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By
NICK ZEGARAC
Ziegfeld Follies (1946) is
something of a brilliantly conceived
disappointment. The film also holds the dubious
distinction of having the most production numbers
ever shot for a single film and then edited out
from its final cut after a disastrous sneak
preview. For although the film attempts to
reconnect MGM through its previous celebratory
association with Broadway impresario Florenz
Ziegfeld Jr. (first immortalized on celluloid in
MGM's The Great Ziegfeld 1936, the Ziegfeld Girl
1941) this third and final installation in that
trilogy is a rather misshapen misfit and poor
cousin to the aforementioned first two films.
To be certain, MGM threw all of its musical comedy
talents together into one hopper, including Esther
Williams, Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, Judy Garland,
Red Skelton, Fanny Brice, Kathryn Grayson, James
Melton and Lucille Ball – to name but the tip of
the iceberg of talents displayed throughout the
film). Unfortunately, the resulting film was not
grandiose so much as it became garish – the sets
not inspired but repainted and recycled from
previous MGM successes.
There is no plot to Ziegfeld Follies. Rather, it
is the follies restaged as one might have seen
during Ziegfeld's reign as the toast of the great
white way. William Powell appears – from heaven,
no less – reprising his role as Flo' and dreaming
of putting on one last show. He muses that MGM
would be the one's to carry such a venture off and
then proceeds to recall Fred Astaire, who opens
the program with ‘Bring on the Beautiful Girls.'
The girls in question appear pink and plucky,
riding atop live horses on a revolving carousel.
But the number suddenly departs from this fluffy
venture with the appearance of Lucille Ball taming
a pack of cat women clawing and preening about the
stage. As if to offset the whole colossal mess
with a ‘no, no – we were only fooling' attitude,
Virginia O'Brien appears atop an obviously fake
pony, singing the deadpan and riotous ‘Bring on
Those Beautiful Men' with lyrics like "…someone to
relax with, and pay income tax with, and though
he's from Hung'r, I'm not getting younger."
The rest of the musical portions of Ziegfeld
Follies are about on par with this rather
lackluster opening; the three exceptions being the
remaining Fred Astaire sequences. In the first
two; ‘This Heart of Mine' and ‘Limehouse Blues'
Astaire is paired with icy cool princess, Lucille
Bremer. In ‘This Heart of Mine' Astaire is a jewel
thief who succumbs to romance, in the latter, he
is a Chinese peasant doomed to death when he is
mistaken as a thief and shot.
Astaire's last performance in the film provided
him with the rare occasion to spar with rival
dancer Gene Kelly – here, in the adroit and
inspired ‘The Babbitt and the Bromide.' The two
dance a competition while aging from youth through
middle age and finally death – as a pair of rival
angels who eventually compliment one another
through dance.
Overall, the comedy sequences in the film fare
poorly – even in 1946 they failed to generate
laughs. But from the vantage of today they have
the faint odor of embalming about them –
particularly Red Skelton's ‘Guzzler's Gin Program'
and Victor Moore's ‘Pay the Two Dollars' – both
highly stylized and frankly, extremely boring.
The finale of Ziegfeld Follies was to have been an
elaborate bubble dance performed by the entire
principle cast and topped off by a mountain of
foam with Cyd Charisse as its topper.
Unfortunately, during filming the bubble machine
broke, sending its foam into the rafters and the
extras fainting from the fumes. As a result,
Vincente Minnelli scrapped nearly the entire
sequence. What little remains has been inserted as
filler between Kathryn Grayson's warbling ‘There's
Beauty Everywhere' and an uninspired Salvador
Dali-esque chorine that look more like a pack of
poised mannequins than elegant dancers. As a
result, Ziegfeld Follies ends as it had begun –
with an artistic thud. Why Warner Home Video chose
to include this film as part of its tributary box
set "Musicals from the Dream Factory" is frankly
beyond the scope of this reviewer's understanding.
Transfer wise, there is much to celebrate. Colors
are rich, vibrant and often quite stunning to
behold. Fine details are very nicely realized. Age
related artifacts are kept to a bare minimum. Film
grain is negligible. The audio has been very
nicely cleaned up and remixed for a stereophonic
presentation that was not part of the original's
theatrical release. Extras include the aptly
titled featurette ‘An Embarrassment of Riches' as
well as audio outtakes of three surviving musical
numbers.
Aside: the original remastered laserdisc of
Ziegfeld Follies included an extensive catalogue
of musical outtakes and it's rather disappointing
to see that these have been discarded herein.
Overall, Ziegfeld Follies is rather flat
entertainment but it does have its moments. But
those are best left for the connoisseur of such
kitsch. |
