Swing Time | Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers

Swing Time | Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers | A lovely film

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Swing Time

	Swing Time Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers Turner Home Ent, 1999 average customer review:based on 49 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

The Best Film Ever Made

If you only watch one Fred Astaire & Ginger Rogers musical this should be the one. There has long been a debate over which film is their best: Swing Time or Top Hat. In my opinion, Swing Time definitely takes this honor, number two being Top Hat, followed by The Gay Divorcee. All of their films together are excellent, but Swing Time is set apart because it takes a much more realistic look at love and life. This film handles the love affair between Astaire and Rogers' characters in a way that none of the other films did. The romance is touching, sweet, charming - and believable!

The songs are amazing, including "Pick Yourself Up", "The Waltz In Swing Time", "A Fine Romance", "Never Gonna Dance", and "The Way You Look Tonight", which is the greatest love song ever written. The scene where Astaire sings this to Rogers is not to be missed. His reaction to her touch - in this scene, as well as in the "Fine Romance" scene - is priceless. Watch for another not-to-be-missed moment, also in the "Fine Romance" scene, as Rogers uses every feminine trick in the book to try to get Astaire to respond.

Although this goes without saying, the dancing in "Swing Time" is superb. I hardly know words that are sufficient to describe the beauty that is the bittersweet dance number "Never Gonna Dance". The emotion in this scene is phenomenal. It is absolutely exquisite. If Fred & Ginger had, indeed, never danced - before or after - to any other number, this alone would have made them famous. It is the most beautiful dance ever recorded in motion picture history. Every time I re-watch this film, I'm always caught off guard by the sheer beauty of this one scene. For this reason alone, "Swing Time" is definitely a "must see" film.

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A lovely film

Swing time did quite badly at the box office in it's time, I don't quite understand that, Top Hat is always the more favoured film and yet, for me, the couple do what they do best at it's best in this film. The plot is just a touch more believable too and the trademark humourous support cast don't have quite so much to do. There is more emotive acting work to do here, to make the plot work, Ginger seems to particualrly honing her craft in this feild (little wonder she won an Oscar four years later!)
The dance numbers are staggering and more daring, "Pick Yourself Up" is so athletic and skilled it is a joy to watch, "The Walse in Swing Time" is half their trademark ballroom number and half a stunningly fresh approach. "Never gonna Dance" is quite simply sublime, elegant, emotive, powerful and beautiful. It really demonstrates the power of dance in motion picture form. I saw an interview with one of the writers many years ago who told the story of how the end sequence of this dance, when Fred and Ginger reach the top of the stairs, took at least 40 something takes to get right because a range of problems, lights blowing out, mistimed spins and even Fred's toupee flying off! He talked of how he saw Ginger changing her pink satin pumps after the 36th take and only then realised the pumps were white, stained pink because her feet were bleeding so much! A classic film and a must see if just for this last dance number, I defy you not feel moved by that number!

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One of the Greatest Musicals of All Time

This film, along with Singing in the Rain and Oliver!, is one of the greatest movie musicals I've ever seen. The film has the perfect blend of music, dancing and comedy I expect when watching a musical. In most musicals, there's usually one or two musical sequences that don't fit or don't match the rest of the material. Not in Swing Time. Altogether there are six musical sequences that are pure genius. The two finest of these are the final two: Bojangles of Harlem, which has Astaire dancing a musical tribute to one of the finest black entertainers of the all time, Bill Bojangles Robinson. This dance number goes right along side Gene Kelly's Singing in the Rain as the finest solo dance number in film history. Lastly, there's the final dance number between Astaire and Rogers, Never Gonna Dance. In my humble opinion, it's the best dancing they ever did together and an unusually touching moment in a film which is loaded with very good comedy. If you like music or dancing and you haven't seen this film, you need to place it as your top priority of films to see.

Also, it's a crime this movie isn't available yet on DVD. What are they waiting for?

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They sing too!

The finest of the nine Rodgers-Astair movies made. That makes the popular dance numbers in Swing Time the best ever filmed. The plot as usual, is dross, a waste of time waiting for the next dance number.
Ginger Rodgers was also a fine actress as her career A.F. proved. She also had to learn all the dance backwards since Fred always lead.
Astair has said that he was indebted to & most admired Bill "Mr. Bojangles" Robinson. He honored him with "Bojangles in Harlem" done in blackface. Astair's treatment was not at all offensive.
A real bonus was the songs written by Jerome Kern. "The Way You Look" & "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off" showed that Rodgers & Astair were more than just dancers. Indeed Astair was quite a taskmaster, demanding (& getting) perfection. No cutways, no editing of a sequence, the numbers are done straight through & the camera never blinks. They had style they had grace.

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Not a fan of dance or musicals, but.....

I can count on one hand the number of musicals and/or dance films I've truly enjoyed. "Swing Time" almost runs me out of fingers, however. It takes awhile to really get up a head of steam, even still; the plot is as thin as a silk scarf in the early part of the film, but I defy anyone to not have a great time with the second half of the picture. The remarkable Bojangles dance number is too right for words, and the talents of director George Stevens were just right for the non-musical moments; Fred & Ginger's first kiss in this film, for example, is staged and played out perfectly. Lots of fun, lots of laughs, and excellent music, without those phony Hollywood musical "why are they singing?!" moments. It works!

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