Spoilt and icy Tracy is due to marry her dull, dependable beau George, but the day before her nuptials, Tracy’s ex-husband Dexter arrives back in town and sets his mind to stopping the marriage. As if her love triangle is not enough, two reporters turn up to cover Tracy’s wedding and report on the shenanigans that the upper get up to.
Competing with Meet Me In St. Louis for the title of Most Pointless Musical in Cinema History, High Society was completely wasted on me. In its day, it may have been a remarkable piece of cinematic satire and taking the piss out of the class differences, but, in my eyes, this was a mediocre and pointless film filled with terrible songs and even more terrible performances.
Spoilt and icy Tracy is due to marry her dull, dependable beau George, but the day before her nuptials, Tracy’s ex-husband Dexter arrives back in town and sets his mind to stopping the marriage. As if her love triangle were not enough to deal with, two reporters turn up to cover Tracy’s wedding and report the shenanigans that the upper class get up to. Putting on a fair and flawless face of the reporters and trying to navigate her way out of her bizarre love triangle is going to prove harder than anything Tracy has ever faced before.
I just don’t get it! Throughout the 50s brilliant musicals were gracing our screens: An American In Paris, Singin’ In the Rain… even bloody Guys and Dolls was better than this. High Society, a musical adaptation of The Philadelphia Story, just plain did not work! The story went nowhere, the musical numbers were not very memorable, and Bing Crosby’s attempt to do jazz was the most abominable and most offensive thing I have ever seen!
The only highlights of the film were Louis Armstrong playing himself (although he seemed to struggle a fair bit with lip syncing), Grace Kelly, sadly this was the last film she did before becoming Princess Grace of Monaco, and Frank Sinatra, although I have to say that even his overacted and incredibly funny drunken scenes weren’t enough to save this film.
Starring Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly, Frank Sinatra, Celeste Holm, John Lund, Louis Calhern, Sidney Blackmer, Margalo Gillmore, and Louis Armstrong, High Society was a pointless and bland musical that failed to capture any theatrical, dramatic, comedic, or romantic response from me. Maybe it was a brilliant piece of cinema in its day but on me personally, whatever comedy or satire or whatever was completely missed.
Filled with mediocre songs, a bizarre love triangle, a very slow moving story, and the occasional bit of jazz to wake us up from the boredom ensued; High Society was a complete flop for me. No desires to add it to the collection.
No comments:
Post a Comment