Holiday Inn 1942
I was able to pick this movie for a dollar when it became available at Dollar Tree briefly. Starring Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire, winning an Oscar for Best Song for “White Christmas” and getting a 100% fresh rating at Rotten Tomatoes made it an amazing deal. Irving Berlin wrote the music for the movie including “White Christmas,” but later on a movie named White Christmas and also starring Bing Crosby came out making things a little more confusing. This isn’t really a Christmas movie, instead taking place on a series of holidays throughout the year.
For the most part this is a pretty good movie, with Bing Crosby singing and Fred Astaire dancing and a romance with the beautiful and talented Marjorie Reynolds. It is a comedy with some music numbers, so it is easy to watch. Easy to watch except for the Lincoln’s Birthday holiday where Bing Crosby (and the rest of the performers) are in blackface singing the praises of Abraham, including that he “set the darkie free.” Oh my. That part is edited out sometimes, and while it certainly detracts from the movie, maybe also provides some historical context. The movie also features a solo dance by Fred Astaire throwing firecrackers, which is great.
Overall the movie has kind of a low budget feel to it and some stiff acting with two leads who didn’t have leading man looks with some subpar acting. And while “White Christmas” is a great song and I have heard parts of others, most of them don’t stand out. Likewise, Bing Crosby is certainly a talented singer, but isn’t trying that hard sometimes, and Fred Astaire is always very good, but the firecracker dance is the closest anything comes to being iconic and it isn’t even that amazing. Still, there are a lot of great elements at work and the the hotel chain based on the name of this movie is still around today.
The blu-ray version of the movie I bought includes a colorized version of the movie that didn’t look that good, so I only watched it for a few minutes, but I didn’t quite have the settings right on my TV (had to reduce the soap opera effect). It makes for a good comparison of the original and colorized reproduction. There are some extras available only through a pop-up menu that include an interview with Fred Astaire’s daughter. This interview is uncomfortably terrible (rehearsed or scripted, it seems very unnatural) but has some good content including Fred Astaire’s performance of “Puttin’ on the Ritz” where Astaire puts his cane to better effect than the firecrackers.
Written: 30 Jun 2019
Owned on: Blu-ray, Digital