The Internet Movie Database Movie Reviews
OK, kids, get out your flags, start waving them around! Stamp your feet! and now, let’s everybody SING!!!
This is such a great movie. It’s a sort of loosely drawn life of George M. Cohan, but mostly it’s full of wonderful songs, excellent musical numbers, a great deal of charming good fun, and of course James Cagney, who was a song-and-dance guy before he became a movie gangster.
Now, granted, he really can’t sing, but he is a HECK of a dancer, you betcha! what a joy to watch…verve, energy and humor all wrapped up in one little package. And the script is good, amusing and fast moving…excepting the obligatory ‘blackface minstrel show’ scene.
Sigh. Why did people in the 40s think that this was a charming piece of their past instead of a blatant display of racism? Ah well. This one isn’t as embarrassing as Mickey and Judy’s foray into that awful field, at least. You can fast forward through it and not lose much…and the rest of the movie is really really good.
Oh, and Walter Huston (the old coot from Treasure of the Sierra Madre does a very creditable job singing and dancing, playing Cagney’s father.
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