I can't believe the reviews referring to this as a charming musical wonderfully sung by JANET GAYNOR and CHARLES FARRELL.
It's possibly the worst attempt at setting music and dance to film that I've ever seen. And on top of a clumsy script, it has EL BRENDEL for comic relief when the whole film is so bad it's hilarious to watch.
You have to have a truly tin ear for music to appreciate what Gaynor and Farrell do to the music. Indeed, their talking voices are so badly recorded that it's a wonder sound movies survived the talkies.
David Butler, the genial director of many a later musical film, fails to bring the musical interludes to life. Of course, part of the fault lies in the tinny soundtrack, but the songs are nothing memorable.
Farrell is a handsome young leading man here but obviously short on talent of any kind. He sounds as though he's reading a script for the first time--and incidentally, Gaynor too is pitifully inadequate both as a singer and an actress. No wonder this film has slipped into such obscurity.
The clichés are endless in the boy meets girl/boy loses girl sort of thing that goes on for an endless running time. The print shown on TCM had a soundtrack muffled by a noisy background obviously unrestored. At any rate, Gaynor sounds like Minnie Mouse most of the time and Farrell's high pitched voice gets no help from the early sound equipment.
Very poor film, worthwhile only as a laughable curiosity.
It's possibly the worst attempt at setting music and dance to film that I've ever seen. And on top of a clumsy script, it has EL BRENDEL for comic relief when the whole film is so bad it's hilarious to watch.
You have to have a truly tin ear for music to appreciate what Gaynor and Farrell do to the music. Indeed, their talking voices are so badly recorded that it's a wonder sound movies survived the talkies.
David Butler, the genial director of many a later musical film, fails to bring the musical interludes to life. Of course, part of the fault lies in the tinny soundtrack, but the songs are nothing memorable.
Farrell is a handsome young leading man here but obviously short on talent of any kind. He sounds as though he's reading a script for the first time--and incidentally, Gaynor too is pitifully inadequate both as a singer and an actress. No wonder this film has slipped into such obscurity.
The clichés are endless in the boy meets girl/boy loses girl sort of thing that goes on for an endless running time. The print shown on TCM had a soundtrack muffled by a noisy background obviously unrestored. At any rate, Gaynor sounds like Minnie Mouse most of the time and Farrell's high pitched voice gets no help from the early sound equipment.
Very poor film, worthwhile only as a laughable curiosity.