Forum DVD Contest - May 2008

The wonderful month of May offers spring showers, NHL playoffs, and the start of the summer movie season. May also gives us the first Online Movie Forums DVD Giveaway.

This month we have Warner Bros. CLASSIC MUSICALS FROM THE DREAM FACTORY VOL. 3. The box set offers 9 great films plus a series of extras, including Vintage Shorts, Classic Cartoons, and more.

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B0011FDVEK.01._SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0011FDVEK?ie=UTF8&tag=chasingthefro-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B0011FDVEK)

To participate in the contest, simply post in this thread and tell everyone what your favorite musical is and why. Your post doesn't have to be lengthy, just recommend a musical and tell us why you like it (you can recommend modern musicals in addition to vintage musicals).

The contest will end on May 31st.

Oh great idea Klance, what fun.

My favorite musicals are Busby Berkeley musicals, my favorite being Gold Diggers of 1933.

It stars a young Dick Powell, Ginger Rogers, Ruby Keeler and Joan Blondell. Joan sings a very poignant, moving song, The Forgotten Man, the movie was filmed during the great depression and this song directly relates to the plight of forgotten out of work men during this bleak time in our history.

Another number sung by Ginger Rogers, We're In The Money, has her singing one of the verses in pig latin.

Another number featuring Dick Powell and Ruby Keeler, Pettin in the Park, Billy Barty playing a baby, and it is a bit creepy the way they have him leering at the women, but you have to take the good with the bad in these musicals.

I love the old musicals, the sets, the music, the outlandish dance numbers, the clothes, the cars. They do a good job of showing us life in another era. They are just good, zany, outrageous fun. You really don't know what a musical can be until you see some Busy Berkeley choreography. He was famous, or infamous, for his elaborate musical production numbers that often involved complex geometric patterns using showgirls and props to make fantastic kaleidoscopic dance numbers.

I have a deep love for movie musicals, even though I know that many are cheesey. Among my top favorites are Fiddler on the Roof and Chicago but I would have to say that I have favorite movie musicals

The first one would be Singin' In the Rain . Gene Kelly has always been one of my favorite entertainers of all time. And Singin' in the Rain was a showcase of his talents. He showed the world that a handsome, talented, man's man could dance and sing. His presence in the film, I believe, opened up the world of musicals to people who would not necessarily have watched them before. Donald O'Connor and Debbie Reynolds are also wonderful in this very funny movie musical.

My second favorite, is The Wizard of Oz, I don't even know that I need to list the reasons why, (But I will anyway). Judy Garland, for one. This, in my opinion the most vulnerable and beautiful acting that I have ever seen her do before. Her voice was just perfect. The rest of the cast was stellar as well. Ray Bolger was wonderfully fantastic as the Scarecrow, and his extended dance scenes are great, it's a shame they couldn't keep them in. Bert Lahr and Jack Haley completed the quartet perfectly. I could go on and on, but I won't.

:)

I'm not a huge fan of musicals, but there are a couple classics that I like...Shall We Dance, Wizard of Oz of course...I'm going to go ahead and recommend a different kind of musical:

Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny...

It's silly and stupid and great for a laugh. It's raunchy and rude and full of crude humor. The sasquatch scene is extremely stupid, but gets me for a laugh every time. Great cameo by Tim Robbins. It's more my style of music...ROCK n ROLL. The songs are part of the plot too. Pretty much the plot is JB (Jack Black) and KG (Kyle Gass) need to win a talent show so they can pay the rent with the prize money. To do that, they need to break into the rock n roll museum to steal a guitar pick....not just any regular old guitar pick...the Pick of Destiny. Foo Fighters front man Dave Grohl also stars as the Devil. A good movie to grab a bag of corn and a beer and just veg out.

