Customer Reviews

Rosalie [VHS]

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If you like musicals and are Young at Heart, you will fall in love with the beautiful Eleanor Powell and be mesmerized by her athletic prowess. Throw in Cole Porter's elegant, rhythmic music and you're hooked. Forget a complicated plot; if that's what you seek, find a Russian play. For the gals, there's that handsome baritone, the inimitable Nelson Eddy. You cannot lose.

"Rosalie" is among the best, most uplifting of Ms. Powell's movies. She was a lush, radiant 25 when she made this movie and a consummate athlete in peak form and probably the best female tap dancer of all time. After God made her, He threw away the mold. (See her ballet -- of sorts -- in Broadway Melody of 1936;
Double WOW.) Normally I oppose cloning humans; for her, I'd make an exception.

West Point Footbal Hero Dick Thorpe falls in love with a pretty Vassar girl who is secretly a princess (Eleanor Powell)in the tiny Baltic kingdom of Romanza. Her evil mum wants a forced marriage for her to a semi-royal who is not in love with Rosalie.
Thorpe, not knowing this, serenades her, flys to meet her in Romanza only to find she is now betrothed to another. Love wins out, of course and there's GREAT dancing and music, and I DO mean great. Yes, there's corn and her father-king is more than a little batty, but that's a small price to pay for the best dancing legs you'll ever see. Sinatra was right!

The ONLY question to ask is WHY this is not in DVD. Can we picket Turner?

"Rosalie" is a shimmering escapist movie that glistens - even in black and white. Production numbers are exceptional, with reminders throughout the story of a fantasy decade of lacy satins, patent leather buckled tap shoes, and gossamer nights.

No magical chemistry here between the lead players, as in MacDonald/Eddy films before and after, but a very pleasant 1930s love story between a West Point football hero, Dick Thorpe (Nelson Eddy) and an incognito Princess attending Vassar, Rosalie (Eleanor Powell).

The harmonious blending of Nelson's distinctive voice and Eleanor's brilliant dancing is what makes this movie succeed. Cole Porter's music doesn't hurt, either. The story line has the two falling in love after the big Army/Navy football game, where Thorpe scores as gridiron hero but wants to score with Rosalie. He has no clue she is a princess in the kingdom of Romanza, a tiny hamlet in Eastern Europe. Rosalie has fun teasing him along and she invites him to her country's springtime celebration. He accepts and trouble starts.

The Queen, Edna May Oliver, disputes Thorpe's interest in Rosalie, having decided on a royal marriage for her daughter. The King, Ralph Morgan, is his usual scatter-brained self, (as in Oz) not entirely in charge of any situation. Those two playing Rosalie's parents is a stretch, they could have easily been her grandparents. But in '30s movie history, all parents looked like grandparents, a sign of that culture.

Also of that culture, the "Hail Good Fellow" mentality does no harm to this well-
worn theme of rich girl/poor boy. Eleanor's uncommon kind of beauty - enhanced
with a curt speaking voice and eyes twinkling throughout as if withholding a secret - matches well with Nelson's out-of-doors but drawing-room smooth, atypical
good looks. No manifest intimacy between the two, but hey...it is only a movie,
after all, and definitely worth seeing...at least once.

This is a typical Hollywood remake of a 1928 Broadway musical. They threw out the original score, some of the dialog, and got a new score from Cole Porter. The original was a Romberg Operetta with ballet which had a decent run. The Hollywood version was a hit with the new jazzy score and services of the new star Elenor Powell, and the slightly wooden Nelson Eddy. The secondary characters are all excellent with Ray Bolger, Edna May Oliver, Frank Morgan, Clay Clement and others. Of the original cast only Frank Morgan and Clay Clement survive in the Hollywood version.

The country of Romanza is supposedly located in the Balkans, but the costuming does not resemble any Balkan costumes that I have seen. They are a fun pastiche of Russian, Hungarian, Tirolean, and generic Gypsy costumes. The large dance sequences feature music stolen from various composers including Borodin. The mixture is unbelievable, but lots of fun.

Those were the days when black & white could be used to great effect. The movie sparkles. This was exactly what the public needed during the great depression and Hollywood dished it out liberally. The transfer to VHS is low noise with good resolution. On hopes that they will use the sophisticated software now available to remove the dirt and scratches when they transfer the film to DVD.

