My first older musical of the year! And honestly, a few minutes into it, I had to check wikipedia to make sure this actually was a musical, because there’s not actually that much singing in it. Looking back on it, I’m not sure Lise was involved in any of the songs. She was there for the dancing.
And oh, how much dancing there was. I have a little bit of mixed feelings on the movie as a whole, because of that. It was funny, and the instrumentals were good, of course. It’s Gershwin so I guess they wanted to show off the music. That’s the only explanation I can come up with for why there were so many extended dancing scenes. I felt that way about West Side Story, too, but it got a little weirder in this one.
Instead of actually…. resolving the conflict of the story in a narrative way, they have The American starts dancing in some of his art (I guess) inside his own head with a bunch of randos, then Lise comes and takes part in the dances, and they dance for nearly 20 minutes. No words. Just Gershwin and dancing. And then when that ends, the conflict is resolved—Lise returns, apparently not getting married to the other guy after all, and that’s the end of the movie.
It was unexpected. I really can’t imagine a movie like this being made today. It wasn’t bad, but it’s not going to be my favorite of the month.
Next: Tuck Everlasting!
Daisy M. Hall 
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