One of the worst movies I've ever seen

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

It is both painfully honest and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time.

Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.

THE BARKLEYS OF Broadway has a script written by Comden and Green for Astaire and Judy Garland as a followup to EASTER PARADE. The script doesn't seem to have been much changed when Ginger Rogers came on board to replace Judy. Ginger, having signed a contract with a new studio (Enterprise Studios, which to the surprise of the industry wound up making very few movies before going bankrupt) hadn't done much of anything for about 2 years other than reading possible scripts, and was available. Most of the musical numbers would receive a radical makeover, though 'A Weekend in the Country' still seems very much like a stroll down the Yellow Brick Road.At the ages of 38 and 50, Rogers and Astaire serve as the oldest couple that I know of to headline a musical comedy, and it was probably a good idea to make them an established married pair rather than to repeat the courting rituals of the usual (and the usual Astaire/Rogers) musical. Unfortunately, the musical numbers are not especially well-integrated into the plot. Oscar Levant's Tchaikovsky interlude, spectacular as the playing is in itself, does nothing but kill time as we wait for the emotional climax of 'They Can't Take That Away From Me'. Similarly, Astaire's solo with the dancing shoes is impressive, but it stops the plot cold immediately after a dramatic turning point, Dinah's walking out on Josh. These interludes, plus a generally pokey second half, stretch the proceedings out to an uncomfortable length. And there's no ultimate reward for it, as the great 'Let's Face The Music And Dance' had been for the overlong FOLLOW THE FLEET. And most of all, one must wonder at the idea of burying the first dance number beneath the opening credits! Decisions don't get any dumber than that.Whatever the movie may have been like with Judy Garland, it is laden with the mystic chords of memory with Ginger Rogers as one of its stars. For some reason, somebody seems to have had ROBERTA on their minds. The best number in BARKLEYS, 'Bouncing the Blues', sees Fred and Ginger dressed in very similar costumes to those they wore in the great tap dance number 'Hard to Handle' from ROBERTA. Where the earlier number is graced by spontaneous ejaculations from Ginger and Fred, 'Bouncing the Blues' is burdened by forced (recorded) interjections from Fred, and it's no accident that such echoes are on the final sound track. Also, the romantic ballad 'Smoke Gets In Your Eyes' dance ends with Fred taking Ginger's hand as they exit stage right to be met with her loving gaze as prelude to a comedic proposal and acceptance (she proposes, he accepts); in BARKLEYS, 'They Can't Take That Away From Me' ends exit stage left with Fred similarly taking Ginger's hand, but this time she turns her face down and away from him as prelude to rejecting his proposal to get back together. It's quite effective if you notice it, but I'm not sure that many will (John Mueller, author of ASTAIRE DANCING, thinks that the 'Highland Fling' number is a parody of the 'Night and Day' dance from THE GAY Divorcée. I've never been able to see that myself). For good or ill, the movie centers around the character of Dinah Barkley. That's mostly good, though Ginger's turn as Sarah Bernhardt must be the low point of her entire career (especially odd for an actress who regularly underplayed her most emotional scenes). However, she received the best contemporary notices for the film, and would have been considered the most important actor in it by contemporary audiences. The script isn't especially sharp, and the musical score is the least of all the Astaire/Rogers films, though this says more about the extraordinary quality of the music from their RKO efforts than it does about THE BARKLEYS OF Broadway in particular (for example, the song 'You'd Be Hard To Replace' seems to me a lovely tune that is pretty much thrown away in the film). Still, it's always great to see the wondrous Astaire/Rogers pairing, and it's nice to have a chance to see them in color. It says everything about the quality of this series that I give BARKLEYS an 8 out of 10 rating though I consider it only the 8th best of the 10 films they made together. There's simply never been anything like them.

Tired of being part of their musical comedy song and dance team, Dinah Barkley (Ginger Rogers) decides to pursue a career as a dramatic actress, disappointing her hoofer husband Josh (Fred Astaire) which leads to their separation. But as much as he resents her for deserting him, he can't help but interfere in her career, calling her up with a disguised voice and pretending to be her director to offer her "acting advice". This turns her career as a dramatic actress around but leads to the possibility of romance between Dinah and Jacques, the director whom Fred had been pretending to be with a "Cyrano de Bergerac" facade. It's obvious that these two will get back together, but how the scam is exposed is all part of the fun.In their first movie together in ten years, Fred and Ginger appear as if time had stood still. He's gone onto other partners, and she's mixed an infrequent musical with mostly comedy or dramatic parts. For what was supposed to be a follow-up for Fred and Judy Garland (after the smash success of "Easter Parade") came as the reunion that nobody thought would ever happen, and one of the most delightful re-teamings in film history. You can see the story being a continuation of "Easter Parade"; Josh Barkley tells his wife that he helped her learn everything she knows, which having seen "Easter Parade" just recently is a perfect way to continue the story. But without Fred and Judy, there's no need to continue that story, and even if Judy had been Dinah Barkley (not Hannah Brown), the connections would have been obvious.Adding color to the Fred and Ginger pairing enhances their stardom, although I certainly wouldn't want to see their 1933-1939 pairings colorized. But you certainly need color for the "Manhattan Downbeat", "My One and Only Highland Fling" and "Shoes With Wings On", one of the most creative of all of Fred's masterpieces. Fred has a beautiful solo he sings to Ginger ("You'd Be Hard to Replace") and the reprisal of "They Can't Take That Away From Me" is elegantly staged. Ginger's singing in "Highland Fling" is a bit off key, but she still dances beautifully.Oscar Levant provides some acerbic dialog, but when he plays classics on the piano during a few concert performances, it is absolutely grand. His best line is a comment about Fred's replacement dance partner, Gale Robbins, and is one she totally deserves. Carol Brewster made my ears ring as Levant's dizzy date, but nothing put me in a bigger tizzy than poor Billie Burke's almost unnecessary contribution as a befuddled matron who may provide excellent parties but provided an annoyance even to her society friends who all seemed to run every time they heard her screeching out their names.When Ginger recites the French National Anthem (very over dramatically), she sounds like she's imitating Blanche Yurka in "A Tale of Two Cities", appropriate for Madame La Farge, but certainly hammy for a rising Sarah Bernhardt to expect to get away with at the "La Comédie-Française". But that's the only embarrassing scene here, with her rehearsals for her straight play very much done like Hepburn's scenes in "Stage Door" where she must face her inadequacies as a dramatic actress until it hits her how she has to play each scene. It's a shame that with each of their careers still in full swing that this was their last movie together. They did present an Oscar together only a few years later, and at any event where they were together, it was like Elvis or the Beatles had taken the stage. More than 80 years after their first appearance together, Fred and Ginger strike magic more than pretty much any other couple. He may have given her class, and she may have given him sex appeal, but together, they sparkled like the stars in the sky and still make cloudy days a lot better.

