I can hang on a lamppost too!

"An oldie but a goodie"

We watched "Singing in the Rain". For those of you like me, its a musical created in the 1950s based on the 1920s. The main theme is about the movie business in the wake of the shift from silent films to sound. The main actor is Gene Kelly, sweet name. Gene is a BIG POPULAR silent film actor, Don Lockwood who is slowly able to make the shift to sound, while his on-screen love, off-screen nuisance, Lina Lamont (Debbie Reynolds) is having a lot of trouble making the transition to sound. Kathy is the female protagonist who is a dancer trying to make it big on the theater stage, who becomes a big role in the film.

Enough of background, lets get into the movie. Being a musical it is extremely cheesey throughout, but what musical isn't?! The main feature in all musicals is of course the sound. The sound was pretty great throughout the film, and i did not notice a spot where there was a mess-up. There were scenes where the tap-dancers would be dancing and the tapping noise would have to be pre-recorded because it would be impossible to catch the sound of the taps in the middle of the acting and singing. The songs and dances were creative and fun to watch (entertaining!). Of course the infamous "singing in the rain" scene was amazing to say the least. The creation of a street so that the water will pool in one spot so that Gene may jump into the puddle in the middle of his dance scene is pretty big attention to detail. Also, being told that the street was created at a half circle around the camera is pretty impressive, because i did not notice that it was curved throughout the entire dance number.

Let's begin to speak about the breakthrough from silent to sound. As portrayed in the movie of course!
Kathy's line "if you have scene one, you have seen them all" is perfect. The whole scene where she bashes the silent movie business and actors is actually exactly what i would think (but never say to someone especially if they were a silent film star). Films from that period of time were all just changing an expression on their face, and having words go on the screen, BORING! Sound though, wow. i like sound. It was a huge innovation, the scene with the man showcasing the new type of film where he is speaking to the party, and the woman says "come out from behind the screen!" I think it shows how shocking it was for people who had never heard a film. The sound did make silent films look completely obsolete, and also pretty dull.

The movie as a whole was pretty good, i am not a big fan of musicals, but it did keep me interested for the most part.
Milk in the rain? That is innovative for that time, but come on... i dont want half and half raining on me.