On Your Toes

There's really only reason why you'd find, rent, and sit through On Your Toes: if you love the dancing talents of ballerina Vera Zorina. She plays a ballerina and is given several scenes to shine. If you're just looking for a showbiz movie about the ups and downs of trying to have a stage career, look elsewhere.

The movie starts out in vaudeville, where James Gleason, Queenie Smith, and Donald O'Connor have a dancing act. Little Donald is absolutely adorable, but he's only in the movie for about fifteen minutes. Then he grows up, and gets replaced by Eddie Albert-fresh off Broadway and in his second-ever film-and the film turns into a bizarre Russian ballet. Eddie leaves vaudeville to pursue classical music, then he connects with Vera, Leonid Kinskey, Frank McHugh, and a strangely accented Alan Hale. The rest of the movie is very odd, full of ballet, and hardly any plot. I was hoping to see more of Eddie Albert singing and dancing, but he didn't get to show off his hidden talents. During the one scene he's shown tap dancing, the camera only shows his feet after a very obvious stunt double enters the frame from the opposite direction Eddie left.