The Barkleys of Broadway is directed by Charles Walters and written by Betty Comden and Adolph Green. It stars Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Oscar Levant, Billie Burke, Gale Robbins and Jacques François. Music is by Lennie Hayton and cinematography by Harry Stradling Sr.Fred and Ginger play the Barkleys, a successful husband and wife musical comedy team that seems to thrive on feuding. However, one day it goes too far and a break up appears certain when the wife entertains an offer from Jacques François to become a serious actress.Firsts and lasts here as it was the first film Astaire and Rogers did for MGM, their first in colour, and their last they would make together after reconvening after 10 years - Rogers stepping in when Judy Garland fell to her troubled wayside. The screenplay is pretty thin, serving only as a thin piece of meat to the dance and musical numbers sandwich, but with stand-outs like the wonderful "Shoes with Wings On" and the joyous uplift of 'They Can't Take That Away from Me' to spend time with, it's a film to brighten the darkest of days. 7/10

Even those of us who are too young to have seen those great Astaire/Rogers black and white musicals the first time around - and let's face it, even one who was only ten in 1935, the year Top Hat was released, would now be eighty one and unlikely to be active on this or indeed any other board - will still feel a frisson at the very opening frames of this movie - over which the credits are supered - a shot of the four most iconic dancing feet in movie musicals doing what they did so well that they helped millions to find momentary relief from the Great Depression. Cynics may argue that MGM opened with this shot - which slowly pans up to reveal Fred and Giner in full spate - knowing full well that what followed was at best a pedestrian script from the vastly overrated Comden and Green (thank God they didn't lumber Fred with some of their equally pedestrian lyrics) who would recycle it yet again four years later in The Bandwagon, once more teaming Astaire with Oscar Levant. In common with, I guess, the majority of musical buffs who are active on these boards I first saw the original Astaire/Rogers movies many years later on TV by which time I'd already seen Fred dancing with other partners from the mediocre (Jane Powell, Vera Ellen) to the outstanding (Rita Hayworth, Cyd Charisse) so that the glaring flaws of those black and white gems -the ridiculous depiction of Venice (Top Hat), the pristine engine room of an ocean-going liner (Shall We Dance) etc to say nothing of the remote coldness of Rogers stood out more than if I had watched them as a child of the Depression seeking only escape from soup kitchens and bread lines but what was undeniable was the charm and style of Astaire, the gorgeous songs and the greatest and most stylish pair of male feet ever to grace the musical screen. Harry Warren was, no question, a great composer but he fell just a tad short of Porter, Kern and Gershwin if not necessarily Berlin and although he delivers a fine score here, to which Ira Gershwin fashioned some deft lyrics the movie failed to deliver a 'standard' to rank alongside The Way You Look Tonight (Swingtime), Cheek To Cheek (Top Hat), Change Partners (Carefree) etc in fact the classiest number on display by a country mile is They Can't Take That Away From Me which Ira wrote originally, with brother George, for Shall We Dance. In the early/mid forties MGM had a penchant for self-contained 'classical' moments in popular musicals, often employing the likes of Jose Iturbi to ham his way though a flashy classical piece that had little or nothing to do with the rest of the film (and like those Lena Horne numbers could be edited out when the film played the Deep South); one had hoped that by 1949 the powers that be had matured a little but no, here we get Oscar Levant - who is playing a composer of 'show' tunes - giving his rendition of The Sabre Dance and Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto Number #1 in D Flat whilst his 'character' has never displayed either an interest in or aptitude for the classics. Maybe they were deliberately attempting an 'old fashioned' feel or trying to cram the quart of Astaire-Rogers into the pint pot of Anchors Aweigh but whatever the intention the result is mild embarrassment. No film that stars Astaire and allows him to dance can be dismissed entirely and when he is allowed to do what he did better than anyone else the film comes alive and is worth watching but on balance there are not enough Astaire magic moments.