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My Fair Lady

My Fair Lady

List Price: $19.98
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Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Fun movie for any age
Review: I enjoyed this movie. I'm 29 years old, and I don't like musicals. But I found myself singing along with Audry like a kid singing along watching Sesame Street. For those who don't like musicals, don't worry. This movie has musical parts only in areas that fits perfectly with its flow. Also, Audry is superb and adorable.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: A Classic
Review: Henry Higgins (Rex Harrison), is a Professor of languages and a rather condescending and conceited man. A visiting colleague, Colonel Pickering, makes him a wager that he can't take a commoner and turn her into a proper lady. Higgins accepts this wager and transforms transform a very unrefined and dirty Cockney flower girl Eliza Doolittle (Audrey Hepburn) into a lady. He succeeds. But when he takes all the credit and forgets to acknowledge her efforts, Eliza angrily leaves him for a young aristocrat. Suddenly Higgins realizes that he's grown accustomed her face and can't really live without it.
While the story behind this movie has been done by some many different filmmakers, only Audrey Hepburn can pull it off and make it a classic.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: QUEEN of the Musicals...
Review: If you're tried and tired of PM(CABARET)decadence...either aesthetic,MOULIN ROUGE;or thematic,CHICAGO...in musicals and long for days when Men were like Rex Harrison and women like Audrey Hepburn,you need to re-View MY FAIR LADY. This is Lerner& Loewe's masterpiece, masterfully brought to the screen by George Cukor with lush elegance,rich humor and bedazzling energy. REX HARRISON oozes aristocratic urbanity; suaves and intellectual machismo that would(should)sodden any second-rate feminist,or over-evolved fellow traveler, with sheer CLASS. With Audrey Hepburn's transcendently radiant Eliza, Professor Higgens justly meets his match in wittiest,comedic combat between sexes yet contrived.
"Just you wait,'enry 'iggens/just you wait!" challenges spunky Miss Doolittle [with "when necessary"...I COULD HAVE DANCED ALL NIGHT...vocal complements by WEST SIDE STORY's Marni Nixon]. Audrey's transformation of cockney flower girl into FAIRY TALE Princess is wonder to behold.(Sherlock Holmes/Jeremy Brett-Freddy gives it everything but elementary try,wooing her "On the Street Where(she)Live(s)". Her dad...irrepressibly irresponsible ALFRED J.,dipsomaniacal existential philospher; philanderer; and MAIN BUM...is played to the max by Stanley Holloway,"WITH A LITTLE BIT OF LUCK". Wilfrid Hyde-White [as elegantly mannered,genuinely gentleman(Jekyll-like linguist)Professor to Higgens(charmingily obnoxious; wickedly smarmy British ubermensch/Hyde] rounds-out the first string of a great film's star line-up...

MY FAIR LADY exudes class, glamour and sheer fun. King of cool, T-Rex is "007"who doesn't need Licence to Kill.But Audrey Hepburn is star-of-stars in this lavish Cinderella fable that knows how to reach the heart. "Where Have all the Cowboys Gone?" a pop song poses. Some went to England for elocution lessons from Professor Henry Higgens. If they're lucky, they get to see Miss Eliza-Mrs.Higgens too. Elizabeth II is still Queen of England. MY FAIR LADY is still Queen of Musicals. With a little bit of luck you might check-it out for a superbly entertaining audience.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: We Want JULIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Review: I can't say much more than what has already been said. Julie should have had this role. The songs are good in this musical but other than that the plot stinks. Unfortunately the songs are not nearly as well sang. Marni Nixion sounds alright but is not Julie. I listened to Audrey's version's of some songs and no offense to a good actress, but she can not sing, not like Julie. So do yourself a favor and buy the original broadway recording to here Julie's beautiful voice. Or better yet watch THe Sound of Music. Who needs MFL when they have TSOM?

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: This one is forever
Review: Audrey Hepburn stars in the film remake of Shaw's play, Pygmalion, in the role that Julie Andrews made famous on Broadway. Apparently the Hollywood bosses thought Andrews didn't have enough audience drawing-power and passed her over in favor of Hepburn. Andrews got her digs in when she won an Oscar for The Sound of Music.
Anyway...
My Fair Lady is a classic. No one other than Rex Harrison could possibly have played Professor Higgins so well; the part seems to have been made for him. The plot: on a dare, linguist Higgins sets out to take Eliza, a street urchin who sells flowers, clean her up and cultivate her, and present her to society as A Lady. It's a social experiment that succeeds only too well, as Eliza takes society by storm and captures the hearts of several men, including Higgins himself. Wonderful cameo roles with Colonel Pickering and Eliza's father, Alfred Doolittle. And wonderful timeless songs: Why Can't a Woman Be More Like a Man, I Could Have Danced All Night, The Rain in Spain, On the Street Where You Live, etc. It's more than a movie; it's an experience.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The Classic Musical Masterpiece On DVD
Review: George Cukor's 1964 "My Fair Lady" won various awards during the Oscars of its time, including Best Picture. George Cukor, famed for directing what society dubbs "women's films" (The Women, etc) and a homosexual director at that managed to produce a great film version of the Broadway musical. It is said that the role of Liza Doolittle made Audrey Hepburn a star. Audrey's fay looks and gamine charms are a deep contrast to the imperious, mysoginstic and even callous Professor Higgins. The musical was first staged in London and later on New York City's Broadway with Julie Andrews in the role of Eliza Doolittle, the role she first introduced into the musical world. In this film, Marni Nixon, another Broadway singer, dubbed for Audrey Hepburn's acting.

