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| Eddie Kearns (Charles King) performs the title number. |
Release Date: Feb. 1, 1929. Running Time: 100 minutes. Screenplay: Sarah Y. Mason, Norman Houston, James Gleason. Story: Edmund Goulding. Producer: Irving Thalberg, Lawrence Weingarten. Director: Harry Beaumont.
THE PLOT:
The Mahoney Sisters come to New York, a vaudeville Sister Act composed of Harriet (Bessie Love) and Queenie (Anita Page). Harriet, who goes by "Hank," is determined to make it big, and her fiancee, composer/performer Eddie Kearns (Charles King), gives the duo the opportunity to audition for the latest revue from producer Francis Zanfield (Eddie Kane).
Zanfield offers the blonde Queenie a spot, and agrees to do the same for Hank after Queenie secretly persuades him. Edddie, who has already been startled by Queenie's beauty, observes the exchange and falls for her completely. Queenie feels the same, but her devotion to her sister leads her to retreat... right into a relationship with the boorish Jaques Warriner (Kenneth Thomson), leaving Hank and Eddie desperate to save her from the lout's advances!
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| Eddie falls for Queenie (Anita Page) - his fiancée's sister. |
CHARACTERS:
Eddie Kearns: Though Charles King receives top billing, Eddie is largely a supporting character, with the sisters more prominent throughout. That's a good thing for the film. King's singing is a lot better than his acting, and he doesn't particularly hold the screen. Still, he does earn a few laughs, particularly in a scene when the short-statured Eddie gets into a fistfight with a much larger man. It ends predictably, but once Eddie recovers, he tries to salvage some dignity by pointing out that it took six people to actually throw him out of the room.
Harriet "Hank" Mahoney: Bessie Love was nominated for an Academy Award for her performance, which is easily the movie's best. She's adept at the fast-talking comedy that dominates the movie's first half, whether looking for ways to avoid giving a bellhop a tip or feuding with a sharp-tongued member of Zanfield's troupe. She's equally good in the dramatic moments. A breakdown scene late in the picture is particularly strong, and ends up being one of the few moments to work on any kind of genuine emotional level.
Queenie Mahoney: Initially seems to conform to a "dumb blonde" stereotype, but we gradually see that she is as good at looking after Hank as her sister is of looking after her. She's the one who intercedes with Zanfield to keep both of them in the revue after Hank's quick temper nearly blows the opportunity. Her devotion to her sister is the catalyst for all the apparently self-destructive choices she makes in the course of the story. Anita Page doesn't match Bessie Love's dramatic range, but she is an appealing enough screen presence.
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| The Mahoney Sisters: Hank (Bessie Love) and Queenie. |
THOUGHTS:
The Broadway Melody is a film with some historical significance. The second winner of the Academy Award for Outstanding Picture (Best Picture), it was among the first movie musicals to double as a drama; most previous musicals had essentially been revues, not dissimilar to the Broadway show portrayed in this movie. The film featured a Technicolor sequence in its original release (though only black and white prints survive), which sparked widespread use of color in musicals of the time. It was also, so far as I can determine, the first movie musical to use prerecorded audio for its songs, with actors lip-syncing to the music rather than singing live during recording. The smoothness of the resulting melodies resulted in this becoming common practice thereafter.
Unfortunately, being historically significant isn't the same thing as being good. The Broadway Melody's producers would take no pride in the other thing for which the film is known: Being a mainstay in discussions of "worst Best Picture winners." In the movie's defense, I find it amiable enough. The leads are generally likable, and several of the comedy bits remain funny. It also doesn't overstay its welcome, running a pleasantly brisk 100 minutes.
Still, there isn't much... there. At the time of its release, simply being a complete talking musical, with a couple large-scale production numbers at that, was enough to enthrall moviegoers. Even at the time, however, it received some criticism for its simplistic story, with Mordaunt Hall's review in The New York Times observing that writer Edmund Goulding's story "has not taxed his imagination."
Talkies were still a novelty, and MGM producers had their doubts that their appeal would last. Irving Thalberg assigned Harry Beaumont to direct the film - a director known mainly for his ability to deliver a professional product as quickly and cheaply as possible. This proved to be a good decision, and not just for the movie's profit margin. Beaumont was not intimidated by the use of sound recording equipment, and was willing to experiment with different techniques and make quick decisions as to which worked best - resulting in the choice to prerecord the songs rather than record the sound for them live.
Because of the heavy sound equipment, early talking pictures saw a noticeable technical reversion from silent films. Simply put: The camera doesn't move. Give Beaumont and his production team credit: The shots are generally well-composed, and the scenes cut steadily to different compositions throughout scenes to provide emphasis and to keep the pace up. But the camera itself remains locked in position, with it left to the editing and acting to provide any sense of things building. Oh, and the film features a notable leftover from silent pictures: Major scene changes are established by silent movie-style intertitles, rather than through cinematic establishing shots.
It would be a few years before Busby Berkeley would revitalize the musical genre with his inventive choreography, which means that the musical numbers themselves don't particularly enliven The Broadway Melody. Even the film's biggest number (The Wedding of the Painted Dolls) is shot as if from a particularly good seat in a stage audience, with only a few camera cuts keeping it from being completely static. A further issue is that this sequence, the film's largest, does not in any way revolve around the main characters - a symptom of so many movie musicals being mere revues rather than stories.
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| The movie's big production number: The Wedding of the Painted Dolls. |
OVERALL:
One's tolerance for The Broadway Melody will likely depend on the viewer's individual affinity for cliched "romantic triangle" stories, as the bulk of the movie is concerned with this very basic plot. The leads are likable enough; and while only Bessie Love stands out, the performances rarely dip below a level of basic competence. It is, for the most part, inoffensive fluff. As a viewing experience, it's easy enough to take... But it's also entirely expendable.
Overall Rating: 3/10.
Outstanding Picture - 1927/1928: Wings
Unique and Artistic Picture - 1927/1928: Sunrise
Outstanding Production: 1929/1930: All Quiet on the Western Front
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