A weekend spent watching film classics which I'd never seen before. First up --
Good, but a tad overlong for my taste. I had to pause for two naps during this one.
A really good movie with an excellent ensemble cast.
Wow! Absolutely my favorite of the bunch. A movie which draws you into its own little world from the very first frame. I think the problem with a lot of film musical comedies is that they always try to establish the plot and characters first like any other movie would, then they shift gears when some one breaks out into a song and dance number. Here, right in the opening sequence, before a word is even spoken, the characters effortlessly build up into a joyously vibrant dance just for the heck of it. Thus, the film establishes that's the kind of world this is going to be and so the viewer accepts that as the ground rules. There is a youthful energy throughout the film which is aided by some excellent set & costume designs and Jacques Demy's masterful camerawork. For a 50 year old film, this still looks very fresh today. The story is almost like a Shakespeare comedy of perfectly matched lovers always looking for, but just falling short of meeting, one another. The best known melody from the film would become "You Must Believe In Spring", although those lyrics have absolutely no relation to the lyrics used in the film.