"Gold Diggers of 1933" is lighter and funnier than "42nd Street," released earlier in the same year and the product of much of the same production team. Though at the same time, the Depression is more constantly present in "Gold Diggers" than it was in "42nd Street," and the film culminates (and ends rather abruptly) with a dark and critical social comment.
Present again are the elaborate and bizarre choreographic creations of Busby Berkeley, designed to showcase lots of female skin. Particularly nonsensical is the "Pettin' in the Park" number that ends (I'm not kidding) with Dick Powell using a can opener on Ruby Keeler. And get a load of those costumes in the "We're in the Money" number; those strategically placed quarters would never have gotten past the censors had this been released post-code. Overall, it's obvious that the filmmakers were still more used to vaudeville than musical comedy, as the film pretty much stops to allow time for some disjointed musical numbers rather than incorporating them into the action.
The aforementioned Powell and Keeler are about as bland as they were in "42nd Street," though Keeler is much more palatable without the saccharine, cavity-inducing personality she was asked to don in the earlier movie. And thank God she isn't given more than a few minutes to dance, since she's got the grace of a truck driver.
The biggest assets to this film are Joan Blondell, spicy and sexy, and Aline MacMahon, who plays the role Rosalind Russell would be playing if she were in this movie. Ginger Rogers, tremendous screen presence aside, has only a couple of scenes and is pretty much wasted again, though she inexplicably gets to sing some bars of "We're in the Money" in Pig Latin and extreme close-up.
A film center in my home city of Chicago is having a Busby Berkeley retrospective, so I've been able to see these two early thirties movies in sequence and note how the art form of musical comedy evolved from one film to the next. "42nd Street" was like musical comedy without the music or the comedy. "Gold Diggers of 1933" adds the comedy, but still struggles with what to do with the music. "Gold Diggers of 1935" is up next, and we'll see what Berkeley and company have learned along the way.
Grade: B+
Present again are the elaborate and bizarre choreographic creations of Busby Berkeley, designed to showcase lots of female skin. Particularly nonsensical is the "Pettin' in the Park" number that ends (I'm not kidding) with Dick Powell using a can opener on Ruby Keeler. And get a load of those costumes in the "We're in the Money" number; those strategically placed quarters would never have gotten past the censors had this been released post-code. Overall, it's obvious that the filmmakers were still more used to vaudeville than musical comedy, as the film pretty much stops to allow time for some disjointed musical numbers rather than incorporating them into the action.
The aforementioned Powell and Keeler are about as bland as they were in "42nd Street," though Keeler is much more palatable without the saccharine, cavity-inducing personality she was asked to don in the earlier movie. And thank God she isn't given more than a few minutes to dance, since she's got the grace of a truck driver.
The biggest assets to this film are Joan Blondell, spicy and sexy, and Aline MacMahon, who plays the role Rosalind Russell would be playing if she were in this movie. Ginger Rogers, tremendous screen presence aside, has only a couple of scenes and is pretty much wasted again, though she inexplicably gets to sing some bars of "We're in the Money" in Pig Latin and extreme close-up.
A film center in my home city of Chicago is having a Busby Berkeley retrospective, so I've been able to see these two early thirties movies in sequence and note how the art form of musical comedy evolved from one film to the next. "42nd Street" was like musical comedy without the music or the comedy. "Gold Diggers of 1933" adds the comedy, but still struggles with what to do with the music. "Gold Diggers of 1935" is up next, and we'll see what Berkeley and company have learned along the way.
Grade: B+