One wonders what the original Broadway score was like, as it featured Romberg and P.G. Woodehouse as well as the Gershwins.

Take a corny overblown plot between a Ruritanian princess (VERY American Eleanor Powell) and a Westpoint cadet and football hero (mature, stout Nelson Eddy), add some comic support (rubber legged Ray Bolger as Eddy's best friend, goofy Frank Morgan as the king and pompous Edna May Oliver as his wife), toss in some overproduced but mind numbing production numbers with the Albertina Rasch dancers and you have the recipe for an MGM showcase musical. While it is overlong in typical MGM style, it is superbly produced with first class lighting, editing and staging. The individual merits are Eddy's marvellous voice, Powell's scintillating dances and, above all else, a couple of outstanding Cole Porter songs ("In the Still of the Night", "There's a Strange New Rythm in my Heart" and the title song).

Powell and Eddy make an odd team. While Eddy is miscast, he is smooth, sophisticated and better than the dumb part deserves but Powell was no actress and tended to grin her roles, twinkling knowingly to the audience. Knowing how good a dancer she was, one awaits eagerly her next number. When she taps down a series of giant drums to the the title song, it justifies sitting through the tedious dialogue although the fast forward button is always at hand. Comedian Billy Gilbert appears too and it is typical of MGM that his "schtick" is much too drawn out,thereby removing the humour and making him merely irritating. Everything is so overdone and heavy handed. The film was also a launch for the Hungarian actress Ilona Massey. Massey looks great but her accent is thick and the part so thankless that she makes no particular impresssion. She has one number too and some of the lyrics are unintelligible.

The Warner's Archive collection are very expensive single disk DVDs straight from the Warner Brothers archives which means unrestored prints with no extras except maybe an original theatrical trailer. In this case, the print of "Rosalie" is good and the original theatrical trailer is included.

I was very disappointed with the black and white expensive DVD. I was expecting similar quality to some of the musicals with Nelson Eddie and Jeanette Macdonald. Nelson's voice was great but the combination of tap dancing with only Nelson singing fell flat on its face. I guess we can't always give rave reviews. Eleanor is a fine tap dancer but her interaction with Nelson left a lot to be desired.

There is not much plot to this 1937 musical, but Eleanor Powell proved why she was the greatest female tap dancer ever (even better than the great Ann Miller, which is saying quite a lot). The Cole Porter songs are great, Nelson Eddy is in fine voice, and the future Wizard of Oz (Frank Morgan) and Scarecrow (Ray Bolger) have plenty of fine moments, including a brief "a capella" tap solo by the latter.

This is a Warner Archives DVD download, which has the same issues as the last title I reviewed - no extras save for the trailer and Warner Archives promo, no scene selection menu, and the chapter breaks are not always in the right places (sometimes in the middle of a number). It did play in my DVD recorder/player, but only after I ran it through my backup portable DVD player.

Overall, a good purchase.

The biggest minus of this product is: no subtitles.

The movie itself:
well, it isn't the musical in the movie history, also not the best dancing of Eleanor Powell. "Born to Dance" was much more enjoable.
Otherwise, the art decors of the drum dance scenes and the background decors are amazing and choreagraphy are good. The Set building was one of the biggest in their time.

The singer and the songs: of course, Nelson Eddy has a great singing voice. Eleanor Powell singing was dubbed once again by Marjorie Lane like in "Born to dance". Chemiestry between both? The most people say no.
The songs, I think, was more infamous one of Cole Porter.

Frank Morgan is enjoyable like everytime also Edna May Oliver as Queen (best memorable in "Pride and Prejudice") and also Tommy Bond is great ("Our Gang"-Member and later Jimmie Olsen in the first 2 Superman movies).

A big plus: the picture quality for a not restored/remastered movie is really great.

A big minus: Warner should stop to bring out those great movies not restored without any subtitles etc.

FAZIT: good to have it, but better would be restored, etc. The movies are worth to get it in the best quality and to save it for the coming 50 or 100 years.

This movie begs ti be transferred on DVD! If Warner doesnt want to re-release her movies as singles at least give us a best of Eleanor Powell on DVD!

Hello
There is a problem on this dvd
It stopped after 20 minutes
Can you send me an other one please
Thanks so much
ERIC WAROUX
8 IMPASSE DE LA CROIX
17390 LA TREMBLADE
FRANCE