Please note: This was screened in Jan 2017
Hollywood’s troubled transition from silent to talking pictures at the end of the 1920s provided the inspiration for perhaps the greatest of all musicals - one that beautifully evokes the pure excitement and pleasure of making motion pictures.
For those who don't know, this film is an affectionate parody of the days when sound came to Hollywood in the wake of The Jazz Singer, and every incident wittily referred to in Betty Comden and Adolph Green's screenplay actually happened. For those who do know, Singin' in the Rain is the supreme original - it wasn't originally a book, and the subsequent stage show was inspired by the film rather than the other way around. It is a unique work of art crafted for the screen by a studio (MGM) at the height of its energy and ambitions.
Never, in the whole history of American cinema, has such a collection of talents come together at the peak of their abilities to generate such an enjoyable and clever movie. Gene Kelly’s (co-director with Stanley Donen) joyous rendition of the title song stands as a lasting tribute to the star and remains an iconic cinema moment. In all these years not a frame of it has dated. It still retains all its freshness and sparkle. And there’s so much more to savour here too beyond those well known sequences. All of which makes Singin' in the Rain probably the most treasured musical in the history of cinema. And certainly well worth braving the weather for.