Gold Diggers of 1933

Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933)

Runtime: 98 minutes

Directed by: Mervyn LeRoy

Starring: Warren William, Joan Blondell, Aline MacMahon, Ruby Keeler, Dick Powell

From: Warner Bros

Yes, I have finally returned. For the foreseeable future I'll post here more often than not. In the Letterboxd review below I explain why I picked this particular motion picture:

Last night I realized I needed a change of pace from what I had been watching the past several weeks, so the remedy being a Busby Berkeley musical sounded like a pretty good tonic to me. I am a nerd so I had heard of the Gold Diggers series of films from way back when, but this is the first one that I had ever seen.

The plot isn't too complex: The Great Depression has hit the theatre industry pretty hard and chorus girls for big Broadway shows are suffering. Suddenly, a well-regarded director comes up with the idea to do a production about the Depression, and one of the gaggle of chorus girls you follow happens to have a boyfriend that keeps his past a secret but he does write and sing quality music, so he's hired. His past comes back to haunt him, but it's not anything serious or is impossible to fix... this is light fluffy escapist entertainment.

In this day and age the story may appear to be full of cliché and antiquated ideas. Yet I was fine with that as I was still entertained by the cast and the characters, from the dames (Ruby Keeler, Ginger Rogers, Joan Blondell, and Aline MacMahon, an entertainer I had never heard of before but she was great as the most sarcastic of the bunch) to the guys (Dick Powell, Warren William, Guy Kibbee, etc.), and there is great dialogue all around. Also, as this was still Pre-Code, there were plenty of risque moments; after all, one of the musical numbers was to a song called Petting in the Park, and it is the “heavy petting” sort of thing.

As I stated already this movie's world (and real life) was The Great Depression and it's a key part of the film, the contrast between the poor and the rich, who aren't portrayed in the highest light, at least at first. It should be no surprise that the first musical number happens right away and it's We're in the Money, a song many have heard but likely only few know is from this motion picture. All four of the numbers done by Berkeley are excellent, whether it's the music or the choreography of those elaborate movements, all done with the bulky cameras of the time. As it entertained those people who desperately wanted to forget about their real life struggles and want to live vicariously through these people, it can entertain people today due to it's humor, music, and fancy stage productions.