Musicals? Huh! What has a serious-minded cinéaste like me to do with a génre where all is froth and frivolity, reality goes out the window in the first five minutes, where whenever anyone has anything serious to say, he bursts into song, accompanied by an unseen orchestra, goes into a dance routine in the middle of the street, and no one sends for the men in white coats? Fie on them all, say I!

. . . with a few exceptions, and the Big One is Cabaret (1972), directed by Bob Fosse and set in 1930s Berlin, where a quite spectacularly ill-matched boy and girl meet and fall in love while Hitler rises inexorably to power offscreen.

Boring background: it's taken from the Broadway Musical by Joe Masteroff, adapted from the play I Am A Camera by John Van Druten, based on short stories in the collection Goodbye To Berlin by Christopher Isherwood - in which, incidentally, Brian Roberts does indeed stay in the same boarding house as Sally Bowles, only he's gay, they don't fall in love, and she's an upper-class English girl who can't sing to save herself.

Liza Minelli could sing. And how! Also dance (Bob Fosse's choreography is the real star of the show):

http://i161.photobucket.com/albums/t222/psionovore/0cab01.jpg

She could act a bit as well.

What I love about this musical is that it isn't a musical in the Meaning Of The Act. When the characters sing and dance, they do it because it's their job as performers in the Kit-Kat Club. The songs they sing counterpoint the action of the film without intruding on it. And as events in the streets of Berlin grow more and more sinister, so the subject matter of the songs grow sleazier and more disturbing. Presiding over this moral decline is the leering, demonic figure of the "Emcee", (Joel Grey, never seen out of makeup, who deservedly picked up one of the films 8 Oscars). Here he is with Liza Minnelli in the hilarious (or is it borderline antisemitic?) "Money Makes The World Go Around.":

http://i161.photobucket.com/albums/t222/psionovore/0cab02.jpg

Michael York excels as the bewildered English academic who finds himself in the middle of this horrendous situation. Also appearing is handsome Helmut Griem as the filthy rich Maximilian, who proves once and for all what a couple of babes in arms the two protagonists truly are.

Here are York and Griem in the best scene of the film. I defy your spine not to tingle:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EdM8PDu6VMg&feature=related

VERY COOL!

lola named several i enjoy, and as a kid, and to this day i've enjoyed Charlie and the chocolate factory, specifically for gene wilder singin "pure imagination and chitty, chitty, bang, bang and Scrooge with albert finney singin "i like life" they all came out in the late sixties and early seventies and had a goofy, silly approach and one other, that came out around then, jesus christ superstar

for the life of me, i can't think of a classic musical beyond yankee doodle dandy with james cagney

Oh, in case I came across as a complete tight-sphincter before, I should mention that there are a few other musicals I count among my guilty pleasures: My Fair Lady, Fiddler On The Roof, Oliver!, Camelot, I'm with Ed on JCSS, and my guiltiest pleasure of all - Calamity Jane. Plus, when the DVD of Sweeney Todd gets released over here next month, I fully expect to add that to the list.

If you're going to go musical, go all the way--The Umbrellas of Cherbourg. (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0058450/) All the dialogue is sung. Plus, Catherine Deneuve.

Congratulations to dimebagdustin who has won the May 2008 classic musicals DVD contest!
Thanks for entering everyone!


This thread will remain open for further discussion on the topics presented.

Let's hear it for DBD!!!!!!

Let's hear it for DBD!!!!!!

Yes..congrats Dimebag..I'm sure as a man who's "..not a huge fan of musicals".. and picked 'Tenacious D:Pick of Destiny' as his fasvourite musical will love a copy of 'Classic Musicals From The Dream Factory Vol 3'. He's probably puttin' on his top hat, tyin' up his white tie, and dustin' of his tails as we speak!

I'm a dummy....I never claimed my prize.... I haven't been on the forums since August... but now that I finally have decent internet access. If I can still get the prize cool, if not...oh well, my bad.

I loved "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers" every since I was youngster. Phenominal dance sequence in the middle. :)