La blonde et moi

I always chuckle when comments moan about some film they review seriously which Helen Keller could tell is made to be a ridiculous comedy. Hey, like THE GIRL CAN'T HELP IT for example. How's this for the full hurricane force of the fun of it all: On Saturday June 11th 2005, as part of the Sydney Film Festival, there was a screening at the 2300 seat Sydney cinema treasurebox THE STATE THEATRE. Guess how many turned up: go on...have a guess...give up? well would you believe...... 2300 people !!! at $12.50 a ticket!! all ready to shatter the chandeliers and lift the roof in unison shrieking and howling with glee at this hilarious musical farce designed to do no more than outrageously entertain. And it did. Maybe best seen like this in a crowded picture palace of good natured punters keen to have communal cinema bliss, but I do believe it was all the rage back in 1956 as well, with Jayne doing Marilyn and Ewell leering and looking sideways. Fab deluxe colour never looked better and with a roster of glamour clad stars, all giving us their all for the FOX/Tashlin schedule it works superbly for 91 minutes of pure 50s delight. Yes it is funny! It's supposed to be! Just enjoy it. Or move to Australia.

Anyone curious about the lighter side of the Eisenhower years needs to catch this candy-box confection. Yes indeed, it's classic R&R with a number of star crowd-pleasers at their peak—The Platters, Gene Vincent & His Bluecaps, Fats Domino, Eddie Cochran, plus the one and only Little Richard. And for the lounge lizard crowd, it's a sultry Julie London crying her trademark river. And, of course, no 50's look-back is complete without a busty blonde. Here it's a cartoonish Jayne Mansfield defying the laws of gravity with her twin gunboats.

And it's all put together by sight gag specialist Frank Tashlin showing why his years as a Disney cartoonist were not misspent. Okay, the 100-minutes gets a little plot-heavy toward the end, plus watching the glamorous Mansfield get all ga-ga over a nerdy Tom Ewell is itself a cartoon. Still, there's a usually dour Eddie O'Brien mugging it up in hilarious fashion, along with a deliciously deadpan Henry Jones trailing behind. I can't believe TCM gave the results only an average rating. Someone over there was asleep. On the contrary, this is one of the most lively and entertaining documents from that cold war decade. Thank you, Frank Tashlin and Twentieth Century Fox.

Nobody is going to award this screenplay awards for being anything more than a satire of the music industry, with scenery chewing main characters playing it big and obvious...no subtlety here, Jayne Mansfield, a stunning beauty, has the most restrained performance of all of the main characters. The '50s broad stroke comedy hasn't aged as well as other films, but, that is to be expected as the beloved popular music of the generation that produced this film gave way to the genre that was actually being satirized, Rock and Roll.

That being said, the film was AHEAD of it's time in showing artists doing their originals for a mass appeal production. AT THE TIME, segregation existed in both CONCERTS and RADIO. Some radio stations would only play Pennimen (Little Richard), Domino and other black artist's songs that white artists had covered...The inclusion of the the original artists was a bold and interesting move, as, even in film history, there had been films targeted for audiences by race in much the same way as was the radio practice of the time.

The influence of those assembled artists, even the ones that the dialog was mocking, for instance, Eddie Cochran, can still be heard over 40 years after his untimely death...Summertime Blues is STILL a rock standard, and classic rock stations still play Little Richard, Fats Domino, and the Platters...Even the faded ghost of the music that was passing (literally and figuratively in the movie), Julie London, has gotten re-issues of re-mastered material on CD recently.

An entertainment on many levels, this film still exudes an exuberance, and quite unintentionally, preserves a visual record of the musical legacy of artists from Jazz to Rockibilly to R&B to Early Rock...and the joy of those performances is still infectious in the 21st century.

Wanna see when Little Richard(She's Got It-Ready-Teddy & Girl Can't Help It), Gene Vincent(BeBop A Lula),The Platters(You'll Never Know), and Fats Domino(Blue Monday)perform their hits live as the actually sang them in 1956? Wanna see campy Jayne Mansfied at her sexiest, wittiest best? Paradoies, sight gags and clever writing make the rocker musical an even better comedy, which has stood the test of time. Jayne bubbles over, while Tom(Ewell) bubbles under and somehow in the end they both bubble up to the surface and find happiness, kids.......... If this isn't enough Calander Girl Julie London does a sultry. teasing version of her hit Cry Me A River that will drive any man to drink. Check the cars out, I once owned one of those. See this movie twice to fully appreciate the music and catch all the gags, clever lines and parodies.

"The Girl Can't Help It" is a '50s comedy that is also a showcase for some of the rock 'n' roll acts of the day, including Little Richard, Fats Domino, The Platters, Gene Vincent, The Treniers, and many others.

Tom Ewell plays a down and out agent, Tom Miller, hired by gangster Fats Murdock (Edmond O'Brien) to make his girlfriend, Jerri Jordan, (Jayne Mansfield) a star. Turns out Jerri feels gratitude to Fats for helping her father, but she isn't in love with him; she doesn't want to be in show business, preferring domestic things like cooking; and she appears to have no talent. She looks great, though, and in some form-fitting gowns, she draws plenty of attention, and all the clubs want to book her. Concerned because she's tone-deaf, Miller has one of the songs Fats wrote in prison (the one in the subject is but one title) "Rock Around the Rock Pile" adapted into a novelty number so that all Jerri has to do is a high pitched sound. The song is an immediate smash. Miller, however, who was jilted by his client Julie London, now finds he and Jerri have fallen for one another. But Fats is still around.

This is a very, very funny send-up of rock 'n' roll and show business, with a marvelously deadpan performance by Tom Ewell, to whom the singing Julie London, in various costumes, is always appearing while singing "Cry Me a River" - on the staircase, in the bedroom, in a bar - a great bit. O'Brien, who performs his "Jailhouse Rock" mockery at the end of the movie, is hilarious.

The real star is the flashy Jayne Mansfield, who underneath that va-va-va-voom figure, blonder than blond hair and huge chest was a beautiful woman and a good actress. Mansfield, probably hired by Fox as a threat to Monroe, figured out early on that making fun of the bombshell image was her best bet. She had a lovely speaking voice and, in serious moments, a natural way of acting. She also radiated warmth. This film and "Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter," which she did on Broadway as well, are good testaments to her work.

Lots of fun.