Rosalie

The first half of this classic movie musical is good. The second half was a big disappointment.

The first half is interesting with likable characters and a couple of good song- and-dance numbers. The second half features a sappy romance and drags on too long.

Frank Morgan doesn't help things. His "bumbling king" character simply gets irritating after awhile. Eleanor Powell is miscast as a romantic "princess" lead. She just isn't that pretty or convincing as an actress. As everyone knows, she was a far better dancer than an actor

Nelson Eddy's singing is okay but, boy, does it sound corny and dated nowadays. Ray Bolger's comedy isn't funny; it's stupid.

On the positive side, some of the elaborate Busby Berkeley-type dance sets are elaborate and astounding. It's amazing to view. Powell's tap dancing is always entertaining, although I've seen better numbers from her in the Broadway Melody series.

The film has two Cole Porter songs -- "Rosalie" and "In the Still of the Night." For several bars of the latter, we see the back of Nelson Eddy as he sings to the back of Eleanor Powell. This daring shot is superb, because we can feel the effect of the song on both. Eddy is stiff, except when he sings. That stiffness is partly in the role as West Point cadet, but it's mostly Nelson. Powell has a great production number in her native Romanza, to which the unsuspecting Eddy has pursued her. Powell's best moments, though, occur as she commands a crack West Point drill team to the strains of "The Stars and Stripes Forever." The Souza march changes from 4/4 to waltz time for a Powell solo. The drill is an imaginative sequence that takes advantage of Powell's incredible skills. After all these years, you still say "Wow!" Frank Morgan is endearing as a king with an eye for the girls, while Edna May Oliver is completely convincing as his forever-angry wife. A couple of good moments occur when Morgan's puppet insults the Queen, speaking, as it were, for its puppeteer. Ray Bolger is completely wasted as Eddy's friend and Billy Gilbert's scenes, in which he sneezes over all bystanders, should have tasted the cutting room floor. But for its several great moments, this one is worth watching.

Fans of Eleanor Powell will wonder how she detoured into this Jeanette MacDonald/Nelson Eddy overblown costume piece -- and in the role of Jeanette MacDonald no less! Whereas delicate Jeanette would have floated through this pageant with an air of fluttering dignity, pants-wearing Ellie delivers too much punch for a princess. She barks most of her lines and unfortunately comes off as a bitch. A more delicate actress would have softened the barrage of "womanly" insults laid on Nelson Eddy and we would know this meant she was smitten. But with the confidant and athletic Powell delivering the insults you really start to wonder if wooden Eddy is a masochist or just extremely submissive. It's an electric energy that cost Powell her spotlight, and didn't fit with MGM's idea of what a feminine leading lady should be.

Those who are fascinated by Ellie's unusual (at least on film) gender-play will be thrilled to see her "go all the way" and dress as a man to sneak into a military academy where she leads the cadets in a marching drill in front of a phallic war memorial. While Powell is hardly mannish (and here with Jeanette's wardrobe and make-up budget she never looked prettier) the production plays with her "masculinity" and dresses her in all extremes of buttoned-downed marching band jackets and crisp uniforms, interspersed with overly feminine gowns with frou-frou puffy sleeves and Jeanette's corkscrew curls. It's an inconsistent and mostly unsuccessful gender dichotomy -- especially when compared to her smart wardrobe play and winning charisma in the Broadway Melody films.

Her tap numbers are too few and too short -- a Pieroette "ballet" on giant drums is an weird jumble of inconsistent imagery, and a brief scene with Ray Bolger makes you wish they'd shared a competitive dance of lightning legwork rather than the time-wasting dialog in the script. Other supporting players are also underused: as the Queen Edna May Oliver appears briefly in a tiered nightgown that exaggerates her Olive Oil frame, and Frank Morgan does his best to keep the banter rolling as a befuddled monarch with a ventriloquist dummy, but there isn't enough comedy here to entertain. A sudden accidental revolution in the tiny Balkan monarchy has potential, but is dropped just as quickly. Even the production numbers are too short, following the pattern of the other MacDonald/Eddy films where actual choreography and musical style are ignored for lots and lots of extras arranged in expensive costumes and plenty of operetta bombast from Eddy.

Other than seeing Eleanor Powell in one of her few starring roles this is a forgettable film that shows no one to advantage, except possibly MGM's costume department. I can see how this was originally a vehicle for Marion Davies because the sets are jaw-droppingly huge.

I'm not much of a fan of Eleanor Powell even though she's a marvelous tap dancer. She always struck me as a cold fish - and there's very little chemistry between her and Nelson Eddy (who is in fine voice) so the romance between them seems totally artificial. So is the plot, which involves her being an incognito princess of a small European country, falling in love with football player Eddy, who follows her to her country when she leaves the States to marry a prince. If it weren't for the score by Cole Porter, it would have been a total bust for me. Although the film is vaguely based on the 1928 show of the same name, MGM head Louis B. Mayer opted to have Porter write a completely new score, supplanting the Sigmond Romberg-George Gershwin score of the original. The music is the best part of the movie, with the hauntingly beautiful "In the Still of the Night" a standout. There is some enjoyable comedy provided by Frank Morgan, Ray Bolger and Billy Gilbert, all of whom I enjoyed more than the leads. A bit long at 123 minutes, but worth a look mostly for the music.

Cole Porter reportedly hated the title song, but Louis B. Mayer loved it, and he was the man with the money, so it stayed. With its opulent sets and numerous extras, this was one of the most expensive films made up to that time, but it was also a huge hit.

West Point cadet Dick (Nelson Eddy) falls for foreign princess Rosalie (Eleanor Powell). He doesn't know she's a princess, though (they never do in movies). Rosalie is called back to her country to marry another guy. Dick follows along to win her heart. When he finds out who she is and that she's engaged, he heads back to America. Then the movie ends with everybody miserable. Just kidding.

36 year-old Nelson Eddy as a West Point cadet is a stretch but we'll overlook that. He does fine and better than fine when singing. Eleanor Powell smiles her way through the whole picture but it's such a pretty smile that I doubt anybody minds. There's some funny parts, such as the airport guys and the ventriloquist bits. Great supporting cast includes Edna May Oliver, George Zucco, Virginia Grey, Reginald Owen, and future Oz costars Ray Bolger and Frank Morgan. Thickly-accented Ilona Massey plays Powell's friend. She's lovely to look at but hard to understand. With a cast like this and such good production values, it really should have been a classic. Unfortunately, there are some problems with it. For one, it's overlong. A movie with such a banal plot has no business being over two hours long. Also, the two leads have little romantic chemistry. They're both likable but there's just no spark.

It's a musical with Nelson Eddy and Eleanor Powell so, it stands to reason, most of us will watch for the singing and dancing. The Cole Porter songs are sung well. "In the Still of the Night" is the stand-out tune. As is usually the case with her movies, Powell's dancing is the highlight of the film. She gets three tap numbers, including an impressive routine on big drums. All three numbers are fantastic. Watching Powell dance is always a treat and you should watch the movie for that, if nothing else.