The Jazz Singer

A simple story of a guy winning back his estranged father, told in strong and memorable images. Jolson looks just right, and although it was done for reasons of cost and technological limitations, it's actually pretty cool that this is a traditional silent movie that turns talkie for the performance scenes. It makes the terrific musical numbers come alive, and it gives the plotting no more or less emphasis than it deserves. Not a great film, but an enjoyable one, and obviously a historically significant one.

For a mawkishly sentimental play that was outdated even when it first was presented on Broadway, The Jazz Singer has had a remarkable life with now three movie versions and possibly more to come. Of course it being considered the first sound film probably has a whole lot to do with it. I doubt it would have been remade twice already if it wasn't a historical moment.

But for trying to hold up the Brothers Warner for some extra salary for doing that first sound feature, Georgie Jessel might have been able to repeat the role he created on Broadway as Jakie Rabinowitz aka Jack Robin, cantor's son who runs away from home as a juvenile and comes back home in time to sing Kol Nidre at Yom Kippur services in place of his dying father. Jessel's greed was Al Jolson's gain as America's greatest live entertainer at the time got to inaugurate the era of movie sound.

As Al Jolson was wont to do in his stage shows, he interpolated material from all sources in his first film that he felt was suitable for him. Toot Toot Tootsie and interestingly enough My Mammy were songs he'd done on stage before and were proved material his audience would respond to. The first song he actually does sing is Dirty Hands, Dirty Face which was something he had not done before. Blue Skies which he sings to his mother after returning home as a Broadway star was in fact a current hit on Broadway at the time Jolson was singing it.

People from that era say that you cannot appreciate Jolson on the screen, that to really get the full impact of his dynamic stage presence you had to see him live. Maybe so, but since that isn't possible, there's enough of him in The Jazz Singer and other of his films to realize what a great entertainer he was, black-face or not.

Warner Oland, later to be the first Charlie Chan, plays Cantor Rabinowitz and Eugenie Besserer is touching as Jolson's mother caught hopelessly between her husband and son. In that first scene of a grownup Jolson in a café before he sings Dirty Hands, Dirty Face you will note that is William Demarest who he's dining with. Myrna Loy has a small role as a chorus girl.

Still both the play and the personality dictate that this film is owned exclusively by Al Jolson. Despite later versions with Danny Thomas and Neil Diamond in the lead, the story will always be identified with the man who said we ain't heard nothing yet.

Though The Jazz Singer is exponentially sentimental and mawkish, it does have a very nice depiction of Jewish life and neighborhood in the Teens and Twenties of the last century. And of course The Jazz Singer is a historic first.

George Jessel passed up a chance to star in this movie. he thought sound in film was too risky a venture to try and took a pass. Al Jolson went on to stardom and George became known as a toastmaster at Hollywood roasts. This is an excellent movie that certainly belongs on anyone's list of 100 best movies. The story has been ably told here, I won't repeat it. I do want to add a few observations, however. The movie is very sentimental, especially in it's portrayal of "Mama" and Jolson's devotion to her. Even when it first came out, writers were critical of this, which harked back to the days of broad stage melodramas. The use of the song Kol Nidre and the Jewish day of Atonement at the ending is significant in that forgiveness and reconciliation is what this movie's theme is all about. Recommended highly, many of the scenes are etched in the consciousness of movie-goers whether you have seen this movie or not. Jolson in blackface doing "Mammy" and "Mother Of Mine", singing "Toot, Toot, Toosie Goodbye". Seeing this film will bring back all these images and place them in their proper contexts. The minstrel type show or even blackface solos were still going strong in the 1920s. In the 1930s and even into the 1940s famous Hollywood actors such as Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney among many others would still be doing songs in blackface. This was no isolated case by a long shot. See it and see history. Also see it for what it is, a classic Hollywood story.

There's not much to say about this other than even today, for this viewer, it is emotionally effective. Yes you know you are being manipulated. Yes, the acting conventions of the silent screen are comically exaggerated. Yes, it is shameless in setting up the ultimate choice. But this is so well structured that even today it escapes cliché. That's so remarkable, because big movies are almost always turned into clichés as bits of them are digested and continuously re-served to us as our visual grammar.

The love interest here is so unusual. He does fall in love with a pretty dancer, but tells her plainly that his career is more important than she is. She later doesn't become part of the choice — as would be the case in nearly every other script — instead she becomes part of the audience, presenting the dramatic quandary: the stage or God.

The presentation of religion is unique in my experience. Everyone here is a Jew, except the performers. They are the "real" and everyone else is "pretend," performing. Though there are many opportunities to fall into obnoxious stereotypes, its avoided over and over. That's despite the dozens of examples they had before.

In fact, there's an amazing engineering of story here. As any viewer will know, this was the first talkie. It was new, and to emphasize its newness a story was created to emphasize the contrast between old and new.

This film is part silent, part "talkie." It shows a struggle between the old (obviously obsolete) and the vital young. It also depicts in a rather subtle but effective way the "old" god, and the new: there's plenty of talk about the performance hall being a modern church. The music as well: we have the implication that it is not only the setting, the performer and the calling, but the music itself that is something new.

Along the way we get street scenes of the Jewish area of New York. These are genuine street scenes and are absolutely phenomenal: there isn't anything I know that compares. There was an attempt of sorts in "The Pawnbroker," which by itself was strong. But nothing compared to this.

Ted's Evaluation -- 4 of 3: Every cineliterate person should experience this.

Director Alan Crosland's and Warner Bros.' 1927 historic milestone film entitled The Jazz Singer was not the first sound film, nor the first "talkie" film or the first movie musical. It's completely baffling to hear many people actually associate this film with the visitation of sound, however, if one can recall the 1926 silent film featuring John Barrymore entitled Don Juan, than they would know that it was the first feature film with a Vitaphone soundtrack, though, like The Jazz Singer, it is by no means the first sound film either. The first sound film can be dated as far back to 1895.

Though, not being the first "talkie", The Jazz Singer, is certainly a remarkable film; it still holds its place as an cinematic landmark for being the first feature-length Hollywood "talke" film in which "spoken dialogue was used as part of the dramatic action." However, it's still largely a silent film with a synchronized musical score and a handful of sound sequences built around singing. It's also become something of a controversial case because of Al Jolson's (arguably the most popular entertainer of his time) use of blackface in some of the musical sequences, forgetful of the fact that this was a theatrical artifice from the era; it wasn't intended as "mean-spirited" as so many claim it to be. It was actually praised by black newspapers in 1927, and was being done by another much defamed minority, a Jew.

You can see what an impact sound must have had in 1927, because it certainly wasn't the movie that made this production a phenomenon. Though, the film itself, is more than just a movie about a guy who likes music. It's also a story about a Jewish kid who turns his back on his heritage to try and make it big on the stage - exceptionally daring subject matter for its era, and still enthralling today. It's certainly not ragged and dull, though, the magic moment when Jolson turns to the camera to announce, "You ain't heard nothing' yet" - a line so loaded with unconscious irony that it still raises a few goose bumps. Audiences were captivated by this and still are to this very day. A must see!!!