A Date with Judy

The music is nice and the acting is excellent. While I like Jane Powell and Elizabeth Taylor was positively gorgeous, I'm a huge fan of Wallace Beery. When we look back and consider great actors, he is very underrated. It offers a look back at the family unit of the time compared to what exists now.

"A Date with Judy" is a nostalgic look at mid-20th century America when most of the world was at peace, or at least enjoying a calm. It's a picture of middle and upper middle-class white America after World War II. The film is set in Santa Barbara, California in 1948. Rock 'n roll hadn't yet burst on the scene. It was the sunset years of the corner drugstore with its soda fountain where teens met after high school. That was just before drive-in restaurants came on the scene in the 1950s. Kids still dressed modestly and nicely. The bobbysoxer boom was just around the corner.

This is one of the lighter types of comedy-musicals that MGM made with various young stars after the series of Andy Hardy films with Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland (1938-1946). The big musicals, of all the studios, were to come in the next two decades. That, despite the demise of the studio system.

This is a cute comedy romance with Jane Powell singing a few songs and she and 16-year-old Elizabeth Taylor organizing a high school musical program. Powell is Judy Foster and Taylor is Carol Pringle. Powell was three years older than Taylor, and although Taylor got her start in films younger than Powell, it was Powell's singing that propelled her career in musicals. Of course, Taylor's star would take off with excellent dramatic roles. Later Powell films were much better, but this is a light and fun film with a couple of tremendous young entertainers very early in their careers.

The most unusual casting for this film has to Wallace Beery as Judy's father, Melvin Colner Foster. The usually gruff, tough, and often nasty Beery actually pulls it off as a caring dad and nice guy in this film.

Carmen Miranda, known as the Brazilian Bombshell, adds some spice and humor to the story, as well as a tune. And, the frequently paired Xavier Cugat and his Orchestra (with Miranda) provide most of the music.

"A Date with Judy" is an enjoyable film that also gives a realistic peek at the culture of the time, in the late 1940s in much of America.

Here are a couple lines from the film.

Judy Foster, "My father seems to think that his fish can get along very well without my help."

Caro Pringle, "I finally convinced father to let you and Oogie try out on his radio station." Judy, "You did? Oh, that's stinky super."

I first saw 'A Date With Judy' at the Radio City Music Hall in late August 1948 when I was eight years old.....what an epiphany!!! Years later I revisited the film via television...how could it ever hold up...but...it remains a total charmer!! Music via Powell is lovely, Elizabeth is breathtakingly beautiful...and charming.....then there is the rest of a super cast...Wallace Beery, Robert Stack, Selena Royale, George Cleveland (the wonderful grandfather from Lassie), Scotty Becket, Xavier Cugat...and lest we not forget, the superlative Carmen Miranda! "It's A Most Unusual Day" ( remember Hitchcock's use of this as Cary Grant walks through the Plaza just before his kidnapping?), Judaline, Love is Where You Find It" and most memorably of all.."Cuanto Le Gusto" (I have murdered the spelling but 'a rose is a rose'!) Super music and memories of the radio program and comic book of the same name.

This is a delightful musical , and was very successful, in 1948 and is a treasure for today...and it's been released on DVD! It would look sumptuous in Blueray...maybe soon?

Jane Powell plays Judy--a kooky teenager who can sing like a bird but who has difficulty picking friends. That's because her best friend, Carol (Elizabeth Taylor) is a rich, meddling, spoiled jerk--yet Judy doesn't seem to recognize this. And throughout the film, Carol does her best to make Judy's life miserable. For no particular reason, Carol drives a wedge between her brother, Oogie, and Judy--who are sweethearts. However, this backfires when Judy ends up with a much handsomer and older man, Stephen (Robert Stack). Now, jealous, Carol is determined to take Stephen for herself. But Stephen is no dummy--he sees that Carol is gorgeous but also lets her know that he can see right through her and her wiles.

In a smaller side story, Judy's father (Wallace Beery) is a nice guy--but a nice guy who is embarrassed that he doesn't know how to dance. With his anniversary coming up, he decides to secretly take dance lessons (with Carmen Miranda) but due to Carol's meddling, people begin to think that he and Carmen are in love! SO, Judy decides the best way to fight this is to make her father feel loved--and she and the family lay it on thick. Clearly this is Beery at his best--and he's easy to love (despite his very nasty personality off-screen).

This is the sort of light family musical-comedy that MGM did best. Films like "On Moonlight Bay" and "Meet Me in St. Louis" are just a small sampling of the sort of genre that the studio made to perfection. They also made some non-musicals with similar plots that just can't be beat, such as "Life With Father", the Andy Hardy films and "Cheaper By the Dozen" (the original--not the new crappy version). These films aren't especially deep but are filled with pleasant plots, a bit of minor melodrama, some laughs and, most importantly, nice folks you'd like to meet. My only complaint is that although Powell has a good voice, her high-toned style and high pitch is NOT to my liking. It's far less simple and pleasant than Judy Garland ("Meet Me in St. Louis") or Doris Day ("By the Light of the Silvery Moon" and "On Moonlight Bay"). I am also not a huge Carmen Miranda fan, though when she wasn't singing, she was just fine. Overall, while not a great family musical comedy, it's a good one and well worth your time.

A Date With Judy probably is Jane Powell's career role, maybe even more so than Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. It's Jane at her juvenile cuteness with the movie song probably most identified with her.

Amazingly enough, It's A Most Unusual Day did not even get nominated for the Oscar sweepstakes that year which saw the best song as Buttons and Bows. Still the Jimmy McHugh-Harold Adamson song has an enduring quality, it's one eternally optimistic tune. Jane sings it so well.

The movie is based on a popular radio series of the time and in a few years it would move on to television where Judy Foster and Oogie Pringle would continue the everlasting courtship.

In this film we have two story lines working in tandem. War veteran Robert Stack working as a soda jerk, putting himself through college, and interested in both Jane Powell as Judy or Oogie Pringle's older sister Carol, who is Elizabeth Taylor. Jane is pretty, but Elizabeth was drop dead gorgeous. Is that ever a no brainer.

The second is Judy's dad, Wallace Beery learning the rumba from Carmen Miranda, so he can surprise mom, Selena Royle on their anniversary. Of course Powell and Taylor mistake the meaning of those office rendezvous.

In true family film fashion it all works out in the end. One thing I never understood is why any kid like Scotty Beckett would want to be tagged with the moniker of Oogie even though it's short for Ogden. What a name to go through life with.

Jane sings divinely though and that's the real reason for watching this pleasing, but terribly dated family film.