I am rating 'Sun Valley Serenade' 7 stars because of the fantastic music and the excellent choreography. The Glenn Miller Orchestra playing the 'Chattanooga Choo Choo' is particularly impressive, especially the part with Dorothy Dandridge and the Nicholas Brothers singing and dancing. This is already reason enough to watch the film. Unfortunately the acting and the quality of the plot drag the picture down. The plot is thin and in part plainly weird. It concerns a jazz band adopting a Norwegian refugee as a publicity stunt (adopting a refugee is of course a good thing, but doing so merely to get a better press sounds pretty dubious to me). When the refugee turns out not to be a small child but a young woman (Sonia Henie), the band leader (John Payne) reacts as ungraciously as possible, Still, for reasons that remain a mystery the girl immediately decides she is going to marry him, tells him so, and sets about wrecking his relationship with his girl friend (Lynn Bari) in the most obnoxious, manipulative manner imaginable. Some minor complications ensue. In the end, the character played by Bari ditches the band leader, who decides (for reasons that remain a mystery) that he suddenly loves the Norwegian girl and wants to marry her. Henie was of course far better at winter sports than at acting; here, her smile is so fixed that it looks frozen. I would describe the overall impression she leaves as sickly cute. The others are better, but the only memorable character is Milton Berle, who playes the band manager. In sum: Music and choreography 10 stars, plot 4 and acting 5. This gives you an average of between 6 and 7 stars, so let's settle on 7 (there are some nice shots of wintry landscapes).
Review of Sun Valley Serenade
