A Classic Film Interlude

Today I put on That's Entertainment to watch while I sorted clothes and folded laundry. I love That's Entertainment for both its collection of clips from MGM musicals and its 1974-set framing narrative. It was made at the perfect time - the studio era was effectively over, as illustrated by the general disrepair of MGM's backlot in the narrator scenes, but that era was still recent enough that stars like Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire were still around to act as the film's tour guides. The numbers chosen for That's Entertainment - Astaire's coatrack dance from Royal Wedding, the cast-of-hundreds numbers choreographed by Busby Berkeley, the selections from Esther Williams' water-based musicals - somehow make today's movies feel so flat and unimaginative. Sure, you can create whole worlds with a computer, but the tactile realities of old-school song and dance just feel more impressive to me.

"Good Morning" doesn't appear in That's Entertainment - it's in the sequel - but it still illustrates what to me is so unique and essential about classic musicals. The quality of the dance is simply unmatched today; you can see the hard work involved in making it appear easy. To me, the moment at the end when all three come up and over the couch in perfect unison is transcendent.

Speaking of classic film, a few days ago I made a film-related impulse purchase on Etsy. Definitely excited to share once it arrives...