith (Vera-Ellen) (he thinks she is some high society girl) so they spend the day looking for her. On the way they run into a cab driver who has eyes for Chip named Hilde (Betty Garrett). They also meet a gorgeous anthropologist named Claire (Ann Miller). Anyway this movie is awesome! It has a lot of great music and Ann dances great during the song "Prehistoric Man." There are also some great shots of New York. They really don't make movies like this anymore which is a dirty rotten shame! This movie is a must see!

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Quality Alert!
Review: This is a fun little movie which I find compelling whenever Gene Kelly and Vera Ellen are on the screen. Otherwise it is somewhat corny to be honest. However, I bought this from Amazon and it turned out to be defective with digital breakup which stalled my player. I returned it then purchased it from our local Tower Video store only to find something similar. When returning it, the manager and I noticed indentations in the stock itself, perhaps indicative of a bad printing which, if this is the case, it would be nice to see Warner Brothers do something about it. If this was an anomaly I would like to know about it as there is something simple and nice, evocative of a past era which I would enjoy having in my collection.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: this is a 'heeluva' film
Review: I don't care what I hear. 'On the Town' is one of the greatest films. Just hearing those songs makes me feel happy and the thought of watching them dance cheers me up, particularly the museum scene. The acting is wonderful, and though slightly out of date New York is shown in it's prime. I'm not out to defy all those people who think its a second rate musical, I'd just like to say that I've watched it many times and the more I see it the more I love it. This is something for solitary or family viewing as it never fails to impress. I love it.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Not the best, by a long shot
Review: Although Kelly, Donen, and Comden/Green would go on to movie greatness together ("Singing in the Rain", 1952) this one comes up short. The problem is simple: MGM didn't respect the original material enough (the Bernstein/Comden/Green Broadway musical of the same name)-- most of the fine Bernstein songs were jettisoned in favor of distinctly second-rate stuff ("Main Street", "You're Awful", etc.), as well as dumping all the great dance numbers save two ("A Day in New York", "Miss Turnstiles"). The other problem is that after Gabey, Ivy, and their friends finally get together atop the Empire State Building, the movie really goes downhill; the whole denouement at Coney Island is silly and takes much too long. There are some good performances, esp. from the women (Betty Garrett and Ann Miller really give the movie oomph and a sense of fun, and Alice Pearce's "I got the gargle!" bit is classic). Sinatra and Kelly are fine as always, but you have to be a big Jules Munshin fan to weather his supershticky performances, both here and in "Take me Out to the Ball Game" (also with Sinatra, Kelly, and Garrett).

I know this movie is a big fan favorite; I just hope that people who think On the Town is a fine musical take the time to check out the really superior products of MGM's famous Freed unit: "Singing in the Rain", "Gigi", "Meet me in St. Louis". When the Freed unit clicked on all cylinders, as they did in those three movies, nobody made better movies of ANY kind.


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