There is much to like about this musical, now on an impressive DVD. Bonus features include commentary by Marni Nixon herself and an audio track that features Audrey Hepburn's attempt to sing the songs herself. There is also a special short documentary on the making of the film. Sit back and get ready to enjoy a fine musical transposed into a wonderful, aesthetically sattisfying film. Highlights include "The Rain In Spain" in which Higgins has managed to make the illiterate urchin with bad English sound clear and regial.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Remains one of the great screen musicals
Review: I really, truly hope that the success of MOULIN ROUGE and CHICAGO will help revive the musical. Many of the first sound films ever made were musicals, and there is no obvious reason why they went away. Moreover, there is a wealth of musical talent among actors today. Kevin Spacey and Hugh Jackman, for instance, are enormously talented, and Mandy Patinkin is a major stage musical talent, yet has never been able to make a film musical.

All of which is to say, films like MY FAIR LADY should be made again. Perhaps not this particular kind of story, but a musical more akin to the needs and tastes of the early 21st century.

MY FAIR LADY is a great, great screen musical, but it could have been even better, and it almost was made a lot worse. The production itself is superb, striking just the right tone and atmosphere throughout, and one has to love the set and art design. But the film was subject to a number of bizarre casting decisions. The most famous surrounded Audrey Hepburn rather than Julie Andrews being cast as Eliza Doolittle. I am tremendously conflicted by this. On the one hand, I am a huge Audrey Hepburn fan, and I love her work in this film. Although for the most part her singing was dubbed by the incomparable Marni Nixon (it is fascinating to hear the outtakes of Hepburn's own singing, which, while not up to the level of Nixon's, was much, much better than Natalie Wood's singing in WEST SIDE STORY, which Nixon also dubbed), she acted her role superbly, and it is hard for me to imagine anyone else playing the role. On the other hand, Julie Andrews did originate the role, and while the studio didn't want her in the film because she wasn't a star. Ironically, Andrews would in the same year make MARY POPPINS, and be nominated for and win the Oscar for Best Actress. Audrey Hepburn would not even be nominated, and many feel that this was payback for the studio not giving the role to Andrews, who clearly had earned the right to the part. Still, I can't say that casting Audrey Hepburn was a mistake. (Interestingly, Julie Andrews and Marni Nixon would appear together shortly afterwards in THE SOUND OF MUSIC, with Nixon playing a Nun.)

More perplexing, however, were other casting deliberations. It seems inconceivable that anyone other than Rex Harrison could play Henry Higgins, yet the studios considered other actors. Among many others, Cary Grant and George Sanders were both considered for the film. Grant was actually quite a good singer, and although he never made film musicals, had performed in a number of musical productions before entering the movies. Still, the thought of Grant singing versus Harrison's inimitable spoken performances of his songs does not make one wish Grant had gotten the role. Harrison is so perfect that one imagines his playing the role an act of fate. Almost as amazing is the fact that Warner Brothers contemplated having James Cagney play Alfred P. Doolittle rather than Stanley Holloway, who played the role on Broadway. Again, I love Cagney, but the role belongs to Holloway. Having anyone else star in the role would have lessened the film.

So, in the end, while one might feel regret that Julie Andrews was left out of the production (though paradoxically happy that Audrey Hepburn was included), the cast of MY FAIR LADY ended up close to perfect. And with the wonderful performances, the great sets, the extraordinary songs (including my favorite, "The Street Where You Live"), and the marvelous costumes, what room for complaint is there?

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Familiar Theme/Still Worth Watching
Review: Based on Shaw's Pygmalion, this "rags to riches" story is a classic because it is so well-done and the storyline ties in to the American myth. Hepburn's character is a rough, street girl from the bad part of London. Professor Henry Higgins sees her as a project, not as a human being. It's the old class warfare scenario.

Professor's associates are somewhat more compassionate than Higgins. In the end we're not sure whether the old man has changed his ways or not.

The sets, music, writing, plot all enter into the mix of making this the classic it is. This is one of those films people watched over and over because it has the potential of being a pleasant addiction.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: One Of the Best Musicals
Review: I love this movie it's based on Bernard Shaws Pymalion.The play is a good read but the movie is great!
Hepburn does a wonderful job and the girl can sing. It has a great message the same as in the play "you are what you think you are, and society makes us if we let it. It's sure brilliant and you will be yelling at her to leave the jerk which is very amusing. You'll love this movie, it is a classic!

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: What is the point of this movie?
Review: This movie actually has no point. I'm a big fan of musicals, even the "musicals with a message," but this one is just horrible. The songs don't advance the plot, none of the actors are paricularly good singers, they can't dance well, and there are so many songs that you lose track of them and tune out.

Everyone knows the basic plot of the movie: A flower-girl is discovered by an English professor. He takes her in and makes her into a lady in six months. The story has several other side plots, though. For instance, Eliza's father, a poor "guttersnipe" is one of the greater orators in England, and he inherits a lot of money, forcing him to marry his mistress and sing an unnecessary six-minute number telling us he's "getting married in the morning."

Now, I'll come to the part of the review that most people will want to stone me for: Audrey Hepburn. I never could understand the mystique about her, but that aside--she's simply not good in this. She can't sing--she was dubbed and couldn't even figure out how to lip-synch well--she can't dance (watch her at the Embassy ball-you can tell the men aren't leading her, so much as dragging a stiff body across the floor), and her Cockney accent wavers in and out. Also, the character is completely unlikeable.

Visual beauty is really the only thing going for this movie. The costumes and cinematography are absolutely spectacular! Also, watch for Mrs. Pierce, the housekeeper, the best character in the movie.
<pBottom Line: This movie makes other musicals cringe in shame and simply isn't worth the unending three-hour spectacle.


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