Singin' in the Rain

"Why don't you?" "What?" "Make a musical!" Talkies changeover at Monumental Pictures, thus cinema's most sustained blast of euphoria. Gene Kelly essays Baudelaire's saltimbanque-poète, the suave matinee idol is deep down a vaudeville tumbler, "dignity, always dignity" is the hambone's motto but the smart-alecky camera knows better. Hollywood here is a grand confectionery system, a factory of images suddenly having to deal with sounds like the cheese-grater voice of the bombshell starlet (Jean Hagen). The newcomer (Debbie Reynolds) pretends to be unimpressed with showbiz and bursts out of a cake at an industry party, her honeyed vocals turn The Duelling Cavalier into The Dancing Cavalier. Vain thespians, fawning gossips, worrywart producers, apoplectic directors—the whole Tinseltown megillah, fondly roasted. "Meet the greatest actor in the world. I'd rather kiss a tarantula!" Arthur Freed's recycled Jazz Age tunes rolled up into Betty Comden and Adolph Green's funniest script, lit up by Kelly and Stanley Donen as a ticklish lesson in mise en scène. (In a vacant studio lot, the scene is set with colored lights, wind machine and painted horizon: "I'm not able to say it without the proper setting.") Art of the pratfall, a philosophy magnificently expressed in Donald O'Connor's comic tornado, his "Make 'Em Laugh" includes a touching ode to Curly Howard. "Good Mornin'" exults in the dawn of inspiration, a choice joke has the prankishly elocutionary "Moses Supposes" segue into the talking bush at the recording session. The camera cranes down to Kelly's rain-spattered grin in the middle of the titular number, and there's no more wondrous illustration of the mighty labors that go into the illusion of effortlessness. "Broadway Melody" is part of a conversation with Minnelli (the rejoinder is The Band Wagon, with Cyd Charisse), Harold Lloyd and Lulu in the neon galaxy. "I can't quite visualize it. I'll have to see it on film first." Cinematography by Harold Rosson. With Millard Mitchell, Rita Moreno, Douglas Fowley, Madge Blake, Jimmy Thompson, and Kathleen Freeman.